monkers
Shaman
You don't see success without wealth - and that's about the size of all that's wrong with world.
How wealthy?
- Thread starter briantrumpet
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You don't see success without wealth - and that's about the size of all that's wrong with world.
Beebo
Guru
I do think there is a modern problem with people living way beyond their means, which makes them look wealthy but on paper they have nothing. So it skews what we regard as normal living.
There is huge amounts of hidden poverty.
Plus it is very much age related, the table is mainly nonsense unless broken down by age.
Throughout my twenties and thirties I had few assets but a reasonable income. Mortgage debt, credit cards, student loan debt all adds up. Plus the cost of raising children.
You usually start to accrue net assets in your late forties and fifties.
OP
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briantrumpet
Veteran
I think the spread on this poll just shows that the forum is populated mostly by reasonably well-off older people with more bikes than they actually need. I don't think Norman Tebbitt was aiming his 'Get on yer bike' remark at people who'd take 30 minutes deciding which one while drinking a skinny latte.
monkers
Shaman
Wealth is an illusion.
More that 95% of the UK money supply is created by commercial banks. If you are somebody who is wealthy and not contributing to paying off that debt, ie not paying PAYE, then you are somebody who is relying on accruing assets while other people pay for it.
The majority of people have assets where the value is in their home. For older people that value is not what they earnt or paid for it. The value is related to how much debt will be created and repaid by others when it eventually comes to market, because there comes a time that you can't take it with you. Most of the rest of 'wealth' is in pensions.
If you die in debt then that has to be paid off by others, even if that debt is repaid by insurance it is paid off by others. This means that it relies on a system of the collective responsibility of others. The accruement of wealth is seen as ''capitalism'' but its collapse is repaid by socialism, the very thing that capitalists hate. Remove that collective responsibility to repay that failure, and capitalism collapses.
Commercial banks gain extraordinary amounts of money by use of fractional reserve banking - they lend money from current accounts, not just once but multiple times over hoping that a change in economic circumstances doesn't cause a run on the bank. But when it does, we've seen the consequences, and then they rely on the taxpayer to bail them out. Meanwhile fat cheques and bonuses have been paid out to these risk takers without consequence to them.
The economical model is no longer a monetary system that refined bartering. Money itself is the product being bought and sold; that an peoples privacy in the form of their data.
This is passed off as not just an ethical system but an essential system.
More that 95% of the UK money supply is created by commercial banks. If you are somebody who is wealthy and not contributing to paying off that debt, ie not paying PAYE, then you are somebody who is relying on accruing assets while other people pay for it.
The majority of people have assets where the value is in their home. For older people that value is not what they earnt or paid for it. The value is related to how much debt will be created and repaid by others when it eventually comes to market, because there comes a time that you can't take it with you. Most of the rest of 'wealth' is in pensions.
If you die in debt then that has to be paid off by others, even if that debt is repaid by insurance it is paid off by others. This means that it relies on a system of the collective responsibility of others. The accruement of wealth is seen as ''capitalism'' but its collapse is repaid by socialism, the very thing that capitalists hate. Remove that collective responsibility to repay that failure, and capitalism collapses.
Commercial banks gain extraordinary amounts of money by use of fractional reserve banking - they lend money from current accounts, not just once but multiple times over hoping that a change in economic circumstances doesn't cause a run on the bank. But when it does, we've seen the consequences, and then they rely on the taxpayer to bail them out. Meanwhile fat cheques and bonuses have been paid out to these risk takers without consequence to them.
The economical model is no longer a monetary system that refined bartering. Money itself is the product being bought and sold; that an peoples privacy in the form of their data.
This is passed off as not just an ethical system but an essential system.
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Pblakeney
Senior Member
On the other hand, some of us have not earned enough to be in the 40% tax bracket and have received zero inheritance yet end up in domicile 9 just because we’ve lived long enough.
It is a nonsense.
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briantrumpet
Veteran
Quite so re the living long enough, but I don't think that seeing the decile figures is entirely without merit in helping people realise that other people haven't been so fortunate: I suspect you'd find the percentage of people owning their home at age 30 now is waaay lower than it was when we were 30, and that's going to have a long-lasting effect on their capitalisation, as rent will soak up their ability to save, whether that's for a private pension or a house deposit. In the 1980s my monthly rent for a house was £200, and when I got a mortgage, that was £230 pcm, IIRC, and that was paid off in my 40s. Then add in that retirement age could well head towards 70 for those in their 30s, and their financial future looks much less rosy. It's why Rick Chasey hated us, as a generation.
First Aspect
Über Member
I think RC had lot of hate to share out. Including people a decade younger than you. Or anyone really who owned a house he would have been able to afford if he'd been born 5 years or more earlier.
Pblakeney
Senior Member
Yes, but as I have tried to point out before, over inflated house prices are because people keep being willing/able to pay more and more.
Throw in that they are planning on making getting even easier access to even more money and house prices are only going to go up further.
I don't think it is pure coincidence that house prices sky rocketed when they removed the 3x salary cap on mortgages.
PS - I was 33 when I took out my first mortgage for my first property. A small flat.
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briantrumpet
Veteran
...and low interest rates pushed up prices more, as you could suddenly afford a £250k mortage, and how could interest rates ever go up again and catch people with their pants down? (I know we went around this argument several times on CS.)
But I'd still argue if all the decile thing does is to alert the relatively-well-off to how asset-poor a large part of the population is, then it's not without its uses.
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briantrumpet
Veteran
He certainly was an enigma. You can generally get partially inside the head of most people who do a lot of forum posting, whether they are Walter Mittys, trolls, or just vaguely normal, but RC was a strange one - he pretty much unloaded the contents of his head onto CS, but I never worked out what he'd have been like if you met him in a pub (other than short, skinny, and bald).
Pblakeney
Senior Member
It also highlights being asset rich and cash poor. You could be living in a distinctly average £269k house and be penniless.
You'd be in decile 6.
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briantrumpet
Veteran
Indeed, but even your example highlights how poor, in asset terms, the bottom *five* deciles are (that's half the population, unless I'm misunderstanding deciles).
No one measure of personal income/wealth is going to convey a comprehensive picture (especially one that disregards age, location, etc), but I think this one does convey something useful. If you have low income *and* minimal assets, your options are really limited, and financial outlook rather bleak.
Pblakeney
Senior Member
Yes. You could be earning £70k and living in rented accommodation. You'd be decile 3.
As I said from the outset, it is a nonsense.
Psamathe
Über Member
I note that the measure used is based on "per household" and thus a lot would depend on the make-up of that household. A household comprising a couple would often be able to consider a larger mortgage, maybe more saving, maybe 2 cars, etc. which would mean higher numbers (welath from the question)..
Other household makeups having other impacts.
Even small things over a long time can have a big impact eg somebody who after a day at work stops of at the pub for a pint, maybe they also smoke (not in the pub), etc. maybe a restaurant once a week, etc. and the amounts can accumulate over time vs somebody who doesn't.
Ian
Other household makeups having other impacts.
Even small things over a long time can have a big impact eg somebody who after a day at work stops of at the pub for a pint, maybe they also smoke (not in the pub), etc. maybe a restaurant once a week, etc. and the amounts can accumulate over time vs somebody who doesn't.
Ian
OP
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briantrumpet
Veteran
I know that PB and I are cut from similar cloth - I've never earned much (started on about £14k pa on leaving university, as I chose not to climb any greasy polls, and never been over £30k pa), but have consistently still lived on less than I've earned. Old habits, inherited from my wartime parents, of being a tightwad who uses 'stuff' (be it cars or trainers) till it falls apart, and eating cheaply at home, not taking expensive holidays etc all add up over 40 years.
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