Andrew Schiff was sitting in a traffic jam in California this month after giving a speech at an investment conference about gold. He turned off the satellite radio, got out of the car and screamed a profanity.Heaven's no! Working folks who must manage without huge salaries and bonuses DO NOT understand the stress of people with incomes of $350,000 or more, when each month they may be challenged to pay for the necessities of life such as food, housing, and health care and perhaps some months be forced to do without one or the other of the necessities.
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Schiff, 46, is facing another kind of jam this year: Paid a lower bonus, he said the $350,000 he earns, enough to put him in the country's top 1 percent by income, doesn't cover his family's private-school tuition, a Kent, Connecticut, summer rental and the upgrade they would like from their 1,200-square- foot Brooklyn duplex.
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The smaller bonus checks that hit accounts across the financial-services industry this month are making it difficult to maintain the lifestyles that Wall Street workers expect, according to interviews with bankers and their accountants, therapists, advisers and headhunters.
"People who don't have money don't understand the stress," said Alan Dlugash, a partner at accounting firm Marks Paneth & Shron LLP in New York who specializes in financial planning for the wealthy. "Could you imagine what it's like to say I got three kids in private school, I have to think about pulling them out? How do you do that?" (My emphasis)
What the stressed-out high earners may have to give up:
$7,500 a year for a golf club membershipMark Brunson, who blogs at Enough About Me, sent me the link and thought at first, as I did, that the article was satire, but indeed the article is serious.
$30,000 a year for a peer-learning group for investors
$32,000-a-year for a daughter's prep school tuition
Guess he'll just have to learn within his means. So sad. Not. He's lucky he still has income.
ReplyDeletePiskie, it is not to be believed that these folks whine for publication. Hey guys, get together and whine amongst your own and sympathize with each other, but PLEASE! spare the rest of us.
ReplyDelete"Weep and howl, ye rich . . . "
ReplyDeletePerfect, Russ.
ReplyDeleteshaking my head trying to understand. nope -- I can't. Let's guess that the first things he gives up are contributions to church and charities altho he may hang in there for the GOP.
ReplyDeletesusankay, Yahoo's source is Bloomberg, which explains a lot about the publication of the story. Sorry, I can't feel their pain.
ReplyDeleteMeanwhile, my 87 year-old father is asking how my finances are (given that I am now three months into not receiving a pay cheque but having to spend about $2000/month for rent, utilities, pension fund payments and vet bills...!). I cannot really muster a lot of pity for them.
ReplyDeleteI cannot really muster a lot of pity for them.
ReplyDeleteCaminante, I understand why.
"And the rich he sent away empty"
ReplyDeleteBex, they're getting there, be it ever so slowly.
ReplyDeleteCaminante--This man absolutely oozes with self-entitlement. The food pantry at my church feeds around 350 people a week. Joining with the voices here of "cannot really muster a lot of pity" for this man.
ReplyDeleteI will pray for you every day until you find a job.
Caminante, you're on my prayer list, too.
ReplyDeleteRemember they probably think they are in the economic middle class.
ReplyDeleteThey are in the top 1% (or about 3 million) Americans. They aren't in the 1% of the 1% (or about 30,000) Americans who are the elite of the elite and who don't need a salary because investment income is what they live on. Most of the 1% look up and see what they don't have and not down and see what they have (as Epicurus says 'vain desires are insatiable').
Erp, you are correct. Because the folks in the article are not in the .000001%, they see themselves as middle class. I know a man who earns near $400,000 per year, and he is outraged that anyone even speaks of raising his taxes.
ReplyDeleteI know a man who earns near $400,000 per year, and he is outraged that anyone even speaks of raising his taxes.
ReplyDeleteI don't get this mentality.
I gross roughly $70k per year right now and live quite comfortably. If someone came to me and said "We'll pay you $400k per year, but the government is going to take $330k per year," I'd say I was getting a good deal and programs that help others are getting well funded.
Some people just prove my father correct: No matter how much they have, they'll always want more.
Jarred, I don't get it, either. I've said to him, 'You've been fortunate. Why wouldn't you want to contribute your fair share to the common good? What kind of country do you want to live in?' I confess that my words don't move him.
ReplyDelete