The median 40 year old has retirement savings of $45K, not $5K. And the median 70 year old has savings of $200K. In both groups, doubling the amount is quite significant.
Using median makes it a loaded statistic skewed in favor of the minority (in this case, the wealthy).
Over half the country is living paycheck-to-paycheck, so that median number is already in the ‘well-off’ category by default, making them irrelevant to the main point of discussion.
Is that true? Median is literally taking the value in the middle. So if there are 30 million 70 year olds then it would be picking the 15th millionth person and using their savings.
Averages or Means are skewed by outliers, not the median. The median is just picking the middle number in a list of numbers. There is no skewing possible. If you have 99 people making $1 per year and one person making $1B per year, the median is $1. The average/mean is $1,000,000.99 which is way skewed.
What does fairness have to do with it? Compound interest is just math.
One could trivially make an argument that we should redistribute the wealth among the population, but there is not a clear way how to do this effectively, or it would have been done already.
The hard part is taking on the appropriate amount of risk in order to actualize those gains; a bank won’t just give you a 10% interest rate, you have to work your ass of for it. An entrepreneur needs to assess the landscape and invest in what the market will want tomorrow, and most people guess suboptimally (3-6%), or end up losing money, whether in fact (negative returns) or relative to inflation (0-3%).
Even pointing to the S&P 500, as most people do, you still need to make the conscious decision to sell and take profits, FOMO be damned. Or alternatively, taking a perceived loss but actual profit (e.g., you didn’t sell right at the peak, but that’s usually okay). It’s not easy, and most people don’t have the time or stomach for it; these people are best served by long term, government-backed bonds, after which you will come out only slightly ahead of inflation.
Using the rule of 72, and a 3% bond rate, it would actually take you 24 years to double your money, not seven. And that, my friend, is why you and I are not billionaires.
but there is not a clear way how to do this effectively, or it would have been done already.
That is terrible reasoning. That would only be true if every idea ever come up with had been tried and no new ideas will come up.
UBI would be quite effective for many reasons. The reason it hasn’t been done already has nothing to do with how effective it might be. And we know giving everyone money is effective, because Alaska does it with their oil dividends.
Another method that has definitely not been fully implemented is debt jubilees for people with more debt than assets to cover that debt (e.g. student debt forgiveness, medical debt forgiveness, etc.).
It’s not reasoning, or an argument for or against, it is just a statement. I’d admit that it’s probably a tautology.
What the post described is a taxation and societal problem, not a problem with investing or compound interest in general.
I’d easily agree that society is unfair, and that our taxation policies are directly antagonistic to the middle class, but again, this is simply math (and though it is theoretical, microeconomics).
But is it really fair that a person with 50 million can turn that into 100 million
Yes.
And since that can only happen by investing that amount into the economy, it’s wisely encouraged by the system, versus putting the 50 million in a vault somewhere.
It’s essentially an investment in the country’s further financialization and privitization…both of which are things completely ruining the country (unless you’re rich, then these movements just make more parts of the country your own personal playground).
And, it’s worth pointing out that the rich carry a large asset base in their own companies which they can borrow against tax free while the value of the underlying assets continually grow. The only thing similar a non-rich person has access to is a home equity line of credit…and even then you own a home with equity which…you ain’t rich but you ain’t exactly broke either.
You think it’s sad because you’re deeply ignorant. Do you also think that if the $5 baseball card you bought becomes worth $100, that that means you’ve stolen $95? lol
No, they don’t. Liquid assets don’t increase in value. If they had $1 in cash seven years ago, it would be worth less than that today due to inflation.
I’m pretty sure that liquid assets are things that you can spend, so cash and bank accounts. Anything that you have to sell to buy things is not a liquid asset. (Note that we are not talking about barter. I had a friend at college who traded a snake for a VW camper, neither of which would be considered a liquid asset. Even though technically you could put the snake in a giant blender…)
No, a liquid asset is one that can be sold quickly for its full market value.
For example, if you have stocks worth $100K, you can quickly convert them to $100K in cash. Whereas real estate is not liquid, because you usually cannot quickly convert a house worth $100K into cash.
Some people make a distinction between “liquid assets” and “near-liquid assets” and would classify something like a money market account (which also does grow in value as many liquid assets do) as a liquid asset, and maybe some forms of stock as near-liquid assets…but I’m splitting hairs.
And guess what those business have? Valuations. Stock price is just an aggregate indicator of the valuation for a company, for the given percentage of shares that are publicly traded. But private companies have valuations, too, and even if they’re not tied to a public stock offering, those valuations are used to form these Billionaire lists.
Same thing with real estate. The value of any asset is based on what someone is willing to pay. Sometimes, you’ll find some crazy billionaire or investment firm who grossly overvalues an asset relative to their peers, and that insane overvaluation does get rolled into those lists.
But such is the nature of economics. You’ve neither gained nor lost value until someone pays you. Until then, it’s anyone’s guess.
When you’re a billionaire, most of your net worth comes from businesses assets you own (and can borrow against without having to claim the loans as income), not liquid assets.
It’s not just billionaires. If you put any amount of money into the S&P500 in Jan 1 2017, it would be worth more than twice as much today.
But is it really fair that a person with 50 million can turn that into 100 million, whereas most people can turn at most $5,000 into $10,000?
Earning $5,000 over 7 years is basically worthless.
The median 40 year old has retirement savings of $45K, not $5K. And the median 70 year old has savings of $200K. In both groups, doubling the amount is quite significant.
Jesus Christ those are pathetic numbers for retirement at those ages.
Got to eat. Retirement is gone, and your 401k is nothing more than a subsidy so you can work part time as a greeter until death.
Using median makes it a loaded statistic skewed in favor of the minority (in this case, the wealthy).
Over half the country is living paycheck-to-paycheck, so that median number is already in the ‘well-off’ category by default, making them irrelevant to the main point of discussion.
You have it backwards. The mean, not the median, is skewed by outliers.
If there are ten people in a room with $10 and one person with $1,000,000, the median is $10 whereas the mean is ~$90,000.
No idea why you’re down voted for math :/
Is that true? Median is literally taking the value in the middle. So if there are 30 million 70 year olds then it would be picking the 15th millionth person and using their savings.
You might not know what median means (math pun!).
Averages or Means are skewed by outliers, not the median. The median is just picking the middle number in a list of numbers. There is no skewing possible. If you have 99 people making $1 per year and one person making $1B per year, the median is $1. The average/mean is $1,000,000.99 which is way skewed.
No one is putting their entire retirement into the stock market, so they’re not doubling the amount.
At age 40, it’s recommended that you put 60-80% of retirement funds into the stock market. Doubling that is still significant.
Sweet, I didn’t realize I could double $0.
And you can do it as many times as you like, no charge*!
* = charges may apply, see your local hedge fund for details
What does fairness have to do with it? Compound interest is just math.
One could trivially make an argument that we should redistribute the wealth among the population, but there is not a clear way how to do this effectively, or it would have been done already.
The hard part is taking on the appropriate amount of risk in order to actualize those gains; a bank won’t just give you a 10% interest rate, you have to work your ass of for it. An entrepreneur needs to assess the landscape and invest in what the market will want tomorrow, and most people guess suboptimally (3-6%), or end up losing money, whether in fact (negative returns) or relative to inflation (0-3%).
Even pointing to the S&P 500, as most people do, you still need to make the conscious decision to sell and take profits, FOMO be damned. Or alternatively, taking a perceived loss but actual profit (e.g., you didn’t sell right at the peak, but that’s usually okay). It’s not easy, and most people don’t have the time or stomach for it; these people are best served by long term, government-backed bonds, after which you will come out only slightly ahead of inflation.
Using the rule of 72, and a 3% bond rate, it would actually take you 24 years to double your money, not seven. And that, my friend, is why you and I are not billionaires.
That is terrible reasoning. That would only be true if every idea ever come up with had been tried and no new ideas will come up.
UBI would be quite effective for many reasons. The reason it hasn’t been done already has nothing to do with how effective it might be. And we know giving everyone money is effective, because Alaska does it with their oil dividends.
Another method that has definitely not been fully implemented is debt jubilees for people with more debt than assets to cover that debt (e.g. student debt forgiveness, medical debt forgiveness, etc.).
It’s not reasoning, or an argument for or against, it is just a statement. I’d admit that it’s probably a tautology.
What the post described is a taxation and societal problem, not a problem with investing or compound interest in general.
I’d easily agree that society is unfair, and that our taxation policies are directly antagonistic to the middle class, but again, this is simply math (and though it is theoretical, microeconomics).
Yes.
And since that can only happen by investing that amount into the economy, it’s wisely encouraged by the system, versus putting the 50 million in a vault somewhere.
They are not investing it into the great magical economy. It’s in hedge funds that actively destroy the economy.
It’s essentially an investment in the country’s further financialization and privitization…both of which are things completely ruining the country (unless you’re rich, then these movements just make more parts of the country your own personal playground).
And, it’s worth pointing out that the rich carry a large asset base in their own companies which they can borrow against tax free while the value of the underlying assets continually grow. The only thing similar a non-rich person has access to is a home equity line of credit…and even then you own a home with equity which…you ain’t rich but you ain’t exactly broke either.
The fact that you can’t see how this is a huge flaw in, at the very least, the American form of capitalism is sad.
You think it’s sad because you’re deeply ignorant. Do you also think that if the $5 baseball card you bought becomes worth $100, that that means you’ve stolen $95? lol
No, I don’t also think that.
I do, however, think that I didn’t insult you, so that insult was absolutely not warranted.
Wealth is not the same as liquid assets
Liquid assets are a type of wealth. For many people, liquid assets make up the biggest part of their wealth.
No, they don’t. Liquid assets don’t increase in value. If they had $1 in cash seven years ago, it would be worth less than that today due to inflation.
Stocks are liquid assets. They can increase in value.
T-bills are also liquid assets. They can also increase in value.
Savings accounts and money market accounts are also liquid assets. They can also increase in value.
I’m pretty sure that liquid assets are things that you can spend, so cash and bank accounts. Anything that you have to sell to buy things is not a liquid asset. (Note that we are not talking about barter. I had a friend at college who traded a snake for a VW camper, neither of which would be considered a liquid asset. Even though technically you could put the snake in a giant blender…)
No, a liquid asset is one that can be sold quickly for its full market value.
For example, if you have stocks worth $100K, you can quickly convert them to $100K in cash. Whereas real estate is not liquid, because you usually cannot quickly convert a house worth $100K into cash.
Some people make a distinction between “liquid assets” and “near-liquid assets” and would classify something like a money market account (which also does grow in value as many liquid assets do) as a liquid asset, and maybe some forms of stock as near-liquid assets…but I’m splitting hairs.
Ultimately, you’re right…downvotes be damned.
When you’re a billionaire, most of your net worth comes from businesses you own, not liquid assets.
And guess what those business have? Valuations. Stock price is just an aggregate indicator of the valuation for a company, for the given percentage of shares that are publicly traded. But private companies have valuations, too, and even if they’re not tied to a public stock offering, those valuations are used to form these Billionaire lists.
Same thing with real estate. The value of any asset is based on what someone is willing to pay. Sometimes, you’ll find some crazy billionaire or investment firm who grossly overvalues an asset relative to their peers, and that insane overvaluation does get rolled into those lists.
But such is the nature of economics. You’ve neither gained nor lost value until someone pays you. Until then, it’s anyone’s guess.
Billionaires are far more likely to own part of a business than 100% of a business. And if you own stocks, then you too own part of a business.
FTFY