Asian immigrants to the US do have higher median current incomes than whites. But the simple laws of arithmetic make multigenerational wealth accumulation a white man’s game since it’s the compounding effects of the lack of taxation over decades and decades.
intercst
Every ethnic group (7 of them) that rank higher than whites, blacks and Hispanics have lower rates of single motherhood, lower rates of incarceration and higher rates of high school and college graduation. West Indies Americans which are indistinguishable in terms of skin color but have low rates of single parent households show similar rates in terms of financial success. The steps to success are simple and seem more cultural, emphasize family, more than anything else.
Sounds like a meager existence. The purpose of financial freedom is to pursue more lofty goals, not coast.
I count five statements that are personal and judgmental.
Why?
You don’t know enough about this person nor is it appropriate to make these statements.
Explain to the board why you know this person’s
and why it’s appropriate to opine on them here?
I don’t see him making any personal claims about your life’s journey, however magnificent or ordinary.
Seems to me that a middle class lifestyle is perfectly aspirational and by not over-consuming he leaves more for others.
And he has dogs. Extra points.
Who are you to judge what a lofty goal is?
I’ve read Intercst’s posts for decades. Why? Because I’ve learned a lot from him. I don’t agree with everything he says, but I admire his ability to set a goal of independence at a young age and actually achieve it. Good for him!
By the way, were you aware that according to the IRS:
“Notices were mailed in February in 125,000 cases targeting wealthy taxpayers who had not filed tax returns since 2017.
These were cases in which the IRS had received third-party information — such as through Forms W-2 and 1099 — indicating that these people received income of more than $400,000 but failed to file a tax return.
The IRS said it believes the total amount of income from these taxpayers is more than $100 billion. At a minimum, the agency expects that hundreds of millions of dollars are owed by these same people in back taxes.”
Would it eliminate the total deficit? Nope, but sure wouldn’t hurt it.
Thankfully, politicians got rid of the auditors who were quailed to go after these taxes, many owed by benevolent multi-millionaires. I bet we saved a bunch of money in auditor’s wages!
And I also bet Intercst pays his fair share of taxes, too. Minimizing the skim, of course. 
I’ve found that the biggest luxury in early retirement isn’t the wealth. It’s the fact that there’s nothing I HAVE to do, and nobody I HAVE to report to. (Obviously, I’m not married)
I’m doing whatever happens to 100% interest me at the time. When I was working, I always had 5 or 6 things I’d rather be doing than sitting in my office or attending a meeting.
And yes. Dogs are great. No matter what you/re doing or where you’re going, the dog is up for it.
Recent story. I was talking to one of my neighbors on Sunday. She’d been rear ended at a stoplight and got whiplash. The car hit her going about 25 mph. She was obviously stressed out by the incident and said to me, “What are you doing to manage the stress from your amputation.”
I said to her, “I’m not stressed. I’m sleeping until noon on most days. If I was still working I’d be stressed.”.
intercst
What is an ethnic group?
Perhaps the most influential and theoretically rich definition of ethnic groups comes from the German sociologist Max Weber. Writing in his landmark work Economy and Society (published posthumously in 1922), Weber defined ethnic groups as human groups that hold a subjective belief in their common descent – arising from physical similarities, shared customs, or collective memories of colonization and migration. Crucially, Weber specified that it does not matter whether an objective blood relationship actually exists. What matters is the belief in it.
This is a radical departure from earlier thinking. Before Weber, most explanations of ethnic distinctiveness pointed to inherited biological traits. Weber shifted the focus inward: the key ingredient for ethnic membership is belief in shared descent, not the descent itself. This subjective dimension of ethnicity became a central fixture of later sociological thinking and opened the door to understanding ethnicity as a social construct rather than a fixed natural category.
Weber went further, arguing that ethnic groups are künstlich – an artificial, socially constructed phenomenon – for three reasons. First, they rest on a subjective belief in shared Gemeinschaft (community). Second, this belief does not create the group; rather, it is the group that produces the belief. Third, group formation is driven by the desire to monopolize power and status. Ethnic identity, for Weber, was therefore not a natural given – it was shaped by social and political forces.
Weber himself acknowledged the concept’s complexity. He once remarked that the whole notion of ethnic groups is so vague and emotionally charged that it might be better to abandon the term entirely – yet he still offered what became one of the most widely cited definitions in the field.
I think if you want to suggest America was and continues to be a collection of white male oligarchs oppressing minorities, it draws my ire. If you want to constantly refer to others that work for a wage as effectively suckers and losers for doing so, I guess it does become somewhat personal.
If I misunderstood the tone or message he is trying to convey, he has my apology. But, it sure sounds like he simply views the world as those that are successful as doing nothing more than taking advantage of others. Some of the most successful people I know are the most generous and live modest lives. They use their financial freedom not to live a life of leisure but work harder at pursuits that interest them and give back to others.
The government is debasing currency and devaluing purchasing power because it no longer taxes the people who have a disproportionately large and growing share of the money. The government has in fact turned our economy into a Monopoly game making it increasingly difficult for hard workers and savers to keep up.
If we don’t go back to taxing the loopholes for trillionaires who pay no taxes on their amasses wealth, and continue to put all of the burden on workers, we are going to devolve into a banana republic at best.
It’s debasing the currency because the decision makers have no financial interest in the consequences of their decisions or if the policies even work. In addition, their own self interest is served promising something to others with someone else’s money.
Venezuela ushered in socialism and taxed the rich as a consequence. It did nothing to stave off the inevitable hyper inflation.
The debt is so large now, taxing at 100% of the top 1% won’t solve the problem. It just gives license to spend even more.
It appears during this discussion you’re saying two things; our government spends irresponsibly and people aren’t disciplined and work hard enough to save, invest, and buy homes.
No one on this board would disagree with the first position, though most would probably allow for significant social services and programs for a stable and progressive society. We could debate forever about how to do that, but cutting our way to solvency, when the results fall on the working class, isn’t sustainable.
And moralizing about people unwilling to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, in the face of decades long macro effects making it more and more difficult for them to do so, does appear, well, insensitive.
I am asking you to define for me where should we draw the line in terms of whom the govt provides support and income. Where would that income threshold be? In addition, what do we then do to combat the resulting inflation further impacting affordability? If you follow it to its end point, it seems to be an economic death spiral. Look at how Covid spending lit asset and related goods and services inflation on fire. It’s not a pull yourself up by your bootstrap argument. It’s that large social safety nets don’t seem to work in perpetuity and stall economic engines. It’s why the saying goes progressive policies actually hold back societal advancement rather than accelerate it.
I’ve never heard that saying, but I do know that functioning governments, regardless of progressive programs, are doomed if we don’t progressively tax the wealthiest people.
In 2020, the US govt decided to give checks out, increasing the debt and deficit, to everybody making $175k a year or less. Even though, the average household earns less than half of that and those impacted by Covid economically were probably 10% of households, we gave out cash to 80% of households. It drove up asset prices and impacted affordability and caused broad based systemic increases in the cost of living.
Now, because of these policies, you want to further increase taxes and reward this fiscal irresponsibility. We already have a highly progressive tax code.
Again, I’ll ask the question. How do you intend to help and whom with home affordability without creating further inflationary harm?
He did not advocate increasing taxes, giving out money or increasing fiscal irresponsibility. Your ideological blinders are…interesting.
Everyone was affected, and responding to a pandemic is what a responsible government does. How it’s done can be argued, but something has to be done, quick. And keeping our economy going, because so many people are staying home, not working, not shopping, could be considered paramount. Partly because that’s where a government gets its taxes.
Taxing the most wealthy citizens very progressively is how we pay for a government that can respond to pandemics, wars, or day to day operations.
If a government doesn’t tax, it won’t have the money to do much, so they print money and drive up inflation.
Decades of lowered taxation on the very wealthy, increased inflation, stagnant wages, and what happens? The burden falls on the working class.
Thus, the working class is unable to afford a home or invest in the stock market. This is no moral weakness of theirs that they chose not to invest.
Result? The extreme wealthy are increasingly getting wealthier, driving up asset prices, and pricing the working class out of these investments, as well as a decent living and retirement.
I never want to reward fiscal irresponsibility. Straw dog argument. I want to see a higher progressive tax code to help pay for a functioning government and help level the playing field.
By making a more level playing field, they will eventually be able to afford more, maybe even a house one day.
Again, explain to me how this works in practice. You raise tax rates and then do what? How are you improving affordability? Are you giving out income and up to what levels? Is the govt going to build homes?
The Gov’t should be building homes rather than giving big tax breaks to local real estate developers. There are a lot of problems that crony capitalism won’t solve.
Where I reside, the city is giving tax breaks to build housing for people at the 40th percentile of the county’s household income, about $82,000/yr. Where is the 40% of the population with an income below that supposed to live?
If developers find that there’s not enough profit in addressing this large unmet market, the city should just end the tax breaks and build housing on its own.
intercst
Can you point to an example where this has worked?
Since the pandemic and the rapid increase in homelessness, voters removed a few conservative talking point artists from office, and the city started pushing more funding towards a half dozen non-profit organizations like this one. There are now fewer tax-breaks for favored insiders.
I suspect that you’re seeing the same in other cities that use science and arithmetic to inform public policy.
Note: Now that they are actually building more housing to serve the low-income market, we’re seeing far fewer people living in tents and sleeping in cars around town. The $17.13/hour state minimum wage helps, too.
intercst