Oh, those poor, poor rich people

[radhak]

The first para might (might) make you feel sorry, till you get to the part where the personal trainer is paid $12000 a year, and you can no longer relate.

You Try to Live on 500K in This Town

Maybe I am not a very nice person - but to be frank, some part of me is smirking. Maybe I am being hasty - they might recover and flourish far better than me, but still...


Particularly when you read the other side's story : In Florida, Despair and Foreclosures

[jackellis]

I have no sympathy for the folks in New York. We live in an area that also has a high cost of living but we've always lived within our means (not having kids did help).

I have mixed feelings for the folks in Florida. No sympathy at all for the land and home speculators. I feel bad for the less fortunate, ordinary folks who were hurt by falling property values, but I also have to wonder about their common sense buying into a bubble.

Perhaps the problem is that when good times last too long, people forget that there are bad times and they can be quite painful. I still remember seeing block after block of boarded-up homes in Houston from that real estate bubble. My wife was paying 17% on a mortgage in California at that time. Neither of us wants to be among the ranks of the foreclosed.

[Ed62]

I think I'm a pretty compassionate guy, but somehow I just don't feel too sorry for some people.

Ed

[Richard in Smithville]

Who will be the one to tell the unemployed just why these guys need more than 10 times what they used to make a year?

A few things that confuse me...

most well-to-do families take at least two vacations a year, a winter trip to the sun and a spring trip to the ski slopes

I take two vacations a year to the local campsite where I get to relax

A personal trainer at $80 an hour three times a week comes to about $12,000 a year

I guess walking around the block with your family is out of the question.

One hour of tutoring once a week is $125. “That’s the low end,” she said. “The higher end is 150, 175.” SAT tutors are about $250 an hour. Total cost for 30 weeks of regular tutoring: $3,750.

Funny thing is, I spend time with my kids when it comes to school help. Does this mean that these over paid exec's are not smarter than a sixth grader?

Nanny: $45,000

LOML and I had the kids, we raised them. We aranged our schedules so we didn't have to pawn off the kids.

Ms. Bass, whose husband is an accountant with many high-end clients, said she spends about $425 every 10 days on groceries for her family. Annual cost: about $15,000.

Just what are they eating? How many people are they feeding?

It make you wonder how some people can take their lifestyles seriously.