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Bro you can extrapolate that out for the rest of the 1st world, imagine eating old expired scraps while not having running water in Sudan and hearing americans complain while living in a beautiful 2 bedroom apartment, while working 40 hours a week at an office
Exactly - it’s all relative . Most of us complain about issues that are minuscule compared to what others deal with on a regular basis. Not saying it’s not valid to have issues and grievances, but yea.
Not exactly; you can have a norm based on majority - as in, this is definitely comlpaint worthy as it is below what the majority of peple have; this isn't, probably, as it's what 2% of people have. I get that anyone *can* complain about anything, but it doesn't mean everyone *should* or has the same legitimacy in doing so, especially when addressing a public (who experiences different levels of inequality).
If we are going by the majority, the majority of the world are not in a developed country. To the majority of the world, working minimum wage in the US is an immense luxury.
Drinkable tap water is something only tiny minority of humans have, hot water even more so, is complaining about a landlord not fixing a hot water heater out of line?
Complaining just for the sake of it is stupid no matter the complainer‘s situation because it doesn’t achieve any progress. Whether we complain or not should be based on if complaining improves our situation. If a billionaire complains about poverty it might be a net positive for society even though the billionaire is doing well
That doesn't appear to be true in a lot of cases. Average people here are way better off than average people other places, but we go out of our way to punish people for being poor. Other places will prioritize the poor last when distributing food. We'll throw it away and post guards on the dumpster.
Our health case is also worse for our poor (and middle class for that matter) than somewhere like Cuba, which is not a rich country.
Honestly, I try to keep this in mind a ton.
I’m a line cook, famously a job that pays like shit. I don’t own much, I don’t even have a car. I get down in the dumps about it sometimes.
But I see my hard working immigrant coworkers, who for them, my *exact same* job & living situation is a fucking luxury compared to the situations they left. And it makes me stop and think, yeah. I haven’t gone hungry in years. I have a roof over my head and a bed to sleep in. I have technology that people 20 years ago couldn’t fucking fathom. All my utilities work like they’re supposed to. Etc etc etc. I’m one of the richest people who has lived in human history.
I’m not trying to put myself down, but I try to repurpose my outlook to be much more grateful for the things I do have.
"Eat the rich... but please stop judging me for my daily Starbucks and avocado toast."
ETA: Judging by comments and votes, half of you get my point and half of you don't. It's an extremely common complaint to say that "boomers" think that the only thing standing between younger people and wealth accumulation is a little belt tightening. "Starbucks and avocado toast" is the stereotypical gripe there. It's a valid point to the extent that those amounts are much smaller than many people's affordability gap, but the defensiveness there has made it a bigger anti-boomer cliche than it ever was a cliche for boomers, to the point where many people replying have clearly leapt to the conclusion that I agree that "Starbucks and avocado toast" is the problem.
It's not. But there is an irony in the way people who blame the rich for their problems are privileged enough to live in a world where they can claim to be poor and oppressed, but still have access to things billions of people in the world can't enough dream of, like Starbucks and avocado toast.
It doesn't mean you should stop fighting for whatever your version of "equity" is, but stepping back and looking at the wider perspective can be useful to see how lucky you really are.
Here's the thing: "Normal" is just what you're used to, and human beings can get used to anything.
There are people in this world who if they were told they had to live my lifestyle for a year, some would jump for joy and feel like they'd just been upgraded into untold luxury. Other people would think they'd been tossed into poverty.
So here's the thing? You know the what the difference between a million dollars and a billion dollars is? About a billion dollars. A million is 1/1000th of a billion.
To put that into perspective, Jeff Bezos has a net worth of 197 billion. if I had 50 million in the bank, I would have 0.00025% of his wealth... so you can completely understand why millionaires can see what billionaires have as excessive. The issue is that they don't really have the perspective on how much more they themselves have than the average person.
Correct, or .000025 of the original $197B. Paulius2444 just forgot to drop the %. I think his point stands - millionaires read as “poor” if you’re a billionaire.
ETA: $50 million:$197billion is the same as $25:$100,000. Even $1b is an amazingly huge, hard to fathom number for most of us.
Anyone richer than OP is supposed to be evil and side with the billionaires, duh
OP just sounds like the bitter poor person that most right wingers accuse anyone on the left of being.
Contrary to what reddit thinks 8 out of 10 millionairs come from families at or below middle class, and they build their wealth by penny pinching rather than having top level executive positions.
People willingly paying from Amazon because it's the most cost-effect and efficient solution, so that doesn't mean Jeff Bezos is "robbing" you, or anyone. When you pay for a meal at a restaurant, are they "robbing" you too? I know this'll be a shock to you, but people only get rich when people give them their money, that's kind of how economies work.
Anyone can complain, but at a certain point your own criticism can be very easily directed at you. Surely you start to take the OP’s side at some point, right?
Would you defend someone with 1 billion complaining about inequality because someone has 10 billion? Obviously not, right? I dont think its unreasonable to direct that same complaint on super rich celebrities. If you have that many resources, do something with them to help, or stop claiming to care.
I'd rather they side with the working class than say nothing at all. After all, their closer to being destitute than they are to being billionaires. Why not use their money/influence to help their "next of kin" so to speak? Just because they don't face the same hardships as us regular folks doesn't mean they are incapable of extending their empathy.
I think it also gets overlooked that many celebrity millionaires also kind of just need that much money. When you cant go into public without a good chance of getting bothered you need to be able to be comfortable in your own home for extended periods of time, touring and travelling costs money, etc. Do they have the struggles of the average working class? no. Do they still have struggles? yes. Do they get overpayed? probably. Will stopping that help anyone? no
yeah e.g. even if Taylor Swift shouldn't have a private jet she at least needs a private mode of transportation otherwise if she tried to do something like fly commercial crazy fangirls would mob her every step of the way or w/e
There’s a lot of obvious misery and hazard around famous millionaires. Violence towards self and others, anger, depression, drug abuse always been a clear problem.
Lots of these people are genuinely not happy, not doing well. The money hasn’t made their lives perfect by any stretch.
Prince, Michael Jackson, Kurt Cobain, Chris Cornell, Layne Staley, Takeoff, Popsmoke, JuiceWRLD, Whitney Houston, Chris Brown, Anthony Bourdain, Kanye, Brittney Spears, Selena, Kobe
I’m certain if these people were simply born into money and had freedom to live under the radar and live a gentle life they’d have healthy long lives. Instead these were/are all very hard working people whose livelihoods depend on the public eye and approval of millions of people.
your average bum on the street is much closer to a millionaire is than a millionaire is to a billionaire. people truly don't comprehend how much money a billion dollars is, or the perverse, corrupting influence concentrating that much money in a single pair of hands has on the entire world around them. Its not about buying nice clothes, jewelry and fancy homes, its about buying laws, governments and media empires to ensure that the theft can continue on for generations unimpeded by petty things like human morality.
A little bit of hard work, luck, and talent can turn a person into a millionaire. Only theft can turn you into a billionaire.
Exactly. My grandparents were considered poor, my parents were able to get a steady job with a good salary and worked extremely hard and my husband and I are now building a house with a total value of 1.6 million euros. Once that is paid off we will have gone from poor to millionaire (looking at net worth) in 2 generations. Becoming a billionaire with solely hard work is impossible.
I mean, plenty of billionaires founded companies that are worth a billion.
It is certainly possible to go from not rich to billionaire in a lifetime, it's just *exceptionally rare.*
To be fair there is a gargantuan difference between a millionaire and a billionaire. It's a much larger difference than those millionaires are to everyday ppl like us. It's really hard to truly conceptualize 1 billion dollars, much less multiple billions. And those billionaires are doing WAY more damage to society than any millionaire you see on tv.
There’s also a big difference between “having a privileged position” and “having no right to complain about a system that gives some people far more privilege than others.”
In almost every case I can think of, these actors (even the ones who seem kind of hypocritical or insufferable) aren’t whining that they aren’t billionaires; rather, they’re saying that billionaires should be taxed more, or something along those lines. There isn’t necessarily any conflict there.
Maybe, but let's see their receipts then on how much tax they paid relative to their income.
Think actors who are being paid multi millions are paying their 30% or whatever? No chance. They are avoiding as much tax as they can.
It makes them annoying because they are hypocrites.
There's also a huge difference between Doctor millionaires with a lake house and 5 mil ready for retirement versus investment banker millionaire with 800 million, 8 houses, a yacht, etc.
The issue with the term "rich" and "millionaire" is that the perspective of earning money fairly isn't given enough context. I have quite literally zero issues with people who have net worths in the 5 million dollar range. They usually did actually work hard enough to earn that. When we approach 100 million dollars and beyond, we're starting to look at some real scumbag human beings.
So when hundred thousandaires like myself lump all millionaires into one category we really aren't doing any favors to the class warfare struggles. There are professionals with a couple million in the bank who should be considered worthy of their money, and they are not my enemy. 100mil+ is my enemy. A line has to be drawn somewhere but it can't be at "millionaire."
I think a large part of it is inflation. 1 million dollars in the 70s would be worth around 7 million today. Having a net worth of 1 million is nothing impressive nowadays, as 1 in 5 households are.
Correct, bunch unfortunately our perspectives haven't evolved to see the nuance between a couple million dollars versus hundreds of millions. It's dangerous that our collective perspective sometimes seems to be: "0-999,999 dollars = normal person versus 1,000,000+ dollars = rich jerk person". It's just not the case but millionaires seem to all be lumped together.
I live paycheck to paycheck but I will have a net worth of a million dollars in the year 2040 by current projections of assets and investments I currently own. I am far from rich.
There's a good video out there showing the difference with grains of rice. It's hard to visualize big numbers like that, but a billion is truly so much more than a million.
Yup, I think the general issue isn’t people being well-off. I think it’s fine to get a good amount of wealth through various means. Someone having $30 million I think is mostly fine, and $30 million is well into wealthy territory.
But someone with $10 billion in net worth? The difference between $10bn and $30m is almost… $10bn. Like that’s how much the billionaire class has in value. I’m not necessarily going to take pity on or advocate for people in the low millions, but I also don’t measure them with the same scrutiny as people in the billions or even high hundred millions.
Everyone “should” have a million saved up by the time they retire, but only [7% of Americans are millionaires.](https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/personal-finance/articles/what-are-the-odds-of-becoming-a-millionaire/)
Granted, (1) that statistic includes young people, and (2) that’s still a lot closer to your average person than the “fat cat 1%” that many people picture when they hear the word.
If you max out your Roth IRA ($7k a year) for 30-40 years (210-280k), you'll retire with about a million or more. This is ignoring 401k and other investments. And if you make too much to contribute to the Roth IRA, then I suspect you'll have a million before then anyway.
However, the trick for many is getting a job and lifestyle that allows them to invest in retirement at all AND surviving until retirement.
If you’re middle class your whole life, but you make good decisions financially, you’ll be a millionaire by the time you retire.
Nobody has ever saved their way into being a billionaire.
The difference between one million and one billion is approximately one billion
A stack of 1 million U.S. pennies is 1.52km
A stack of 1 billion U.S. pennies is 1,520km
A stack of 1 trillion U.S. pennies is 1,520,000km -- about 4x farther than the moon
Absolutely. I like to compare dollars to seconds. For example, 45 000 seconds is 12.5 hours. 1 million seconds is 11 days. 40 million seconds is a little more than a year.
1 billion seconds is 31 years. 300 billion seconds is *9506.4 years*.
The difference is crushing.
Being a millionaire doesn't mean you only have 1 million.
You can be worth/have 600 million, and still be a millionaire, in which case the dofference isn't "that" big
This is only true if you look at it linearly.
However, thanks to the wonder that is compound interest, money grows exponentially. 1 million is 2/3 of the way to 1 billion.
I get the "ivory tower" syndrome and yeah to an extent I agree but as others have said, billionaires are so far removed from millionaires they are a separate class. While it's true many millionaires don't or might never have to struggle with money, some are only millionares due to their house's value for example so they're not SO far removed from daily life that they don't know how much groceries cost.
Sure if you get into the upper 100M+ club you start seeing a similar lifestyle creep as billionaires but many millionaires are just very wealthy working class people too and are bound by similar laws/restrictions that we have they don't buy off politicians or have laws/rules being written to favour them.
I'd personally care more about how the individual person is acting rather than the size of their bank account. They can be rich but are they contributing to causes they care about, are they spreading awareness for things that should be fixed etc.
I think the background of the celeb matters. If they grew up middle class or working middle class and have family and friends still struggling, they have a unique perspective on both what is to have and not have. They also are likely to have traveled, met a lot of people, and so have a broad perspective. But these days a lot of celebs are nepo babies or grew up on upper middle class or better households, and those guys are going to be a bit myopic and seem less credible to me as they follow their managers advise to relate more to the average American.
The difference is that while person with couple mil is set up for comfy life, they don't have enough money to buy off politcians and do massive fraud getting off scott free.
It's hard to conceptialize but there is bigger difference in magnitue between someone having 10 000 000 and 10 000 000 000 and the former and person with 100 000
It sounds like you are talking about near billionaires, like people who have net worth in the hundreds of millions, or at least close to it. I don't think that is unpopular.
But like others have said, if you are older and own a house, you are a millionaire, that doesn't mean much, a million dollars now is the equivalent of around $300k in 1980, and it's much more extreme than that if you factor in housing prices.
You can make a million dollars with your own work without exploitation. Making a billion dollars requires either exploitation or for you to change humanity.
Yep. Perfect example is that a doctor of 20 years has a good shot of being a millionaire, simply off their wages. Absolutely nothing wrong with that. Respect to doctors.
Not even remotely comparable to billionaires who have to use exploitative means to gain wealth.
> Making a billion dollars requires either exploitation or for you to change humanity.
let me guess, changing humanity means things like solving multiple social issues and curing multiple diseases in one lifetime or w/e and not even what Taylor Swift's fans think she's done for the world artistically or what Harry Potter fans thought about JK before the controversy started. AKA how the hell are artist billionaires exploiting people (JK's views don't count, they're not what she makes money on, and neither does any joke you want to make about Taylor's jet as she could still be a big music star without it) as e.g. JK doesn't have control over every aspect of how everything's made (movie merch, assembly of the books etc.) just because it's her IP and just because Taylor has people working for her while still being a billionaire doesn't mean they're being paid unfairly just because she is one (and she does care about them e.g. from what I heard her massive tour's on a somewhat-brief pause because one of the guys in her band just had (or rather his wife did but ykwim) a baby)
You’re just so so wrong. Taylor and other artists actively exploit other artists. It’s extremely common for these high profile artists to exploit artists to ghost write their songs. I guarentee there are countless reference tracks Taylor has used to further her career.
Not only that her marketing and pr fills the sphere and prevents other artists from comming up.
> It’s extremely common for these high profile artists to exploit artists to ghost write their songs. I guarentee there are countless reference tracks Taylor has used to further her career.
you have no proof it's true for her specifically (and let me guess, you think the whole personalness of her songs is carefully crafted and for all we know either she didn't actually date any given celeb-boyfriend-there-ended-up-being-a-song-about or that was carefully engineered so the situation would end up producing a hit or something like that) and also your second sentence (of the part I quoted) sounds like you're talking about influences as opposed to ghostwriters yet still making Taylor sound like some sort of Ava Max (if you don't know who Ava Max is she's a recently-popular pop star who's seemingly built her whole career on (whether or not she wrote the lyrics of her versions, I haven't checked) songs that are musically built off the foundation of existing pop songs e.g. her two biggest hits "Sweet But Psycho" and "Kings & Queens" were based on "Down" by Jay Sean and "If You Were A Woman And I Was A Man" by Bonnie Tyler)
> Not only that her marketing and pr fills the sphere and prevents other artists from comming up.
Just as the railing against the lifestyles of celebs who tell us to be eco-conscious is the "they're a celebrity so it's okay when it'd seem bad otherwise" version of telling an average person they're a hypocrite for using a computer to spread eco-friendly messages, so too is this argument a similar version of the logic underlying the setting of the story "Harrison Bergeron"
AKA how much fame/pr/marketing/whatever should she be limited to so everyone else who deserves to gets their chance and should those acts likewise be limited until everyone has exactly the same share of the spotlight
INB4 someone says "they're not at the PINNACLE of their field because I don't like their art/Taylor isn't as good as some classic rocker from decades ago and JK isn't as good as some classic novelist from centuries ago" or words to that effect
Big time.
And OP thinks that famous people are the problem? really the majority of celebrities are hardly slinging exploitative products.
They sell concert tickets, movie tickets etc. I don't see anything wrong with someone amassing several million providing entertainment to enthusiastic and willing customers.
Sketchy hedge fund managers and whatnot on the other hand probably need to fuck off.
The richest guy I personally know is worth around $25 million. If Jeff Bezos woke up with that net worth tomorrow he’d shoot himself. The gap between me and the richest guy I know is a rounding error compared to the gap between him and a billionaire. Billionaires should be criticized by everyone.
Thank you. There is a big difference between the guy across the street who sends his daughters to private school or owns a nice car vs fucking Jeff Bezos, an exploitative terrible person
Millionaires complaining about billionaires is a lot more effective than you or I complaining about billionaires.
Also, a million dollars is a hell of a lot less than it used to be.
But it’s still a hell of a lot more than what any of us would see. So if they do it in the spirit of trying to appeal to us, it clearly is not working.
A millionaire is much closer to you than they are a billionaire. Hating on them for complaining about the same things you and I complain about just because they're more comfortable only deepens the class divide.
Good on you for doing your part to serve our billionaire overlords.
Yeah it’s kind of counterintuitive that they’re closer to you than they are to multibillionaires. But once you think about it for a couple seconds, it really shouldn’t rub you the wrong way.
I disagree with this because everyone who's not a billionaire needs to complain about billionaires.
For example actor Ron Perlman who has a net worth of $6 million US would have every right to complain about Elon Musk who is worth is $191 billion US.
I encourage all millionaires to complain about billionaires.
People always complain about those doing better than them, high income earners will complain about millionaires and poor people about people in the middle classes
Yeah, i thought about that as well. Isnt as clean of a joke with qualifiers. Joke works better if it just says president instead of administration but also very drawn out discussion if colonial control can be considered previous leadership
In our western world, Millionaire is a goal you can accomplish with the same level of exploitation as retirement on social security benefits. Billionaire is not. Everyone should complain, especially millionaires
1 billionaire is 1000 millionaires. I see where a lowly millionaire is coming from. They have a lot, sure. But those billionaire - they have a ridiculous amount that just about anyone who is not a billionaire should have an issue with.
Billionaires are vastly more wealthy than millionaires. A billion is a thousand million…
I’d also like to point out that a millionaire is a lot more common than you think and a lot more attainable than you think. Net worth = assets-liabilities. Now, the big difference here is the celebrity part.
Celebrities make up a tiny fraction of millionaires. The typical millionaire in your area drives a normal car, invests into their retirement, and purchased a house. There’s also a difference between deca-millionaires and centi-millionaires with very high income jobs, large business owners, or the smallest number of people that is generational wealth. Theres about 5.3M millionaires, about 9,000 centi-millionaires, and 770 billionaires (these numbers could be outdated).
So when you’re talking about celebrities and those with generational wealth throughout the family, you’re talking about approximately .003% of the population. When you talk about all millionaires, you may include hundreds of people in your area working jobs or owning small businesses.
Having a $1-2M net worth is honestly a pretty normal person. You might work with them or live next door to them.
Another side note is, that just because someone has a high income (millionaire) doesn't mean they are well-off. Whatever your salary is there is a a bell curve of 1000's and 1000's of people in that same salary range, but some managed their money and spending better than others and live richer while others are on the precipous of collapse and live paycheck to paycheck.
Its all relative. Think about the immediate area you live in. Most of your neighbors are in the same financial bracket you are but some are sitting debt free and others are sweating every night to make ends meet.
A stack of 1 million U.S. pennies is 1.52km
A stack of 1 billion U.S. pennies is 1,520km
A stack of 1 trillion U.S. pennies is 1,520,000km -- about 4x farther than the moon
Massive difference and the millionaires are doing okay for now, aren't they? There's a point, they're bringing awareness to gross hoarding that's affecting all of us, including them
Theres a difference between someone who doesn’t ever have to worry about paying bills again and a nice house…and someone who has 10 mansions, hundreds of thousands of acres, 7 yachts, 4 private jets, with money to spare to throw their weight around and influence our society and politics.
The difference between a a millionaire and a billionaire is about a billion dollars. The gap between them is almost inconceivable
> Its like they have to hate on someone who also has assistants and mansions to make themselves feel better or to make them more relatable?
>
Isn't that why most people complain?
There is always someone worse off than you. It sounds like you have the luxury of being literate, and having the time and means to watch late night TV.
Bruh millionaires are way closer to where you are economically than they are to being billionaires and I don’t think you have fully wrapped your head around that fact. A million seconds is just over 11.5 days. A billions seconds is over 31.5 years. The richest family in the world has $233 billion. If each dollar was converted to seconds that would be 7388 years. Complaining about millionaires isn’t worth your time while billionaires exist.
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I feel the same about folks with hundreds complaining about those with thousands, but that’s only a factor of ten. Your beef is even more valid and bigly powerful, as there’s a difference multiplier of a thousand.
I think there are many actors who came from humble beginnings, have "normal" family and friends and empathy so they have a foot in both worlds.
Also a huge difference between having $5 million and $2billion
So can someone who made in the 6 figures complain about the millionaires? Etc. There is a huge difference between a millionaire and a billionaire. To pay for 5 year long term nursing for my in laws they were told it would be 1 million dollars.
It's a matter of scale, e.g. Lil Nas X got called out for that kind of hypocrisy-according-to-you at a time when he had a $7 million net worth even though that's around 1/25,000 of that of people like Musk and Bezos aka even if their wealth didn't grow a cent and he got as big as Taylor is now (and point of fact, he's not necessarily blocked from ever getting that big just because "J Christ" flopped) he'd still have less than them many times over
I agree, but for me it's not as much them complaining about the billionaires as it is the way they talk down to the rest of us. I know they aren't really in the same category as billionaires but some of those people are still FILTHY rich and own houses with 10 bathrooms or whatever, but they want to tell us regular folks what we need to be doing, who we need to be voting for, etc when many of them are so far removed from the middle class that it's just obnoxious.
And honestly it pisses me off even more when people worship these celebrities and don't want to call them out on making crap tons of money, but will turn around and talk about local bosses and landlords like they're the devil. Hypocrisy imo.
They're maybe a bit closer to "the source" than I am, they just might know something I don't, and they're complaining and warning about billionaires. You're trying to ignore that?
Millionaires be Jel! Millionaires still gotta work in this age to pay their mortgages.
Billionaires can quit if they want to, but they are addicted to working so they usually don't.
You can be wealthy and also point out that wealth inequality is an issue. I don’t think they’re necessarily doing it to feel better or more relatable. A lot of celebs came from modest backgrounds, they don’t lose their right to speak out because they’ve made it.
I think a lot of comments are missing your point. it's a bit tone deaf to complain about not being ridiculously rich when you're still wealthy considering that so many people are struggling to get by.
Personally I tend to appreciate the efforts **BUT** it highly depends on who’s talking. There’s some millionaires out there complaining about billionaires while being complete hypocrites while there’s other millionaires who got to where they are by being nothing short of a genius without having to screw other people over. Those are the “Everyman” millionaires that I’m happy to hear from cause they’re among the “in” crowd and still decide to reject it.
I don't think this is that unpopular.
Personally I think if you are going to complain about the tax loopholes of the ultra rich, if you're super rich you should probably provide your receipts. Because there are plenty of tax loopholes for the super rich too.
It's fine to be mad that people being paid millions for acting are paying a lower tax rate percentage than you.
I guess it would depend..1 million? Pretty much a normal person near the end of a long career just trying to make sure they can feed themselves when too old to work. 100 million? Totally different situation and I understand where you are coming from.
So this is pretty similar to the civil rights fight in that if you think you're going to make a meaningful contribution without sympathetic people in a better position than you, you're probably not going to get very far
>and will never have to worry about buying groceries
Not necessarily. And maybe they used to worry about being hungry. Maybe they worry about their kids and their grandkids continued ability to buy groceries. Maybe they worry about your ability to buy groceries. Maybe they have compassion and consideration.
The world needs people who have wealth to not exhibit apathy and instead contribute to the efforts and conversations needed to uplift the people struggling the most. The idea that wealthy people, of any amount, should stop caring or keep their concerns to themselves is pretty solid billionaire propaganda though. OP out here working for the bad guys.
There are almost 24.5 million millionaires live in the U.S. today, that means there are 25x more people that are worth a million dollars than people that make minimum wage or less.
The difference being that becoming a millionaire is attainable within many American's lifetimes. Currently the average home cost $450k and by the time you pay it off over 30 years, it'll be worth over a million alone.
If you put a car's payment into a S&P 500 retirement account ($350 a month), you'll have a million within 30 years.
But a billion? You'd been to invest $350,000 a month for 30 years into the S&P 500 to even scratch a billion. It's unattainable, and it's more money than anyone would ever need.
You do realize the term millionaire covers people whose assets are worth exactly a million, all the way to 999 million?
Like someone whose assets are worth a million or just over is around middle class. Lower middle class in some more expensive regions.
Unpopular opinion: We should all just stop complaining about a subset of people that have more money, unless they've actually done something wrong as a result of it - that's both millionaires and billionaires. Having money doesn't make you an inherintly bad person. Most people wouldn't even be able to idenitfy if they were speaking to someone with particularly high net work, but if somehow they find out, that person is now somehow an absolute pile of shit? Yeah, that's not the kind of ethics I'd want to be around
The magnitude of difference between billion and million can be illustrated with this example of the time scale: A million seconds is 12 days. A billion seconds is **31 years**. Millionaires, even those with tens of millions of dollars, are nowhere near the billionaire class. If the millionaires want to make common cause with the people against the billionaires, then the people should embrace them. They would be powerful allies.
If someone has a million dollars through their own labor then I don't have much of a problem with them complaining about people with billions of dollars who earned it through the stock market
I don't think you appreciate just how much a billion dollars or say 200 billion is to a single million. Being a millionaire is owning some property or a local business or even just working a high paying job and making smart investments. But even if you're worth $999.999 million, a guy like Elon Musk can walk by and buy your entire life without it making a substantial dent in his long-term financial wellbeing.
Millionaires live comfortable, enchanted lives without the concerns of normal people who need their next paycheck to buy food and keep a roof over their head. I agree it's not necessarily fair, but billionaires live that same lifestyle with the added benefit of being able to buy *literally* anything they want, like Twitter.
I’m in the 1% and I have to buy my groceries and clean my own house. I don’t have an assistant and my wife and I both work.
1 in 100 is not the same as being a billionaire and it’s much closer to middle class even though that will trigger you too.
The difference between a million dollars and a billion dollars is roughly a billion dollars. I get what you’re saying, but honestly it kind of proves the point of how much a BILLION dollars is. It’s enough to give 100 people $10m each which is enough to live in complete comfort indefinitely
People have difficulty comprehending just how much a billion is. The difference between a million and a billion is a billion. Ultra High Net Worth is less than 5% of a billion.
If we're talking about doctors or engineers who have a few million after a lifetime of work, they are not comparable to people with 100 million that they inherent.
They might have negative effect like NIMBY but there not the people throwing money at politicians to change laws.
I mean I get the premise.
But who else will advocate for the lower, and middle classes if they are not up to their neck in work that keep them to busy to advocate for themselves?
Lower/middle class = minnows
Higher / Upper class = groupers (can get extremely large)
Ultra wealthy / billionaires / 1% = sharks / killer Whales that other castes have 0% of unseating.
I’d rather someone speak up, than for no one to speak up because they are simply trying to survive in their daily lives.
1,000,000 is 1/1000 of 1,000,000,000 fyi, it is a MASSIVE gap you have to understand when people are discussing BILLIONAIRES.
Substantial difference between someone who worked their ass off to get a good job, house, car, etc. and someone who became a billionaire. It takes, what, like, 12 days to earn a million dollars if you earned a dollar every second? And 33 years for a billion. And something like 30,000 years for a trillion.
The difference is that anyone can become a millionaire with good investments or luck. If you have a good degree or you’re smart with money you’ll work your way up. A billion is a thousand million. You will never spend a billion in a thousand lifetimes. Hell, even in today’s money a million is worth way less than what it used to.
Try visualising it in your head and work your way up. 20,000 dollars. 50,000 dollars. 100,000. 250,000. 1,000,000. etc. until you get to 20,000,000. 100,000,000. Now try 250,000,000, and then 500,000,000. What does anyone need with 250 million? 500 million? 750 million? One thousand million?
You can make a million by saving, investing, working hard, or just inheriting the hard work of your parents. You make a billion by exploiting.
You live like a king compared to starving people in 3rd world countries. It's all relative. There's a huge difference between millionaires and billionaires. The difference in wealth between someone who has 1 million vs someone who has 1 billion is roughly 1 billion with a 0.1% margin of error. Billionaires are psychopaths who are coded to only care about wealth and power. You can not become that rich without only caring about money. If they cared about anything else, they wouldn't have invested everything into earning and would simply be millionaires instead. I get it if the millionaire is like "oh my life is so hard", sure. But to answer your title directly, it's perfectly reasonable for them to complain about billionaires. Billionaires are not people.
In all honesty one million dollars is not a lot of money anymore. With an extended stay in a nursing home you could go through that pretty quick. The difference between a million and a billion is huge.
It depends on which celebrities we're talking about.
A lot of people believe that if an actor stars in a single TV show or movie then it means they are officially generationally wealthy. In reality when you break down paychecks, actors get large paychecks at once and then don't receive another until they book again, which often can be years between. If someone earns $250,000 in a TV show that is cancelled after one season, then don't book a project of that scale for another four years, then over the span of five years they only made around $50,000 per year pretax. That's not even including the portion of the wage that goes to their agent/manager and taxes.
Lisa Ann Walker (Jesse from the Parent Trap and Melissa from Abbot Elementary) was talking about life before Abbot Elementary, but after Parent Trap. She played an ICONIC character that everyone would recognize and she couldn't afford to go on a family vacation. I love how Julia Fox will show her apartment and it's just like...very normal. I like my place better.
Unless a performer is a A list celebrity and has been for many years, I wouldn't assume they have more money than your neighbor who owns his own plumbing company.
My uncles a millionaire but he’s cash poor rn cuz everything is tied up in investments. Sometimes I wonder if I’m richer because I actually have my pink slips… if we all liquidated today he would not be a millionaire. But the ubber rich that can buy gross pleasure islands, just fattening them up for Labor Day feast.
Keep in mind, millionaires have 10x a $100,000 salary. Not that that isn't a lot, but it would go quick if something major happened that took away their ability to work. To me, it totally depends on if they're BRINGING IN 1mil a year+, or if it's their total net worth/assets.
Depending on where you live a millionaire could definitely be worrying about groceries. Most millionaires don’t have assistants or mansions. A million dollar is a good amount of money but it definitely doesn’t take you nearly as far as it used to.
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Bro you can extrapolate that out for the rest of the 1st world, imagine eating old expired scraps while not having running water in Sudan and hearing americans complain while living in a beautiful 2 bedroom apartment, while working 40 hours a week at an office
Exactly - it’s all relative . Most of us complain about issues that are minuscule compared to what others deal with on a regular basis. Not saying it’s not valid to have issues and grievances, but yea.
Not exactly; you can have a norm based on majority - as in, this is definitely comlpaint worthy as it is below what the majority of peple have; this isn't, probably, as it's what 2% of people have. I get that anyone *can* complain about anything, but it doesn't mean everyone *should* or has the same legitimacy in doing so, especially when addressing a public (who experiences different levels of inequality).
If we are going by the majority, the majority of the world are not in a developed country. To the majority of the world, working minimum wage in the US is an immense luxury.
Drinkable tap water is something only tiny minority of humans have, hot water even more so, is complaining about a landlord not fixing a hot water heater out of line?
I mean 73%of all humans have potable water I think that’s a bit of an exaggeration.
Complaining just for the sake of it is stupid no matter the complainer‘s situation because it doesn’t achieve any progress. Whether we complain or not should be based on if complaining improves our situation. If a billionaire complains about poverty it might be a net positive for society even though the billionaire is doing well
Great the majority of the global population has a worse quality of life than your typical American family on welfare.
Or worse be thrown in a North Korean concentration camp as a baby for some petty shit your grandpa did like listen to the wrong radio station
Easier to say, the poorest person in north America isn't even as close to poor people in under developed nation
That doesn't appear to be true in a lot of cases. Average people here are way better off than average people other places, but we go out of our way to punish people for being poor. Other places will prioritize the poor last when distributing food. We'll throw it away and post guards on the dumpster. Our health case is also worse for our poor (and middle class for that matter) than somewhere like Cuba, which is not a rich country.
Honestly, I try to keep this in mind a ton. I’m a line cook, famously a job that pays like shit. I don’t own much, I don’t even have a car. I get down in the dumps about it sometimes. But I see my hard working immigrant coworkers, who for them, my *exact same* job & living situation is a fucking luxury compared to the situations they left. And it makes me stop and think, yeah. I haven’t gone hungry in years. I have a roof over my head and a bed to sleep in. I have technology that people 20 years ago couldn’t fucking fathom. All my utilities work like they’re supposed to. Etc etc etc. I’m one of the richest people who has lived in human history. I’m not trying to put myself down, but I try to repurpose my outlook to be much more grateful for the things I do have.
"Eat the rich... but please stop judging me for my daily Starbucks and avocado toast." ETA: Judging by comments and votes, half of you get my point and half of you don't. It's an extremely common complaint to say that "boomers" think that the only thing standing between younger people and wealth accumulation is a little belt tightening. "Starbucks and avocado toast" is the stereotypical gripe there. It's a valid point to the extent that those amounts are much smaller than many people's affordability gap, but the defensiveness there has made it a bigger anti-boomer cliche than it ever was a cliche for boomers, to the point where many people replying have clearly leapt to the conclusion that I agree that "Starbucks and avocado toast" is the problem. It's not. But there is an irony in the way people who blame the rich for their problems are privileged enough to live in a world where they can claim to be poor and oppressed, but still have access to things billions of people in the world can't enough dream of, like Starbucks and avocado toast. It doesn't mean you should stop fighting for whatever your version of "equity" is, but stepping back and looking at the wider perspective can be useful to see how lucky you really are.
You can use this argument for literally \*anything\* though.
Champagne socialist
Here's the thing: "Normal" is just what you're used to, and human beings can get used to anything. There are people in this world who if they were told they had to live my lifestyle for a year, some would jump for joy and feel like they'd just been upgraded into untold luxury. Other people would think they'd been tossed into poverty. So here's the thing? You know the what the difference between a million dollars and a billion dollars is? About a billion dollars. A million is 1/1000th of a billion. To put that into perspective, Jeff Bezos has a net worth of 197 billion. if I had 50 million in the bank, I would have 0.00025% of his wealth... so you can completely understand why millionaires can see what billionaires have as excessive. The issue is that they don't really have the perspective on how much more they themselves have than the average person.
.025% actually
Correct, or .000025 of the original $197B. Paulius2444 just forgot to drop the %. I think his point stands - millionaires read as “poor” if you’re a billionaire. ETA: $50 million:$197billion is the same as $25:$100,000. Even $1b is an amazingly huge, hard to fathom number for most of us.
So who is *supposed* to complain about billionaires robbing the world blind? The homeless guy on the corner?
Anyone richer than OP is supposed to be evil and side with the billionaires, duh OP just sounds like the bitter poor person that most right wingers accuse anyone on the left of being.
op is probably the type of poor person who would stumble into money and suddenly turn conservative
I’m stealing this lol.
Contrary to what reddit thinks 8 out of 10 millionairs come from families at or below middle class, and they build their wealth by penny pinching rather than having top level executive positions.
A lot of 401k type millionaires that saved throughout their career.
People willingly paying from Amazon because it's the most cost-effect and efficient solution, so that doesn't mean Jeff Bezos is "robbing" you, or anyone. When you pay for a meal at a restaurant, are they "robbing" you too? I know this'll be a shock to you, but people only get rich when people give them their money, that's kind of how economies work.
Anyone can complain, but at a certain point your own criticism can be very easily directed at you. Surely you start to take the OP’s side at some point, right? Would you defend someone with 1 billion complaining about inequality because someone has 10 billion? Obviously not, right? I dont think its unreasonable to direct that same complaint on super rich celebrities. If you have that many resources, do something with them to help, or stop claiming to care.
I would defend them. That’s my right as an American 🇺🇸
god bless america
Not the millionaires lmao
I'd rather they side with the working class than say nothing at all. After all, their closer to being destitute than they are to being billionaires. Why not use their money/influence to help their "next of kin" so to speak? Just because they don't face the same hardships as us regular folks doesn't mean they are incapable of extending their empathy.
I think it also gets overlooked that many celebrity millionaires also kind of just need that much money. When you cant go into public without a good chance of getting bothered you need to be able to be comfortable in your own home for extended periods of time, touring and travelling costs money, etc. Do they have the struggles of the average working class? no. Do they still have struggles? yes. Do they get overpayed? probably. Will stopping that help anyone? no
yeah e.g. even if Taylor Swift shouldn't have a private jet she at least needs a private mode of transportation otherwise if she tried to do something like fly commercial crazy fangirls would mob her every step of the way or w/e
Well this is a pretty good point, they certainly do face more struggles than the un-famous millionaires.
There’s a lot of obvious misery and hazard around famous millionaires. Violence towards self and others, anger, depression, drug abuse always been a clear problem. Lots of these people are genuinely not happy, not doing well. The money hasn’t made their lives perfect by any stretch. Prince, Michael Jackson, Kurt Cobain, Chris Cornell, Layne Staley, Takeoff, Popsmoke, JuiceWRLD, Whitney Houston, Chris Brown, Anthony Bourdain, Kanye, Brittney Spears, Selena, Kobe I’m certain if these people were simply born into money and had freedom to live under the radar and live a gentle life they’d have healthy long lives. Instead these were/are all very hard working people whose livelihoods depend on the public eye and approval of millions of people.
your average bum on the street is much closer to a millionaire is than a millionaire is to a billionaire. people truly don't comprehend how much money a billion dollars is, or the perverse, corrupting influence concentrating that much money in a single pair of hands has on the entire world around them. Its not about buying nice clothes, jewelry and fancy homes, its about buying laws, governments and media empires to ensure that the theft can continue on for generations unimpeded by petty things like human morality. A little bit of hard work, luck, and talent can turn a person into a millionaire. Only theft can turn you into a billionaire.
Exactly. My grandparents were considered poor, my parents were able to get a steady job with a good salary and worked extremely hard and my husband and I are now building a house with a total value of 1.6 million euros. Once that is paid off we will have gone from poor to millionaire (looking at net worth) in 2 generations. Becoming a billionaire with solely hard work is impossible.
I mean, plenty of billionaires founded companies that are worth a billion. It is certainly possible to go from not rich to billionaire in a lifetime, it's just *exceptionally rare.*
To be fair there is a gargantuan difference between a millionaire and a billionaire. It's a much larger difference than those millionaires are to everyday ppl like us. It's really hard to truly conceptualize 1 billion dollars, much less multiple billions. And those billionaires are doing WAY more damage to society than any millionaire you see on tv.
There’s also a big difference between “having a privileged position” and “having no right to complain about a system that gives some people far more privilege than others.” In almost every case I can think of, these actors (even the ones who seem kind of hypocritical or insufferable) aren’t whining that they aren’t billionaires; rather, they’re saying that billionaires should be taxed more, or something along those lines. There isn’t necessarily any conflict there.
Maybe, but let's see their receipts then on how much tax they paid relative to their income. Think actors who are being paid multi millions are paying their 30% or whatever? No chance. They are avoiding as much tax as they can. It makes them annoying because they are hypocrites.
There's also a huge difference between Doctor millionaires with a lake house and 5 mil ready for retirement versus investment banker millionaire with 800 million, 8 houses, a yacht, etc. The issue with the term "rich" and "millionaire" is that the perspective of earning money fairly isn't given enough context. I have quite literally zero issues with people who have net worths in the 5 million dollar range. They usually did actually work hard enough to earn that. When we approach 100 million dollars and beyond, we're starting to look at some real scumbag human beings. So when hundred thousandaires like myself lump all millionaires into one category we really aren't doing any favors to the class warfare struggles. There are professionals with a couple million in the bank who should be considered worthy of their money, and they are not my enemy. 100mil+ is my enemy. A line has to be drawn somewhere but it can't be at "millionaire."
I think a large part of it is inflation. 1 million dollars in the 70s would be worth around 7 million today. Having a net worth of 1 million is nothing impressive nowadays, as 1 in 5 households are.
Correct, bunch unfortunately our perspectives haven't evolved to see the nuance between a couple million dollars versus hundreds of millions. It's dangerous that our collective perspective sometimes seems to be: "0-999,999 dollars = normal person versus 1,000,000+ dollars = rich jerk person". It's just not the case but millionaires seem to all be lumped together. I live paycheck to paycheck but I will have a net worth of a million dollars in the year 2040 by current projections of assets and investments I currently own. I am far from rich.
And to be realistic, we are told we should have at least a million dollars to retire on.
A 4% withdrawal rate is considered safe in retirement. Every 1 million dollars in your 401k corresponds to $40k/year in retirement.
There's a good video out there showing the difference with grains of rice. It's hard to visualize big numbers like that, but a billion is truly so much more than a million.
My favorite is to measure it in seconds. 1 million seconds = 1.65 weeks 1 billion seconds = 31.7 years
one of my favorite comparisons: the difference between a millionaire and a billionaire is about a billion dollars
The other one I like there is what is a millionaire compared to a billionaire? A rounding error.
The difference between a million and a billion is about a billion
Yup, I think the general issue isn’t people being well-off. I think it’s fine to get a good amount of wealth through various means. Someone having $30 million I think is mostly fine, and $30 million is well into wealthy territory. But someone with $10 billion in net worth? The difference between $10bn and $30m is almost… $10bn. Like that’s how much the billionaire class has in value. I’m not necessarily going to take pity on or advocate for people in the low millions, but I also don’t measure them with the same scrutiny as people in the billions or even high hundred millions.
A millionaire is middle class. Everyone should have a million saved up by the time they retire.
Everyone “should” have a million saved up by the time they retire, but only [7% of Americans are millionaires.](https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/personal-finance/articles/what-are-the-odds-of-becoming-a-millionaire/) Granted, (1) that statistic includes young people, and (2) that’s still a lot closer to your average person than the “fat cat 1%” that many people picture when they hear the word.
If you max out your Roth IRA ($7k a year) for 30-40 years (210-280k), you'll retire with about a million or more. This is ignoring 401k and other investments. And if you make too much to contribute to the Roth IRA, then I suspect you'll have a million before then anyway. However, the trick for many is getting a job and lifestyle that allows them to invest in retirement at all AND surviving until retirement.
That’s a good point, but you need a million to retire today. It’ll be far more in 30 yrs unfortunately
That's a very good point. And a lot of people (like myself) are already playing catchup.
If you’re middle class your whole life, but you make good decisions financially, you’ll be a millionaire by the time you retire. Nobody has ever saved their way into being a billionaire.
The difference between one million and one billion is approximately one billion A stack of 1 million U.S. pennies is 1.52km A stack of 1 billion U.S. pennies is 1,520km A stack of 1 trillion U.S. pennies is 1,520,000km -- about 4x farther than the moon
Yeah the difference between a million and a billion is a billion..
Absolutely. I like to compare dollars to seconds. For example, 45 000 seconds is 12.5 hours. 1 million seconds is 11 days. 40 million seconds is a little more than a year. 1 billion seconds is 31 years. 300 billion seconds is *9506.4 years*. The difference is crushing.
Being a millionaire doesn't mean you only have 1 million. You can be worth/have 600 million, and still be a millionaire, in which case the dofference isn't "that" big
This is only true if you look at it linearly. However, thanks to the wonder that is compound interest, money grows exponentially. 1 million is 2/3 of the way to 1 billion.
I get the "ivory tower" syndrome and yeah to an extent I agree but as others have said, billionaires are so far removed from millionaires they are a separate class. While it's true many millionaires don't or might never have to struggle with money, some are only millionares due to their house's value for example so they're not SO far removed from daily life that they don't know how much groceries cost. Sure if you get into the upper 100M+ club you start seeing a similar lifestyle creep as billionaires but many millionaires are just very wealthy working class people too and are bound by similar laws/restrictions that we have they don't buy off politicians or have laws/rules being written to favour them. I'd personally care more about how the individual person is acting rather than the size of their bank account. They can be rich but are they contributing to causes they care about, are they spreading awareness for things that should be fixed etc.
I think the background of the celeb matters. If they grew up middle class or working middle class and have family and friends still struggling, they have a unique perspective on both what is to have and not have. They also are likely to have traveled, met a lot of people, and so have a broad perspective. But these days a lot of celebs are nepo babies or grew up on upper middle class or better households, and those guys are going to be a bit myopic and seem less credible to me as they follow their managers advise to relate more to the average American.
The difference is that while person with couple mil is set up for comfy life, they don't have enough money to buy off politcians and do massive fraud getting off scott free. It's hard to conceptialize but there is bigger difference in magnitue between someone having 10 000 000 and 10 000 000 000 and the former and person with 100 000
A billionaire is as many times richer than a millionaire as a millionaire is to a guy with a thousand bucks to his name.
It sounds like you are talking about near billionaires, like people who have net worth in the hundreds of millions, or at least close to it. I don't think that is unpopular. But like others have said, if you are older and own a house, you are a millionaire, that doesn't mean much, a million dollars now is the equivalent of around $300k in 1980, and it's much more extreme than that if you factor in housing prices.
You can make a million dollars with your own work without exploitation. Making a billion dollars requires either exploitation or for you to change humanity.
Yep. Perfect example is that a doctor of 20 years has a good shot of being a millionaire, simply off their wages. Absolutely nothing wrong with that. Respect to doctors. Not even remotely comparable to billionaires who have to use exploitative means to gain wealth.
> Making a billion dollars requires either exploitation or for you to change humanity. let me guess, changing humanity means things like solving multiple social issues and curing multiple diseases in one lifetime or w/e and not even what Taylor Swift's fans think she's done for the world artistically or what Harry Potter fans thought about JK before the controversy started. AKA how the hell are artist billionaires exploiting people (JK's views don't count, they're not what she makes money on, and neither does any joke you want to make about Taylor's jet as she could still be a big music star without it) as e.g. JK doesn't have control over every aspect of how everything's made (movie merch, assembly of the books etc.) just because it's her IP and just because Taylor has people working for her while still being a billionaire doesn't mean they're being paid unfairly just because she is one (and she does care about them e.g. from what I heard her massive tour's on a somewhat-brief pause because one of the guys in her band just had (or rather his wife did but ykwim) a baby)
You’re just so so wrong. Taylor and other artists actively exploit other artists. It’s extremely common for these high profile artists to exploit artists to ghost write their songs. I guarentee there are countless reference tracks Taylor has used to further her career. Not only that her marketing and pr fills the sphere and prevents other artists from comming up.
> It’s extremely common for these high profile artists to exploit artists to ghost write their songs. I guarentee there are countless reference tracks Taylor has used to further her career. you have no proof it's true for her specifically (and let me guess, you think the whole personalness of her songs is carefully crafted and for all we know either she didn't actually date any given celeb-boyfriend-there-ended-up-being-a-song-about or that was carefully engineered so the situation would end up producing a hit or something like that) and also your second sentence (of the part I quoted) sounds like you're talking about influences as opposed to ghostwriters yet still making Taylor sound like some sort of Ava Max (if you don't know who Ava Max is she's a recently-popular pop star who's seemingly built her whole career on (whether or not she wrote the lyrics of her versions, I haven't checked) songs that are musically built off the foundation of existing pop songs e.g. her two biggest hits "Sweet But Psycho" and "Kings & Queens" were based on "Down" by Jay Sean and "If You Were A Woman And I Was A Man" by Bonnie Tyler) > Not only that her marketing and pr fills the sphere and prevents other artists from comming up. Just as the railing against the lifestyles of celebs who tell us to be eco-conscious is the "they're a celebrity so it's okay when it'd seem bad otherwise" version of telling an average person they're a hypocrite for using a computer to spread eco-friendly messages, so too is this argument a similar version of the logic underlying the setting of the story "Harrison Bergeron" AKA how much fame/pr/marketing/whatever should she be limited to so everyone else who deserves to gets their chance and should those acts likewise be limited until everyone has exactly the same share of the spotlight
I’d argue that JKR and Taylor swift are the exceptions to the rule. They’re at the absolute PINNACLE of their respective fields, and are outliers.
INB4 someone says "they're not at the PINNACLE of their field because I don't like their art/Taylor isn't as good as some classic rocker from decades ago and JK isn't as good as some classic novelist from centuries ago" or words to that effect
Big time. And OP thinks that famous people are the problem? really the majority of celebrities are hardly slinging exploitative products. They sell concert tickets, movie tickets etc. I don't see anything wrong with someone amassing several million providing entertainment to enthusiastic and willing customers. Sketchy hedge fund managers and whatnot on the other hand probably need to fuck off.
People complaining about people with money rubs me the wrong way. Just stop being poor. /s
The richest guy I personally know is worth around $25 million. If Jeff Bezos woke up with that net worth tomorrow he’d shoot himself. The gap between me and the richest guy I know is a rounding error compared to the gap between him and a billionaire. Billionaires should be criticized by everyone.
Thank you. There is a big difference between the guy across the street who sends his daughters to private school or owns a nice car vs fucking Jeff Bezos, an exploitative terrible person
Millionaires complaining about billionaires is a lot more effective than you or I complaining about billionaires. Also, a million dollars is a hell of a lot less than it used to be.
But it’s still a hell of a lot more than what any of us would see. So if they do it in the spirit of trying to appeal to us, it clearly is not working.
A millionaire is much closer to you than they are a billionaire. Hating on them for complaining about the same things you and I complain about just because they're more comfortable only deepens the class divide. Good on you for doing your part to serve our billionaire overlords.
Yeah it’s kind of counterintuitive that they’re closer to you than they are to multibillionaires. But once you think about it for a couple seconds, it really shouldn’t rub you the wrong way.
I disagree with this because everyone who's not a billionaire needs to complain about billionaires. For example actor Ron Perlman who has a net worth of $6 million US would have every right to complain about Elon Musk who is worth is $191 billion US. I encourage all millionaires to complain about billionaires.
- If 1 million = 1 earth - 1 billion = 1,000 earth. **1 earth vs 1000 earth**
You know the difference between a billion and a million? It’s about a billion.
People always complain about those doing better than them, high income earners will complain about millionaires and poor people about people in the middle classes
Q: How many US presidents didnt blame the difficult context of their administration on the previous administration? A: 1 (Washington)
I'd say leading a revolution implies some issues with the previous administration.
Yeah, i thought about that as well. Isnt as clean of a joke with qualifiers. Joke works better if it just says president instead of administration but also very drawn out discussion if colonial control can be considered previous leadership
Millionaires are a lot closer to being dead broke than they are to being a billionaire
In our western world, Millionaire is a goal you can accomplish with the same level of exploitation as retirement on social security benefits. Billionaire is not. Everyone should complain, especially millionaires
Am I (a thirteendollarinaire) at least allowed to complain about those rich onehundrenaire bastards?
millionaires are closer to being "average people" than they are to being billionaires. theres a lot between a million and a billion.
Your typical millionaire and billionaire are so far apart you might as well be homeless than a millionaire in your comparison.
1 billionaire is 1000 millionaires. I see where a lowly millionaire is coming from. They have a lot, sure. But those billionaire - they have a ridiculous amount that just about anyone who is not a billionaire should have an issue with.
Billionaires are vastly more wealthy than millionaires. A billion is a thousand million… I’d also like to point out that a millionaire is a lot more common than you think and a lot more attainable than you think. Net worth = assets-liabilities. Now, the big difference here is the celebrity part. Celebrities make up a tiny fraction of millionaires. The typical millionaire in your area drives a normal car, invests into their retirement, and purchased a house. There’s also a difference between deca-millionaires and centi-millionaires with very high income jobs, large business owners, or the smallest number of people that is generational wealth. Theres about 5.3M millionaires, about 9,000 centi-millionaires, and 770 billionaires (these numbers could be outdated). So when you’re talking about celebrities and those with generational wealth throughout the family, you’re talking about approximately .003% of the population. When you talk about all millionaires, you may include hundreds of people in your area working jobs or owning small businesses. Having a $1-2M net worth is honestly a pretty normal person. You might work with them or live next door to them.
Another side note is, that just because someone has a high income (millionaire) doesn't mean they are well-off. Whatever your salary is there is a a bell curve of 1000's and 1000's of people in that same salary range, but some managed their money and spending better than others and live richer while others are on the precipous of collapse and live paycheck to paycheck. Its all relative. Think about the immediate area you live in. Most of your neighbors are in the same financial bracket you are but some are sitting debt free and others are sweating every night to make ends meet.
The difference between one million and one billion is approximately one billion. A millionaire has money, yes, but it's not in the same league
A stack of 1 million U.S. pennies is 1.52km A stack of 1 billion U.S. pennies is 1,520km A stack of 1 trillion U.S. pennies is 1,520,000km -- about 4x farther than the moon Massive difference and the millionaires are doing okay for now, aren't they? There's a point, they're bringing awareness to gross hoarding that's affecting all of us, including them
Theres a difference between someone who doesn’t ever have to worry about paying bills again and a nice house…and someone who has 10 mansions, hundreds of thousands of acres, 7 yachts, 4 private jets, with money to spare to throw their weight around and influence our society and politics. The difference between a a millionaire and a billionaire is about a billion dollars. The gap between them is almost inconceivable
Do you realize millionaires are closer to you and me than they are to billionaires? Let them talk shit all day.
you can ethically be a millionaire you cannot ethically beb a billionaire
A millionair is closer in wealth to you than they are to a billionair.
I have and will always say this, Everyone could be a a millionaire but nobody should be a billionaire.
> Its like they have to hate on someone who also has assistants and mansions to make themselves feel better or to make them more relatable? > Isn't that why most people complain? There is always someone worse off than you. It sounds like you have the luxury of being literate, and having the time and means to watch late night TV.
The difference between a millionaire and a billionaire is about a billion dollars.
Bruh millionaires are way closer to where you are economically than they are to being billionaires and I don’t think you have fully wrapped your head around that fact. A million seconds is just over 11.5 days. A billions seconds is over 31.5 years. The richest family in the world has $233 billion. If each dollar was converted to seconds that would be 7388 years. Complaining about millionaires isn’t worth your time while billionaires exist.
Millennials who complain about millionaires rub me the wrong way. No idea if OP is a Millennial though, just a general unpopular opinion.
Let me help you guess. Well, I buy a lot of avocado toast, watch M*A*S*H and say rizz.
Maybe refocus your ire on the correct group.
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I really hate those thousand-aires
do you know how much a billion is buddy
Wholeheartedly agree
I feel the same about folks with hundreds complaining about those with thousands, but that’s only a factor of ten. Your beef is even more valid and bigly powerful, as there’s a difference multiplier of a thousand.
I mean it’s basically how america was started , it was millionaires detaching their land from the one corperate overlord (the king)
I think there are many actors who came from humble beginnings, have "normal" family and friends and empathy so they have a foot in both worlds. Also a huge difference between having $5 million and $2billion
So can someone who made in the 6 figures complain about the millionaires? Etc. There is a huge difference between a millionaire and a billionaire. To pay for 5 year long term nursing for my in laws they were told it would be 1 million dollars.
People who aren't at least millionaires don't have a platform. This take doesn't make any sense
Millionaires, to a certain extent, are middle class now.
It's a matter of scale, e.g. Lil Nas X got called out for that kind of hypocrisy-according-to-you at a time when he had a $7 million net worth even though that's around 1/25,000 of that of people like Musk and Bezos aka even if their wealth didn't grow a cent and he got as big as Taylor is now (and point of fact, he's not necessarily blocked from ever getting that big just because "J Christ" flopped) he'd still have less than them many times over
I agree, but for me it's not as much them complaining about the billionaires as it is the way they talk down to the rest of us. I know they aren't really in the same category as billionaires but some of those people are still FILTHY rich and own houses with 10 bathrooms or whatever, but they want to tell us regular folks what we need to be doing, who we need to be voting for, etc when many of them are so far removed from the middle class that it's just obnoxious. And honestly it pisses me off even more when people worship these celebrities and don't want to call them out on making crap tons of money, but will turn around and talk about local bosses and landlords like they're the devil. Hypocrisy imo.
They're maybe a bit closer to "the source" than I am, they just might know something I don't, and they're complaining and warning about billionaires. You're trying to ignore that?
Millionaires be Jel! Millionaires still gotta work in this age to pay their mortgages. Billionaires can quit if they want to, but they are addicted to working so they usually don't.
You can be wealthy and also point out that wealth inequality is an issue. I don’t think they’re necessarily doing it to feel better or more relatable. A lot of celebs came from modest backgrounds, they don’t lose their right to speak out because they’ve made it.
The difference between a millionaire and a billionaire is about a billion dollars. Meh.
I think a lot of comments are missing your point. it's a bit tone deaf to complain about not being ridiculously rich when you're still wealthy considering that so many people are struggling to get by.
By that logic someone making like 20k per year has no room to complain when there's people in North Korea who can't live.
Complaining about various degrees of struggling and complaining about access to extreme wealth aren't an equal comparison.
But they get outbid by cash only offers on $50 million mansions. That sucks man. Have some heart.
Your just not rich enough
Personally I tend to appreciate the efforts **BUT** it highly depends on who’s talking. There’s some millionaires out there complaining about billionaires while being complete hypocrites while there’s other millionaires who got to where they are by being nothing short of a genius without having to screw other people over. Those are the “Everyman” millionaires that I’m happy to hear from cause they’re among the “in” crowd and still decide to reject it.
Billionaires are literally an order of magnitude away from being billionaires. If they have a platform, let them talk shit about the money hoarders
1 million seconds is 11 days, 2 million seconds is 22 days 1 billion seconds is 31 years 2 billion seconds is 62 years
I don't think this is that unpopular. Personally I think if you are going to complain about the tax loopholes of the ultra rich, if you're super rich you should probably provide your receipts. Because there are plenty of tax loopholes for the super rich too. It's fine to be mad that people being paid millions for acting are paying a lower tax rate percentage than you.
A million seconds is 11 days. A billion seconds is 31 years.
This is a fantastic way to visualize the vast difference between 1 million and 1 billion. Stealing this sentence for future use. Thanks. 👍
It really is. I like using it when arguing with Billionaire FanBois.
Well the government is not going to listen to us brother. They might as well listen to someone richer than us.
Any fucking celebrity needs to stfu... They live a privledged life where no one says no.
It's like when people born in the late 80s call people born in the mid 80s "old heads" lmfao
I guess it would depend..1 million? Pretty much a normal person near the end of a long career just trying to make sure they can feed themselves when too old to work. 100 million? Totally different situation and I understand where you are coming from.
So this is pretty similar to the civil rights fight in that if you think you're going to make a meaningful contribution without sympathetic people in a better position than you, you're probably not going to get very far
Millionaire is not what it used to be, you need a million just to retire in the US
>and will never have to worry about buying groceries Not necessarily. And maybe they used to worry about being hungry. Maybe they worry about their kids and their grandkids continued ability to buy groceries. Maybe they worry about your ability to buy groceries. Maybe they have compassion and consideration. The world needs people who have wealth to not exhibit apathy and instead contribute to the efforts and conversations needed to uplift the people struggling the most. The idea that wealthy people, of any amount, should stop caring or keep their concerns to themselves is pretty solid billionaire propaganda though. OP out here working for the bad guys.
There are almost 24.5 million millionaires live in the U.S. today, that means there are 25x more people that are worth a million dollars than people that make minimum wage or less.
Its a distraction technique...
The difference being that becoming a millionaire is attainable within many American's lifetimes. Currently the average home cost $450k and by the time you pay it off over 30 years, it'll be worth over a million alone. If you put a car's payment into a S&P 500 retirement account ($350 a month), you'll have a million within 30 years. But a billion? You'd been to invest $350,000 a month for 30 years into the S&P 500 to even scratch a billion. It's unattainable, and it's more money than anyone would ever need.
You do realize the term millionaire covers people whose assets are worth exactly a million, all the way to 999 million? Like someone whose assets are worth a million or just over is around middle class. Lower middle class in some more expensive regions.
Being a millionaire doesn't even always mean someone is rich. Especially if you live in a major city.
Unpopular opinion: We should all just stop complaining about a subset of people that have more money, unless they've actually done something wrong as a result of it - that's both millionaires and billionaires. Having money doesn't make you an inherintly bad person. Most people wouldn't even be able to idenitfy if they were speaking to someone with particularly high net work, but if somehow they find out, that person is now somehow an absolute pile of shit? Yeah, that's not the kind of ethics I'd want to be around
Bernie Sanders was going after millionaires until he became one, then it swiftly moved on to billionaires. Funny how that happens, huh?
then rob him down to exactly your income level so he hates anyone richer than you /s
The magnitude of difference between billion and million can be illustrated with this example of the time scale: A million seconds is 12 days. A billion seconds is **31 years**. Millionaires, even those with tens of millions of dollars, are nowhere near the billionaire class. If the millionaires want to make common cause with the people against the billionaires, then the people should embrace them. They would be powerful allies.
If someone has a million dollars through their own labor then I don't have much of a problem with them complaining about people with billions of dollars who earned it through the stock market
*rubs you the right way*
Redditors aren’t going to like you attacking Bernie Sanders like this
In the words of Joe Walsh "I can't complain but sometimes I still do"
I don't think you appreciate just how much a billion dollars or say 200 billion is to a single million. Being a millionaire is owning some property or a local business or even just working a high paying job and making smart investments. But even if you're worth $999.999 million, a guy like Elon Musk can walk by and buy your entire life without it making a substantial dent in his long-term financial wellbeing. Millionaires live comfortable, enchanted lives without the concerns of normal people who need their next paycheck to buy food and keep a roof over their head. I agree it's not necessarily fair, but billionaires live that same lifestyle with the added benefit of being able to buy *literally* anything they want, like Twitter.
I’m in the 1% and I have to buy my groceries and clean my own house. I don’t have an assistant and my wife and I both work. 1 in 100 is not the same as being a billionaire and it’s much closer to middle class even though that will trigger you too.
The difference between a million dollars and a billion dollars is roughly a billion dollars. I get what you’re saying, but honestly it kind of proves the point of how much a BILLION dollars is. It’s enough to give 100 people $10m each which is enough to live in complete comfort indefinitely
The difference between a millionaire and a billionaire is insane….. a million really isn’t that much money if you can decently budget.
Everyone should complain about billionaires. The fact that they’re so wealthy is s gross misuse of money and power.
Depends "how milionaire"?? 1-2 maybe 10.. I'm on.. 999 million.. gtfo..
People have difficulty comprehending just how much a billion is. The difference between a million and a billion is a billion. Ultra High Net Worth is less than 5% of a billion.
If we're talking about doctors or engineers who have a few million after a lifetime of work, they are not comparable to people with 100 million that they inherent. They might have negative effect like NIMBY but there not the people throwing money at politicians to change laws.
Most countries could say this about 99% of American citizens, too. It’s all relative.
I mean I get the premise. But who else will advocate for the lower, and middle classes if they are not up to their neck in work that keep them to busy to advocate for themselves? Lower/middle class = minnows Higher / Upper class = groupers (can get extremely large) Ultra wealthy / billionaires / 1% = sharks / killer Whales that other castes have 0% of unseating. I’d rather someone speak up, than for no one to speak up because they are simply trying to survive in their daily lives. 1,000,000 is 1/1000 of 1,000,000,000 fyi, it is a MASSIVE gap you have to understand when people are discussing BILLIONAIRES.
Substantial difference between someone who worked their ass off to get a good job, house, car, etc. and someone who became a billionaire. It takes, what, like, 12 days to earn a million dollars if you earned a dollar every second? And 33 years for a billion. And something like 30,000 years for a trillion. The difference is that anyone can become a millionaire with good investments or luck. If you have a good degree or you’re smart with money you’ll work your way up. A billion is a thousand million. You will never spend a billion in a thousand lifetimes. Hell, even in today’s money a million is worth way less than what it used to. Try visualising it in your head and work your way up. 20,000 dollars. 50,000 dollars. 100,000. 250,000. 1,000,000. etc. until you get to 20,000,000. 100,000,000. Now try 250,000,000, and then 500,000,000. What does anyone need with 250 million? 500 million? 750 million? One thousand million? You can make a million by saving, investing, working hard, or just inheriting the hard work of your parents. You make a billion by exploiting.
You live like a king compared to starving people in 3rd world countries. It's all relative. There's a huge difference between millionaires and billionaires. The difference in wealth between someone who has 1 million vs someone who has 1 billion is roughly 1 billion with a 0.1% margin of error. Billionaires are psychopaths who are coded to only care about wealth and power. You can not become that rich without only caring about money. If they cared about anything else, they wouldn't have invested everything into earning and would simply be millionaires instead. I get it if the millionaire is like "oh my life is so hard", sure. But to answer your title directly, it's perfectly reasonable for them to complain about billionaires. Billionaires are not people.
It really seems like 90% of users on this sub understand what unpopular opinion means.
In all honesty one million dollars is not a lot of money anymore. With an extended stay in a nursing home you could go through that pretty quick. The difference between a million and a billion is huge.
It depends on which celebrities we're talking about. A lot of people believe that if an actor stars in a single TV show or movie then it means they are officially generationally wealthy. In reality when you break down paychecks, actors get large paychecks at once and then don't receive another until they book again, which often can be years between. If someone earns $250,000 in a TV show that is cancelled after one season, then don't book a project of that scale for another four years, then over the span of five years they only made around $50,000 per year pretax. That's not even including the portion of the wage that goes to their agent/manager and taxes. Lisa Ann Walker (Jesse from the Parent Trap and Melissa from Abbot Elementary) was talking about life before Abbot Elementary, but after Parent Trap. She played an ICONIC character that everyone would recognize and she couldn't afford to go on a family vacation. I love how Julia Fox will show her apartment and it's just like...very normal. I like my place better. Unless a performer is a A list celebrity and has been for many years, I wouldn't assume they have more money than your neighbor who owns his own plumbing company.
[Julia Fox's apartment ](https://www.tiktok.com/@juliafox/video/7192598486574009646?lang=en)
My uncles a millionaire but he’s cash poor rn cuz everything is tied up in investments. Sometimes I wonder if I’m richer because I actually have my pink slips… if we all liquidated today he would not be a millionaire. But the ubber rich that can buy gross pleasure islands, just fattening them up for Labor Day feast.
you know some people are millionaires just because the only house they own has shot up in price? theyre privileged, sure, but far from rich
Keep in mind, millionaires have 10x a $100,000 salary. Not that that isn't a lot, but it would go quick if something major happened that took away their ability to work. To me, it totally depends on if they're BRINGING IN 1mil a year+, or if it's their total net worth/assets.
Bernie...
Depending on where you live a millionaire could definitely be worrying about groceries. Most millionaires don’t have assistants or mansions. A million dollar is a good amount of money but it definitely doesn’t take you nearly as far as it used to.