RANT: The Rich Get...More Vile

It's churlish to bash on the rich. It seems a case of sour grapes, even somehow self-defeating. After all, it would be stupid to deny that money can be very seductive in what it can do for one's life. It buys you independence and gives you more options in life. Money gives you choices, no doubt about it.

Why the hell do you think I play the lottery every chance I get?!

I refuse to play the hypocrite and pretend that being wealthy wouldn't make my life better in more ways than one. Of course it would. I consider myself genuinely fortunate in that I'm not motivated by huge homes and fancy cars and private jets and wardrobes the size of small Central American countries. I never have been.

I don't want the billions. Or all the flash of conspicuous, gaudy, yucky wealth. But to have enough money to have have a home fully paid for, know that my mother will never again have to work a day in her life, have NO DEBT at all and never have to worry about money again - bliss.



But in this recession on the back of so much profligate stealing by uber-rich bankers and Wall Street types, the rich have only become more tasteless. A reminder of how flawed our money systems are and how so very much is for the benefit of so very few.

And so I come across an article today on Yahoo regarding a survey of rich Americans done by Fidelity Investments. According to the findings, most of the rich surveyed declare that one needs a minimum of $7-million in order to be 'rich'. Yip, six million bucks and you ain't yet 'rich'. Jeepers, talk about inflation!

And, the survey found, the rich continue to fret about money - the poor (rich) things. AND it seems the older they get, the more money they believe is necessary to be comfortably 'rich'! It seems the itch to be rich only gets worse with age.

So, yes, it seems the rich do get richer - not to mention more vile.

After all, who goes around pondering what it is to be 'rich' and frets about staying so obviously rich? And who feels comfortable enough to answer such ludicrous surveys about wealth in this day and age? Who are these people?

They are the cocooned, the pampered, the powerful 'other' who influence governments and make sure that governments bail them out when they get too greedy. Okay, that's mostly the super-rich to whom $7-million is really chump change, but you get my drift.

The words of Thomas Jefferson seem so pertinent here:

Experience demands that man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term to the general prey of the rich on the poor.



Harsh words perhaps, but somehow strangely relevant when one reads surveys like this.

Do you get my point?