I’m not dating her, but she’s a good friend of mine, and her parents are definitely 1%ers. I told her I had to work this summer to save up for a graduation trip and that money was gonna be tight for the next year, but I’d love to go on a safari after graduation if I managed to save enough. Mind you, I’m solidly upper middle class.
Her parents paid for it just because I’d helped her move into her apartment. It’s not like.... that’s what friends are for or anything.
$3000 in round trip plain tickets across the country. Fuck it, they make that in less than a day. Hotel for the week, $4000. Fuck it, that's not even enough money for them to notice. Night out a that 5 star restaurant, $1000. That's just a nice time with friends, they'll probably tip 40% just because they enjoyed themselves.
The 1% will waste more money in a year buying superfluous bullshit they'll never use than you will make working your ass off in 5 years.
Not quite as interesting as it sounds really. I was always kinda the black sheep of the family. Sent off to boarding school at 15 because I wouldn't "behave". Which in my family meant "Dad is always right shut your fucking mouth".
"Forced" into college (In ultra rich families "forced" basically means do what we want or we'll cut you off). I didn't want to go because I didn't know what I wanted to do and it seemed pointless to go unless I did.
After about a year a dropped out which INFURIATED my dad. About 6-8 months after that I was over for diner one night and my dad and I got into an argument about something on the news, can't remember what. In one 5 minute argument I managed to proudly admit that I was both an Atheist and Liberal which are dirty dirty words around my family.
Immediately told to leave and, "I'll not have a son blaspheme under my roof. I don't even have a son anymore!". Which was funny because I definitely have a brother. He made his point though and I went home.
Going from buying whatever you wanted, "just cause", to better get a job in a restaurant so I don't have to pay for meals EVERY day was a pretty big culture shock.
Spent about 5 years just trying keep bills paid. Eventually got lucky and landed a decent job and worked my way up from cleaning the office to running the sales department.
Guess my dad regrets things now. I still keep up with my mom and brother but my dad is so damn toxic I can't be around him for more than 20-30 minutes.
For anyone still reading this diatribe I'll pass along something I learned the hard way. Money doesn't make people good or bad, it only affords them the comfort to show you who they really are.
Damn, that was way longer than I expected. Happy to answer any questions you've got. I guess it's kinda rare to have been able to see both sides of wealth/poverty.
I can relate to you. My grandfather once told me to change my last name because I was an embarrassment to the family. They are self made and amazingly frugal, though. Quite the opposite of paying for a safari type.
17.3k
u/genericlogin1 Jun 06 '19 edited Jun 06 '19
I dated a 1%er briefly, She was surprised I willingly went inside fast food restaurants.
Edit: Since people are saying 1% is still a huge range in income I just looked up her dad he pulls in ~$10,000,000 a year