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Comment by DrNosferatu

10 days ago

Society as a whole, or one percenters like him?

Bezos is a 0.0001-percenter. Most of people on HN are probably in the top 1% to 5%.

You're in the top 10% in the US if you make $170k/yr.

  • True. But that’s income, to be top 10% in your net worth you need 1.5m USD and 12m USD for top 1%

    • Yeah, but net worth is weird because for most people, it just measures age. When you're young, you have nothing in your 401k and you have a brand new mortgage, so you're worth around $0. Negative if you have any student loans.

      When you're in your 50s or 60s, the mortgage is repaid, and if nothing blew up, you probably also have a million or two in your 401k, so at that point, it's actually not that hard for a person who had a decent career in the SF Bay Area to be worth $4M+. And many FAANG retirees will probably flirt with $10M+ if they don't spend too much.

  • are most people on HN making 170? I feel a bit less privileged now.

The massive economic productivity gains from AI will improve the lives of very few if some form of fair fiscal redistribution is not be put in place.