How Much Money Should You Have?

The MaxSpeak Gospel of Wealth

The podcaster Hasan Piker has become the Great Satan of the U.S. Left. I’m not going to bother unpacking all of his controversial details. Who cares? I know more than all of these characters. They have money, but I know stuff.

The other side always needs a boogieman, and if they lack one, they will just make him up. I note that Piker is said to have a net worth of $8 million. A similar question pertains to the Black Lives Matter celebrities said to be sitting on millions in real estate holdings. For a Lefty, is that too much? Yes! Kudos to Professor David Greenberg of NYU, who bequeathed $5 million to the Democratic Socialists of America. Better late than never. May he R.I.P.

I take for a point of reference my own family. We live quite well by my lights with annual incomes from pensions and Social Security combined well under $200K. Google says median household income in the U.S. is about $84K, so by that standard we are rich. (Trust me, we don’t feel rich.)

With pretty safe bonds, say 4 percent, you can make $40K a year on a million dollar balance. So by my standard, $5 million should be enough if you have no job. Gross it up a bit since I live in a low-cost area and we lucked into a low-rate mortgage, or cut it back if you can still work. He who does not work, who is able and below retirement age, fuck him.

There is an idea on the Left of a “maximum wage.” I used to think it was dumb, since it implies a marginal tax rate of 100 percent. The politics and administration of such a tax would be daunting, but I no longer think the underlying, motivating idea is so dumb.

This reminds me of The Rolling Stones’ emigration to the friendlier tax haven of France. In his very entertaining autobiography, guitar-god Keith Richards complains that U.K. taxes would take 90 percent of their earnings, so why do concerts? I was a bit sympathetic.

90 percent sounds high, though I suspect his resentment was motivated more by the need to establish the worth of his work rather than personal spending needs, even after taking the costs of his flagrant consumption of heroin and coke into account. I also suspect for Mick Jagger, thanks to his serial marriages, spending needs loomed larger. (Incidentally, there is a new tv documentary about Richards and the group that I liked.)

There are jobs or work I would do for free. The problem is that the sponsors or audience attaches the value of the product to whatever it cost, so I always insisted on getting paid, the more the better. It wasn’t because I needed the money.

The cost of living in places such as New York City or San Francisco can be astronomical (Obviously, I wish Mayor Mamdani the best of luck in changing this), but not everybody has to live there. So too the cost of child care and educating the kids, if you shun the public schools. It’s a huge waste of money that should be donated to Doctors Without Borders or people like Francesca Hong. Families whose primary residences have ballooned in value should be downsizing, moving to Akron, and disgorging their capital gains.

My electrician moved to West Virginia, where he says he is “redneck rich.” I think he must have come from my own county, one of the richest in the U.S. I live in Virginia, not among the highest tax states, but not the lowest either.

I once tried to become super-rich. I think I would have given most of it away, especially to lefty projects, but I never got the chance to demonstrate my altruistic inclinations. Riches were not forthcoming. More the reverse, actually. But I made sure I would end up safely solvent. I would like that for everybody. Under socialism, everybody is solvent because public benefits obviate the need for private sector insurance and great accumulations of wealth. Nobody has to die for lack of money or beg on Gofundme to pay for a life-saving operation.

I don’t begrudge anyone the need to make a living, even to finance a mid-to-upscale lifestyle or fancy hobbies. But there is a limit. Skydiving or golf, o.k. Collecting numerous classic cars or owning a Lear jet, too much.

Another factor is that, as for young athletes, levels of wealth that are volatile because the high incomes are transitory may need to last a long time. I still think a net worth of $4 million for almost anyone, not counting the house, is a solid amount. If you have more, you should be giving it away. There is a multitude of options. And I don’t mean me (though don’t hold back!). Billionaires? Forget it. Shoot them, or send them to a collective farm.

One has to wonder about the bona fides of self-proclaimed lefty leaders who accumulate like Ebenezer Scrooge. Michael Moore, whose films I thought were brilliant, was said to own a ridiculously huge estate, but he blamed that on his wife. I read online that in his divorce, he and his soon-to-be ex-wife divided nine properties between them. Too much!

As Andrew Carnegie in his “The Gospel of Wealth” said, “He who dies rich dies disgraced.”