The median net worth of a 65-year-old in the United States is about $390k, so the income it produces is generally a modest supplement to social security. At the 75th percentile, which is also generally considered middle class, net worth is about $1.1 million and easily enough to provide a comfortable retirement lifestyle.
The idea that someone is middle class because they’ve earned a penny in bank interest is absurd.
No, the idea is that the middle class (defined in the conventional way) spends time in both the “worker” category and the “owner” category.
The ordinary middle class pathway is to work for 30-50 years and then retire on their savings (or a defined contribution retirement plan) or to rely on a defined benefit pension fund that is itself invested in securities, aka capital. This is the baseline expectation of retirement planning for the middle class in the U.S.: the investments/savings provide the cash to live on, while ownership of the primary residence shields the retiree from certain housing costs, or can provide cash flow through a reverse mortgage.
Through the power of compounding, a 40+ year savings plan generally increases its value over time so that the vast majority of the value comes from return on investment rather than invested principal.
If you want specific calculations, we can do that to show that the typical middle class path takes in more than “a very small amount” in their retirement savings/investments.
Or are you planning on coming back with a load of caveats
These details are obvious from my first comment in this thread, that the middle class in the United States works its way into an “ownership class” in time for retirement, through savings/investment. That’s exactly what I meant in that comment, and spelling it out makes it pretty clear what I meant at that time, and that I haven’t shifted my position in this thread.
I’m not talking about people who only make a small amount of interest or investment return over the course of their lifetimes. I’m talking about people who are already unambiguously middle class (between 25th and 75th percentile incomes), who end up relying on investment income to provide most of their retirement expenses.
I’m talking about people with half million dollar 401(k)s that return hundreds of thousands over the course of a retirement. Some of it is principal but most of it is gains/return/interest.
Basically if you’re able to retire in America, you’re an “owner” for those decades. Yes, there are people in America who can’t afford to retire, but most people in the middle class can.
Defining the middle class as middle incomes is pretty conventional. I think you’ve misunderstood my description of the middle class (people who fit the definition generally have income from both work and from investment) as a definition.
So let me be perfectly clear:
And hey, I was gonna let it go but it’s clear your autocorrect has now adopted it as a new word it will happily let you spell wrong repeatedly: it’s spelled petit bourgeois, or petit bourgeoisie for plural.