Well, if money can't buy happiness, give it back! (Jules Renard, French author and member of the prestigious Academie Goncourt)
It is a good article (letter) but it does not tell us much that most of us did not know.There are some concrete numbers given that you don't often see. That is useful. I'm not worried about any of these folks in the top 1%, not from a financial standpoint anyway. They have the means to take care of themselves. What worries me is public education, out of control military and medical spending, and Mit Romneys 47%. That's what we should think about. That's what we should worry about. And that is what the top 1% should worry about unless they plan to emigrate soon.
Any comment on the part, below, I had in mind a 7mil networth to enter the top 1% and much more the top 0.1% how does the IRS and fed calculate the networth, how come there is such a large difference in their figures - 1.5 and 8.4million? "A New York Times article (Economix, 1/17/12) agrees that the threshold for being in the top 1 per cent in household income is about $380k but states that, based on Fed data, the 1% threshold for net worth is $8.4M. The figure I use is around $1.5M and comes from the IRS. The Fed uses a simple formula based on assets and liabilities at a broad level of analysis with little detail. Using Fed data, about 8% of US households have a net worth exceeding $1M and the median net worth of the top 10% of US families is $1.569M. The IRS uses the estate multiplier technique to calculate the data, a more complex measure based on tax returns, capitalization of earnings power, and other factors. The estate multiplier technique has been around for decades, is more widely used, and in the opinion of many, is the more accurate number. Where the true threshold is located is impossible to determine with accuracy, but my observations in managing money support the lower number or something close to it. "