US is a poor country

[Eldad]

Reminds me of every Bloomberg Opinion article title. Find something almost universally true, then make the title say the opposite, then employ the worlds worst argument to take advantage of our reactionary passions on the one hand and over open-mindedness on the other. 
 

 

Edited 12 hours ago by Eldad

[Sinbius]

33 minutes ago, whiskybravo said:

Fair enough! It is absolutely the right spot and it’s been a fun debate.  But you have to admit, starting a thread titled US is a poor country is a pretty massive piece of bait.  

 

 

 

I admit it 

 

..but I had "good" intention...I find this idealization of the American dream wrong...most American are not doing well...and that could be said of course of the people of other countries...the difference is that other countries are not in denial...

 

 

Edited 12 hours ago by Sinbius

[Castanza]

3 hours ago, LC said:

The US does a great job making massive amounts of edible food as cheaply as possible. I do question the sustainability. We pump dead soil full of ammonia, we suck water and drain natural water tables, and then every end product is either bathed in bleach or assaulted with radiation to sterilize it. Quality sucks, however. But the goal is not quality, the goal is to feed 400 million people as cheaply as possible.

 

It's no wonder we are also the leader in developing drugs to control for obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure. 

 

Wendell Berry is that you? 

[EBITDAg]

1 hour ago, Malmqky said:

The U.S. has insane wealth disparity. Obviously. 

Because the richest people (who are mostly 1st or 2nd generation immigrants) came to the US and built enormous companies in the country with the highest disposable incomes and deepest capital markets. Not because the poor in America are so much worse off than poor Italians. There are just way more rich people in the US.

[Eldad]

17 minutes ago, Sinbius said:

 

I admit it 

 

..but I had "good" intention...I find this idealization of the American dream wrong...most American are not doing well...and that could be said of course of the people of other countries...the difference is that other countries are not in denial...

 

 

By some measures the US is 5th in median household income and by others it is 2nd. So the average person is doing among the best in the world without the billionaires. The countries above the US are tax shelters or petroleum states. If the median person is 2nd or 5th, how are the majority not doing well exactly? 
 

The above average person and entrepreneur class is doing fantastically better than everywhere else. 10% of the US are millionaires. Representing 40% of millionaires worldwide with 5% of the worlds population. 
 

The US also has by far the largest economy and almost all of the worlds great businesses. 
 

Who is in denial here? Everyone or you? 

[Castanza]

Wealth in a vacuum doesn't mean much. Accessibility to goods, services, and opportunities is far more important. The US does this pretty damn well imo. Sure we don't have the living museum aesthetics (we should have been Art Deco) like much of Europe; and we have gone down the corporatocracy path a little too far (imo)....But there is no question that opportunity is abundant in the US for all and to get started not much effort is needed. 

 

Also in the US we like space! Cannot imagine being stuffed in a 100sqft townhome with my kids, parents, grandparents and in-laws.....Sounds like Hell on earth 

[Sinbius]

33 minutes ago, Eldad said:

By some measures the US is 5th in median household income and by others it is 2nd. So the average person is doing among the best in the world without the billionaires. The countries above the US are tax shelters or petroleum states. If the median person is 2nd or 5th, how are the majority not doing well exactly? 
 

The above average person and entrepreneur class is doing fantastically better than everywhere else. 10% of the US are millionaires. Representing 40% of millionaires worldwide with 5% of the worlds population. 
 

The US also has by far the largest economy and almost all of the worlds great businesses. 
 

Who is in denial here? Everyone or you? 

 

Median household income is incomplete without accounting to the cost of living and debt situation ( and how it decrease from the median down the curve...)...

What you have said it is true...but at the same time The U.S. bottom 50% generally possesses less real purchasing power than their counterparts in Western and Northern Europe...(source :⁠ World Inequality Database (WID) and the ⁠OECD Income and Wealth Distribution Databases.)

Edited 11 hours ago by Sinbius

[LC]

45 minutes ago, Castanza said:

Wendell Berry is that you? 

 

I had never heard of Wendell Berry but sounds like an interesting guy. Reminds me a bit of Henry Thoreau. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendell_Berry

 

 

30 minutes ago, Castanza said:

and we have gone down the corporatocracy path a little too far (imo)....But there is no question that opportunity is abundant in the US for all and to get started not much effort is needed. 

 

Agree with this take. The anti-corporate criticism all is a bit romantic but I think there's a fair point buried in the sentiment. 

[Castanza]

12 minutes ago, LC said:

 

I had never heard of Wendell Berry but sounds like an interesting guy. Reminds me a bit of Henry Thoreau. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wendell_Berry

 

 

 

Agree with this take. The anti-corporate criticism all is a bit romantic but I think there's a fair point buried in the sentiment. 

 

The Unsettling Of America is his Magnum Opus and Nick Offerman narrated the audio book. Very much in line with Thoreau although slightly different focuses. Goes great with a glass of Kentucky Bourbon.

[Eldad]

1 hour ago, Sinbius said:

 

Median household income is incomplete without accounting to the cost of living and debt situation ( and how it decrease from the median down the curve...)...

What you have said it is true...but at the same time The U.S. bottom 50% generally possesses less real purchasing power than their counterparts in Western and Northern Europe...(source :⁠ World Inequality Database (WID) and the ⁠OECD Income and Wealth Distribution Databases.)

Ok so top 50% is unparalleled in the world basically. And if you tweak a lot of things, the Bottom 50% is maybe top 10 or 15 when compared to small, mostly homogeneous, semi-socialist European countries with no social dynamism. How do you get “poor” from that?

You are starting to remind me of the German propagandist on the speaker in Saving Private Ryan “the Statue of Liberty is Kaput”

[wabuffo]

On 7/19/2026 at 3:49 PM, Sinbius said:

Hi,

 

I always get the impression that people on this forum think of US as a rich country...with a great capitalistic system that produce wealth left and right if you only want to put the effort and have the initiative to do something in your life...the American dream...everyone has a shot at big success...

 

Enough talk let's show the numbers (global wealth report 2026 is the source)...: 

Median Wealth vs. Mean Wealth per Adult

 

Rank (Median)	Country / Market	Median Wealth (USD)	Mean Wealth (USD)	Impact of Inequality / Insights
1	Luxembourg	$394,005	$654,732	Balanced distribution; exceptionally wealthy middle class.
2	Belgium	$277,166	$408,000	High wealth equality with widespread homeownership.
3	Australia	$210,783	$616,036	Widespread wealth, but heavily skewed upward by ultra-rich.
4	New Zealand	$206,617	$449,852	Strong balance between total country wealth and distribution.
5	Denmark	$203,771	$523,344	Robust social safety net supporting middle-class stability.
6	Hong Kong (SAR)	$187,968	$648,267	Major financial hub with extreme capital concentration at the top.
7	Canada	$147,811	$399,886	Significantly more equitable distribution than its US neighbor.
11	Italy	~ $110,000	$279,439	Solid baseline wealth due to high homeownership and private savings.
15	Germany	$53,485	$346,613	Low homeownership rates; real estate wealth is concentrated in few hands.
28	United States	$68,998	$696,277	Extreme gap; billionaires heavily inflate a mean detached from daily reality.

 

This data is from the UBS Global Wealth Report 2026.   Yet the same report in 2025 had median US Wealth Per Adult = $124,041.   

 

Was there a Great Depression II that hit the US in the last year? 

$124k in 2025 to $69k in 2026?   lolz.

 

I think this study and its results should be taken with a big grain of NaCl.

 

The Federal Reserve does a triannual Survey of Consumer Finances and the latest study in 2025 pegged median US family net worth at $192,900.  

 

And as others have mentioned, Americans owe a much lower percentage of their median wealth to the value of their principal residence (see chart below from the OECD).  In terms of liquid median net worth, it adds some more context to some of the numbers.

 

 

Bill

Edited 3 hours ago by wabuffo

[Red Lion]

5 hours ago, Sinbius said:

 

False statement according to ⁠World Inequality Database (WID) and the ⁠OECD Income and Wealth Distribution Databases.

 

The U.S. bottom 50% generally possesses less real purchasing power than their counterparts in Western and Northern Europe.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I just asked ChatGPT what percentage of Americans work full time, and the answer was 48.6% with another 10% working part time. It doesn't seem like any huge surprise that the bottom 50% generally possess less purchasing power since they're not working... 

 

If 50% of a society doesn't work, then they will have the most purchasing power when there's a stronger safety net. Meanwhile, it seems like a lot of the countries with great safety nets don't have as much opportunity for wealth creation from looking at the numbers you're presenting. 

 

As far as the median net worth, I feel like the health insurance setup in the USA probably plays the biggest role in this. The biggest obstacle (in the USA) to starting a business, is being able to maintain/afford health insurance. Same problem for anyone who doesn't have a corporate/government job. But you can get free or nearly free insurance by keeping a low income (with ACA) and almost zero assets (with Medicaid). There are plenty of Medicaid recipients that could save some money, but it would be foolish to do so since it would mean getting kicked off of medical insurance. If you're in the bottom 50%, you probably need to bridge the gap to the top 20-30% just to make up for the differential in health insurance costs. When you factor in SNAP, discounted utility rates, section 8 type housing, and EITC, these all act as a huge disincentive for the poor/lower middle class to make otherwise good financial decisions. This framework keeps lots of people poor, costs the taxpayers (almost exclusively the rich by the way) more in the long run, and steers more of our economic activity under the table. 

[Marco Van Basten]

10 hours ago, Sinbius said:

 

I admit it 

 

..but I had "good" intention...I find this idealization of the American dream wrong...most American are not doing well...and that could be said of course of the people of other countries...the difference is that other countries are not in denial...

 

 

Where on bloody earth do you get that most Americans are not doing well?   If you exclude those who either became seriously ill or had someone in their immediate family become seriously ill, what % of people who acquired useful skills, worked hard, lived within their means and invested their savings did poorly?  And no, someone who went to Columbia and got a degree in gender studies and now can't get a job does not qualify.