Maybe you are in the top 1% and unaware of your status?

[Lsbcal]

Some people on this ER forum might just be in the top 1% and not know it. I was intrigued by this article Who Rules America: An Investment Manager's View on the Top 1% .

I've had many discussions in the last few years with clients with "only" $5M or under in assets, those in the 99th to 99.9th percentiles, as to whether they have enough money to retire or stay retired. That may sound strange to the 99% not in this group, but generally accepted "safe" retirement distribution rates for a 30 year period are in the 3-5% range, with 4% as the current industry standard. Assuming that the lower end of the top 1% has, say, $1.2M in investment assets, their retirement income will be about $50k per year plus maybe $30k-$40k from Social Security, so let's say $90k per year pre-tax and $75-$80k post-tax if they wish to plan for 30 years of withdrawals.

and this ...

While income and lifestyle are all relative, an after-tax income between $6.6k and $8.3k per month today will hardly buy the fantasy lifestyles that Americans see on TV and would consider "rich". In many areas in California or the East Coast, this positions one squarely in the hard working upper-middle class, and strict budgeting will be essential.

I'm beginning to think the the top 1% maybe should be narrowed to the top 0.5% by the "Occupy" crowd. As stated about the top 0.5%:

Membership in this elite group is likely to come from being involved in some aspect of the financial services or banking industry, real estate development involved with those industries, or government contracting. Some hard working and clever physicians and attorneys can acquire as much as $15M-$20M before retirement but they are rare. Those in the top 0.5% have incomes over $500k if working and a net worth over $1.8M if retired.

 

[Animorph]

Yep, at least consider age along with wealth.

And for income, some stability needs to be considered as well. Apparently only about a quarter of those at the top incomes stay there for longer than one year. You get the big bonus or big stock capital gains and then fall back down to normal I guess.

 

[donheff]

Not to worry, all the 1% proposals would increase taxes on high incomes (some including dividends and realized capital gains). I suspect few, if any, of the retired members of this board have incomes in the ranges under discussion. Better that we go after the top incomes now. If we don't get things better balanced soon assets may become the target - then we will be in the top 1%.

 

[Bestwifeever]

The article is discussed in great length here:

http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f52/so-who-are-the-1-a-58381.html

and here:

http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/f28/interesting-article-58261.html

Probably better to carry on the discussion in one of the above two threads, so this thread is now closed.