When is it "enough" money?

I live in India and I am pretty poor, I hope to be middle-class/upper-middle class someday, but I have noticed something sinister from some people who are extremely privileged, they can be still be bought with money.

Lack of money makes you desperate, and paranoid, and comparison drives you crazy, hard to be morally perfect as a poor man, but I see actors who have made insane amounts of money on the backs of their Indian fans like Shahrukh Khan, Canada Kumar, Ajay Devgan, Hrithik Roshan and many more who are well-respected in the industry and who still can sell their own fans financial ruin (gambling) or death (Tobacco) in ads. I thought the point of being rich was that you could be more moral, what is the use of getting rich if you use your influence and fame to do more harm than good?

Also, all the actors mentioned above have made numerous movies about patriotism, many in their private conversations like to brag how much they "love their country... blah... blah... blah", but yet they feel ok selling Tobacco to their fans who made them what they are.

I have a cousin who worships Shahrukh Khan and who took up Pan(Tobacco) because he was naive and because he probably thought it was "cool" since his favorite actor (on whom he has modeled all aspects of his life was selling tobacco), thankfully we were able to get him off that a few years ago, but he spent money like water and he gained worse health for it. He got off easy, many suffered financial ruin or even death. So, when is it fucking enough!? When will these people have enough money?

edit: It's just not India, it happens everywhere (just watch CoffeeZilla to see more prime examples of this)
Also, I am not saying I am perfect, if someone gave me an insane amount of money to sell Pan, I will, judge me if you will. But, I like to think if I had "enough" money, I would be immune to the attractions of blood money, I like to think I can try to be as moral as I can be then, but these people almost make me think that there is never "enough" money.

edit 2: Kurt Vonnegut's Quote on Money is quite interesting

Azzu , (edited )
@Azzu@lemm.ee avatar

I think "enough" is when you don't have to worry about water, food and shelter.

I have roughly enough to pay for these things, a little more, can get internet and a few euros each month for random luxury stuff.

I earned more before, but I reduced the hours in my job severely so I get to this money state. I like the reduced hours more than having more money.

So yeah for me, idk what everyone's talking about, there's definitely an "enough". Of course, more is also "nice" but "enough" is when you survive with a little bit over.

Of course, like others say, for most people there is not an "enough", they keep wanting more. It depends on the individuals. I have a bunch of friends who are friends because they think like me. But I can't be friends with most of the population because they can't get enough.

Famous people are mostly famous exactly because they can't get enough. No one works that much, tries to acquire status that much, if they are satisfied eventually. Because when you would be satisfied, you stop chasing more fame, not getting to a level that we would call "famous".

Taalnazi ,

I'd add access to medical health and physical safety.

Azzu ,
@Azzu@lemm.ee avatar

You're absolutely right. I live in a country of socialized healthcare so it's easy to forget how important it is.

Taalnazi ,

So do I. But unfortunately, even here, not all places offer actually decent LGBT+ safety and affirming healthcare. And as ally I think that that's terrible.

intensely_human ,

I think acquiring money can be an addiction, in the sense that it’s a behavior that allows escape (it’s a simple goal that’s easy to define, allowing a person to stop looking around and just go forward). Just like video games provide an orienting direction, hence provide dopamine, hence can be addicting, money can do the same thing.

Because money is a number, it’s inherently gamified. You can just set “more money” as the objective and you never have to change it and it’s always a direction to go that can produce dopamine.

Now, if it’s not the best, most meaningful direction. the dopamine flow decreases but doesn’t stop. Just like the video games getting boring, or your brain adapting to the cigarettes or cocaine. You still get a little jolt of dopamine, but not as much as before, so it’s this tired, boring life.

The thing is, there’s a lot of uncertainty and withdrawal and relearning you have to go through to get away from the repetitive small-hit dopamine cycle and into the more organic, less repetitive, large-hit dopamine cycle of … being a real person doing valuable things.

So yeah. Money as addiction. Source of small dopamine hits, that are easier to obtain and more familiar and hence comfortable, than the messy and uncertain process of seeking dopamine through real-world accomplishment.

ALSO, there’s the problem of how markets work. When a person is relative low in the market structure, their only way of getting profit is to really produce a lot of value. The higher a person gets in that structure, ie the more they advance financially, the less value they’re adding. The ultimate asymptote they approach is when they have sufficient money to live on the interest, and it’s totally automatic, and their contribution to economic value is zero.

This means that as a person follows the path (one of many paths) from worker to entrepreneur to pretty bourgeoise to elite, they steadily lose the natural, organic meaning that comes from actually providing value to others.

The person who used to love and be sustained by the smiles and appreciation of their coffee customers, probably isn’t getting much juice out of sitting there looking at spreadsheets of their 5000-coffee-shop empire.

But along the way, they’ve already switched their dopamine source to be from a combination of value provided and money received, to be just the money.

Which is like sitting there lighting up a cigarette to stave off the discomfort for another hour, or to prevent having to think about something that makes you anxious or uncertain. Just light up a smoke: dopamine.

Just like me with this damn website. Addicted. Small dopamine hits, comfortable stand-in for actual meaning.

Subject6051 OP ,

Nice points here!

baatliwala ,

Bollywood actors are hypocritical and never use their platform for good. Stopped watching them in theatres long time ago.

ICastFist ,
@ICastFist@programming.dev avatar

Money is power. Power corrupts.

Frankly, I think 5 million USD should be enough for anyone pretty much anywhere in the world to live the rest of their lives comfortably. Taking 1 million out to spend immediately and leaving the rest in a savings account, even at 2% interest per year, you're getting 6666 per month, or 80k per year.

For me, personally, living in Brazil, 600k dollars would probably keep me afloat for the rest of my life with my current expenses and comfort. That's roughly twice my current salary for the next 25 years.

So, when is it fucking enough!? When will these people have enough money?

For many, it's never enough, because they see it as a competition, one about showing off "wealth" in the most cringe way possible (just look at all the assholes that love to show off their expensive car collection) and also where they interpret rules like in the Munchkin card game: it's ok to cheat, so long as you don't get caught.

frezik ,

I think we can put a specific maximum for a comfortable western lifestyle. You can certainly argue that a comfortable western lifestyle is already far and away better than most of the people on Earth will ever see. This is something of an arbitrary point where past this, most of us are going to agree that it's excessive.

It's USD 10 million.

Why? Let's start with the Trinity study:

https://thepoorswiss.com/updated-trinity-study/

The original looked at a standard retirement portfolio and asked how much you can withdraw over a thirty year retirement. It took market data from 1925 through 1995 (the updated version linked above goes to 2023) and then checked a thirty year window over that entire period with various withdrawal rates.

What it found is that if you withdraw 4% of the portfolio the first year, and increasing it by inflation each subsequent year, it's highly unlikely the portfolio will run out in the 30 year window. The time period covers has market ups and downs, high inflation and low, and this 4% stays.

The updated study above says a 3.5% withdraw had a high chance of lasting 50 years.

Lets play it ultra safe and put it at 2.5%. With $10M, we'll have $250,000/year to play with, and our rules adjust that for inflation.

(Median household income in Manhattan is $128k)[https://www.point2homes.com/US/Neighborhood/NY/Manhattan-Demographics.html]. We're pulling almost twice that. I feel comfortable saying a person can live nicely in any city on this income.

So there you go: $10M. If you want a 100% tax bracket, that's a good place to put it. Any more money past that is just a game that hurts everyone else.

Cort ,

So is that $10M per person or family or family generation? I think the part where things start to spiral is when someone has a few kids who themselves have a few kids each and then add in the spouses. Even at 2 kids per generation and only the first Gen kids have spouses and you're up to 10 people or $100M.

frezik ,

Household income would be a whole family that lives together.

bradorsomething ,

Money only amplifies who you are and what you’re able to do. I’m quite comfortable, but I like to build things and make companies grow, and solve technical problems. I don’t really want to sit back and just do nothing - in fact I’d love a partner to help me do a bit more relaxing - but when left to my own devices I am always learning some new skill or refining some process or generally trying to make the world around me a little better.

intensely_human ,

Are you gay, or a woman? I’m pretty good at relaxing, and wouldn’t mind having an industrious partner.

franzfurdinand ,
@franzfurdinand@lemmy.world avatar

A big swing, but I'm genuinely rooting for you.

bradorsomething ,

He shot his shot, I can’t fault him. Straight male, unfortunately.

franzfurdinand ,
@franzfurdinand@lemmy.world avatar

Ah, well, fair. Would have made for a great story! 🙂

kava ,

Greedy people are more likely to end up wealthy. Greedy people are also more likely to end up doing ethically dubious things.

Of course, any wealth at all is unethical if you're being honest with yourself. There's a famous passage in the Bible.

Jesus was out teaching his disciples or healing people- whatever he did. And a rich man comes up to him and asks

"Jesus, I want to follow you and go to heaven. Please tell me what I should do"

What did Jesus say? Jesus told him to a) sell all of his shit b) give that money to charity c) physically follow me around

What did rich guy do? Have an epiphany about morality and living the good life?

No, he cried. He cried because he didn't actually want to let go of the good things he had for morality.

All of us in first world nations are guilty of this to some extent. The way our world is shaped you essentially have to be unethical to survive. There are levels to it, of course. But I think your perspective is too black and white and needs a little nuance. Seem like a teenager.

Feathercrown ,

I don't think all wealth is unethical, but it's certainly easier to get money by being unethical

intensely_human ,

I learned earlier today that paywalls are inversely associated with scams happening.

That tells me that scamming is one of the least profitable economic activities.

Feathercrown ,

Uh... am I missing something? Wouldn't the need for a paywall imply that without a paywall the non-scam site is doing worse financially?

intensely_human ,

Jesus saying that did not mean that it is unethical to be rich. The reason it’s hard for a rich man to enter heaven is the rich man can afford endless distractions from facing the hard problem of his own suffering.

Poor people are more likely to encounter circumstances that they cannot survive without adapting. The ultimate adaptation to difficulty is when you find bliss in the struggle. You enter the kingdom of heaven after transcending ordeals.

Rich people don’t transcend ordeals they just sidestep them.

Basically rich people don’t have a cross. Well, they can have one, but it comes harder. They live cushy lives that don’t require entering heaven just to survive.

Same reason Gautama had to go be a monk before he could be attain enlightenment. You basically don’t take the problem of suffering seriously enough to solve it, unless your suffering is great. A rich person’s suffering is the leaky roof that never collapses. A poor person’s suffering is a collapsed roof, which forces action on learning how to build a new, perfect roof.

electric_nan ,

I don't know, but I wonder the same. I'm in the US and work for a guy that has tens of millions of dollars. He still spends all day in the office 6 days a week. To be fair, I don't think he does it for the money, exactly, but I can't understand why he keeps working at all.

intensely_human ,

Have you asked him?

The_Worst ,

Maybe he just likes to work?

electric_nan ,

Which I cannot understand lol.

NotMyOldRedditName ,

Is it his company? It could be his baby and his passion.

If it's just some random manager... well, I got no clue lol

electric_nan ,

Yeah it's his company, and I think that is basically it.

RBWells ,

It's harder to think about "enough" in places like India (or even the US) where there is so much inequality.

But I would define "enough" as comfortable. Not worried about bills, buying whatever groceries you want, a good living situation and enough cushion that an emergency won't make you homeless.

The addiction to more, more, more is a disorder like hoarding is.

dumblederp , (edited )
@dumblederp@aussie.zone avatar

You get to define your own sense of what "enough" money is. Many people will never have enough.

The philosopher Diogenes was sitting on a curbstone, eating bread and lentils for his supper. He was seen by the philosopher Aristippus, who lived comfortably by flattering the king. Said Aristippus, "If you would learn to be subservient to the king, you would not have to live on lentils." Said Diogenes, "Learn to live on lentils, and you will not have to cultivate the king."

I like to reference Maslows Hierarchy of needs for a different perspective of personal value.

https://aussie.zone/api/v3/image_proxy?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.simplypsychology.org%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2Fmaslow-needs3-1024x1024.jpg

intensely_human ,

I learned this the hard way for myself.

I’ve lived on the street defending myself against violence, and growing gnawingly more hungry every day, and dealing with sleep deprivation from always being moved along.

I’ve also been a senior software developer at a company that broke promises to me, and I smiled and ate that shit for the money and also to “grow up” and be less naive and idealistic. Also, I started breaking promises to them too.

When I lived on the street I was happy and whole, despite the discomfort. When I was working that dev job I went to the hospital twice with stress-related issues I thought were going to kill me, and separately, shelled out over $7k on neurofeedback training to reduce my beta wave amplitude and cut down on my panic attacks.

That learned me good. I am done sacrificing my integrity for any material comfort. It simply does not work. My body was suffering despite the cushy conditions around me. I was uncomfortable in my own skin, and not in a trivial way. I was fucking ill from that.

Long story short, I realized the reason to stand up and face the cavalry is that it hurts less to die fighting than it does to die running away.

RedditRefugee69 ,

There’s nothing wrong with the lesson here but this sounds fake. Those are the two most superficial stereotypes of class life with no explanation how you bridged that gap. There is a big jump in happiness when you no longer have to worry about making ends meet. From there, you just have to not get caught up in consumer envy.

But hey this is the internet so who knows

intensely_human ,

Well I’m sorry it sounds fake. Stories about my life often do because I have a weird combinaron of characteristics that lead to weird situations, leading to a density of adventures that most people find simply unbelievable.

Also, if it’s fake there’s definitely something wrong with the lesson. Nobody should be making shit up to teach lessons. Lessons need to come from the truth.

Jolteon ,

Yep, money can buy you the bottom tier and a half of that triangle. Everything above that is up to you.

corsicanguppy ,

I'll leave this here.

The happiest nations of the world aren't obsessed with chasing money and hoarding it because they've been supported by their neighbours from birth to where they're working and supporting their own neighbours. So many of the things that Americans hoard money to try and prevent are just ... handled .. by everyone's neighbour, anonymously. The knowledge that this coordination and 'smoothing' of stressful troubles is done anonymously, regularly, and unilaterally, serves to reduce a lot of the effects of food insecurity and health insecurity and shelter insecurity. They have a system that works, and it's shown to be reliable, and people are more calm.

So I'm not going to say how they achieve that, except "find the objectively-ranked happiest nations of the world and either move there or convince your government to do what they're doing" and I'll move on. It's not hard, but you're going to go through stages of disbelief (nah, that can't work because people will cheat), bargaining (can I cheat please?), etc, and either you'll be ultimately frustrated at the fact that your locale just can't get there, or you'll be moving to the locales where they're doing it.

intensely_human ,

I just want to add that a substantial social safety net doesn’t have to be a loss of freedom. You can keep it broad and level and market activity can happen above it while still processing information.

As a libertarians, I often argue with other libertarians about this. To me, being a libertarian is about making liberty the highest value to be sought by governmental design. A reduction of risk for everyone across the board increases liberty. It leaves people free to engage with others as they see fit and to seek profit wherever they will.

That calm thing you’re talking about is huge. One of the prerequisites of anything that can be called freedom is the ability to think clearly, and science has shown that the more stress and uncertainty a person is under chronically, they less clearly they can think. Freedom means being able to do what you choose, and people can’t really choose if they’re sleep deprived, full of adrenalin and cortisol. Like, the psychological literature calls that “ego depletion”, and with good reason. A person whose willpower budget is always drained, and therefore can’t control themselves, is not a free person.

Never underestimate the ability of a few good policies to increase individual liberty. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.

Hugh_Jeggs ,

Liberté, Égalité, Fraternité

Appoxo ,
@Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

IMO: Not having to worry about money.
Bonus points if you could easily absorb being jobless for 1-2 years while not making any compromises.

corsicanguppy ,

IMO: Not having to worry about money.

'enough' is massively subjective. Not worrying about money is also very personal.

In America, where people need to sell their house for medical costs - even with a 'good' insurance plan - I don't know any number would free me from worry.

Appoxo ,
@Appoxo@lemmy.dbzer0.com avatar

That's where the bonus points come in. Ability to easily absorb 1-2 years being jobless wirhout compromising in your living style.

LoreleiSankTheShip ,

Epicureanism teaches that you will never have enough money, enough fame, enough influence, so chasing after those will never make you happy. Instead, you should focus on fulfilling your needs and fixing problems in your life, getting enough to eat, enough sleep, surrounding yourself with friends and enjoying the small things in life. When you're unburdened by needs, you reach long-lasting happiness.

So to me, that means earning enough to fulfill your needs is enough, especially if you don't have to worry about losing your job any time soon

bjornsno ,

Oooh look at Epicure over here, just casually getting in his 8 hours of sleep. Brag more king.

On a serious note, the capitalists have commercialized all of this. Getting enough to eat might be doable with a meager income technically, but eating well and healthy is expensive. Getting a good bed in a nice living space that facilitates rest well costs a fortune. So you need two middle class plus jobs to afford it for yourself and your partner, which comes with its own set of stressors.

The small things in life are also actively commercialized. A coffee with friends? Better save up for the chain cafe prices. A movie night in? Remember to pay your Netflix subscription. A hike? Gotta pay for gas to get there, depending on where you live. I'm not saying it's impossible to have small things for free/cheap, it's just not that easy. There's also going to be constant social pressure, through advertisement or influencers, first or secondhand, to do all the things they tell you will make you more happy. You'll have to actively resist that, which in turn can cause you to become distanced from your social circle.

God forbid you get sick, the health insurance and pharmaceutical industry will fleece you and in some countries leave you with crippling debt, making all of the above out of reach for you.

All of this to say: money isn't just something you have to chase after for the sake of it in our current society, it's an absolute necessity to try to have more than what you think you actually need in the moment to get by and enjoy the small things. It might sound cliche, but "society is like stacked against us, man" is actually a completely true statement.

corsicanguppy ,

Epicureanism

Word nerds spell 'lagom' weird.

eran_morad ,

When i am convinced that my children will each have at least enough money for a good education and a home of their own. If my next twenty years are as successful as my last twenty years, then I’ll have enough money only after i can also fund my grandchildrens’ educations.

It’s kind of a shit world that we’re leaving for the next generations. I’ll try to look out for mine before i fuck off to the great beyond.

Nighed ,
@Nighed@feddit.uk avatar

Part of the problem is that most people will spend most of their time around people of a similar wealth level. They will therefore always be around people richer than themselves and generally see less people that are much poorer (at least in a personal context).

This means that 'rich' people don't feel rich. (Unless they are self aware enough to realise it). It also means that your references for morals etc are now other rich people rather than 'normal' people (although it's normal to them!)

Therefore, they always want to acquire more money, and their references for how to go about that are the richer people who have already done similar things.

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