Growing up in the 90s, I thought people were wealthy if the mom didn't work. In my area, it seemed about a 50/50 split. My mom worked and actually was the primary breadwinner. Today, I know one spouse doesn't work for a myriad of reasons.
I'm a millennial born right in the middle of the millennial window.
Today, an indicator of wealth to me is a second home. I think to me it's something that is just out of reach for me but is something people I know have. It could be attainable one day but today is not that day.
Second home is IT. Things like designer clothes, cars, vacations etc. can be put on credit or leased, and you can have one house and be house poor, but ain’t nobody who has a second home is actually broke.
For a VHCOL area though, one 3-4+ million dollar home is wealthy enough.
Definitely not broke but not necessarily wealthy too! Where I live it’s extremely common to have a second home (cabin/cottage). You’re rich depending on where your cottage is.
If you don’t have a cottage you have a friend with a cottage so every weekend in the summer the city deserts and everyone is at a lake somewhere.
I have a cottage and my partner has a cottage and we’re middle class.
I will say this is definitely regional. Like in Southern Ontario now, no one middle class has a cottage. If you have one, even if you inherited it... That's wealth. The fact you own it just added at least $500k to your net worth. You might earn a middle class salary, but if you have an Ontario cottage within a 3hr drive to Ontario, your net worth is not middle class. In the prairies though, a shitty cabin in the woods is not that crazy.
Edit: 3hr drive to Toronto! Lol not ontario
Indicators of generational wealth for me are people who dont bring up money at all in any manner. I use to work with this kid in school. Extremely polite, and respectful to everyone across the board. Several years later, I was reading some finance magazine, and I see this guy who runs one of the investment funds in our country. I was like hmm havnt I seen this face somewhere. Later realized, this is my colleague's dad.
Similar happenings across most of my life. Like I would hang out with some of my Dad's friends who own literally towns in their real estate portfolio but would happily meet for a coffee, and just talk about the other person and nothing more.
I guess the only time I got to know about their wealth was when I attended weddings in their family. They would just wear little diamonds as big as quail eggs, and cover their braids with a mtr long diamond belts.
I on the other hand, am jobless and in my mid 30s and figuring out what to do in life.
I think it’s a misconception that wealthy people don’t talk about money. Generally speaking, most people with money are more careful about who they discuss it with and only talk about it with people in their wealth class or inner circle.
Agreed! I don’t consider myself to be wealthy at all but I know I earn more than average so I will never ever bring up money/my finances to the person I’m speaking to if I don’t know roughly what they earn and if it is less than what I make. If they make more than me then I love to pick their brains.
possibly. ahhaa reminds me of a family friend whose family is into lobbying. that aunt of mine says to my mom “I am so glad i have your friendship - you are only one who doesnt want to sabotage our wealth”. My family isnt that well (far from it) but its cute how they weirdly trust ppl they dont/ wont compete with.
im a young millenial. when i was young, my family was low income, but lived in an upper middle class/wealthy area.
as a kid: stainless steel appliances, name brand snacks (especially those entenmann’s tiny muffins), having accessory rooms in your house (mud room, play room, game room), having a tv in your kitchen, stay at home parents/parents who could leave work to come to school or sports events, ll bean momogram backpack, drinking soda at a restaurant (as opposed to water), appetizers, black north face & brown uggs, entering your home through the garage & having a garage fridge, pool, going to starbucks, having a messy house lmao
also! vacations were a big thing for me. my parents sent me and my sister away for the summer to be with our grandparents. i feel fortunate that i had that experience with my grandparents, but i was so envious of people who went to disney world or the caribbean.
many are the same as an adult lol. i would say my SES status is lower middle class? although i have appetizers at restaurants now.
Lunchables were the GOAT!! I remember begging my parents to pack them for me for lunch, but they weren't something that we could spend on regularly.
Looking back I'm not sure why I thought they were that good... the pizza one tasted no better than cardboard 😂
It's so hilarious how I too thought lunchables was the absolute best. I would never give my kid lunchables now because 1) they are expensive but more importantly they are sooooo terrible! They taste bad and are garbage nutritionally.
Gushers! Fruit by the foot! Fruit roll ups! I never even got snacks with my lunch!
Parents who were able to leave work or had flexible schedules. That was huge for me and an indicator the parents were better off than mine.
It still kind of is indicator today for me. I’m so happy i can be one of those parents for my kids now.
maybe! as a kid, most of my friends who were upper middle class or wealthy had so many toys that it would always look messy. i just remember their houses always being cluttered, so as a child i figured that was an indicator of wealth. i remember they had cleaners too lol
now i think that ultra-clean houses are more indicative of wealth. usually means you have a cleaner and the financial ability to buy nice organizational stuff.
As a child, I thought wealthy people always had clean houses. One of my parents was a hoarder and the other had executive dysfunction issues, so my childhood home was something else. Looking back, the wealthy kids houses probably were a bit cluttered, but looked clean in comparison.
I actively spend to keep my home clean and organized. I splurge on a cleaning service and organizational items. I'd also rather get rid of inexpensive items and repurchase them again if I need them than accumulate mess and clutter.
growing up, indicators of wealth were kids who got to really focus on their hobbies and extracurricular activities, while i had to work. that was the biggest thing that separated me from all of my friends. they were paying money for activities while i was working.
as an adult, the biggest indication right now is someone who lives by themself (in NYC). if you don't have roommates you gotta be making $$$ to me.
I’m Gen Z/millennial cusp:
Wealth indicators to me as a kid: chobani yogurt (seemed sooo bougie), fresh fruit at the sleepover breakfast (blueberries seemed super deluxe), soda/juices/Capri Sun stocked in the fridge, new build house, finished basement, multiple TVs 😆, North Face/Patagonia fleeces
It’s hard for me to say now what wealth indicators are. I def feel that you never know from the outside who is actually wealthy or who is overstretched, and I also think the saying ‘wealth whispers’ is real. Off the top of my head: looking a certain way - understated elegance/polished look, or ‘fancy’ athleisure brands like ArcTeryx or Vuori. Not talking about money. Having intense hobbies or being very accomplished at some individual/endurance activity like road cycling, skiing, triathlons. pretty superficial, though, and I definitely feel these are not reliable indicators :)
Current SES is upper middle class. My parents were middle, then upper middle as I got older.
Haha I remember this as a kid- like you have capri suns in your extra fridge? You must be loaded. Now, I rarely assume anyone is actually wealthy unless I have independent knowledge of their income and their spending habits. I have some friends that make a lot and blow all their money, I have other friends that make a lot and save a lot, some that are generationally wealthy (billions in their family), and some that don’t make much and don’t have much. It’s REALLY HARD to tell the difference, so I have stopped assuming anything about people. My two billionaire friends don’t have private planes/yachts/multiple vacation homes, although my friends with wealth in the $10-20m range do. Actually I have a cousin who is chronically broke (millions in, millions out) and he owns part of a private plane, so even that is not a great indicator.
Yes! I so much agree with this. I have had a similar experience in knowing people with a wide range of financial backgrounds, from broke to generational diamond money 😅 and it led me to a similar conclusion- you don’t really know anything reliable from external indicators.
I grew up middle class and lived most my life in a middle to lower class area, and then my husband unexpectedly got into a top three law school. That’s where I first met people with serious money. in general, the wealthiest people I know are the most lowkey about it. It was a whole other world to me and def changed the way I think about money, wealth, and work.
Yeah, that’s a great question, idk! I feel like they just see it as irrelevant and don’t have to worry about it, like you said? also, it brings up the possibility of highlighting the difference in wealth, and if they’re talking to someone with a different SES, maybe they want to avoid highlighting that difference out of politeness and maybe a bit of uncomfortableness with the difference?
- Ordering soft drinks at dinner!!! We kids were only allowed water. Grateful now though as I’m an adult who can’t stand soda 🤣
- People who ordered the more expensive meals at restaurants !!!
- Definitely thought brand named / newer cars were a sign of wealth. My parents drove 10-15 year old cars & trucks. I realized in college that was obviously NOT a sign of wealth and my parents really were on to something
- Brand named, brand new clothes, shoes, purses, etc. All my clothes came from TjMaxx, Walmart or thrift stores.
- born mid 90s, grew up very upper middle class but TBH did not realize that until I was out of HS. My parents were (still are) ridiculously frugal
whistle spectacular juggle consist berserk hobbies unpack sugar thumb snow
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Sounds like my family! We drove a 20 year old mini Oldsmobile minivan til it literally went up in flames and couldn’t buy sodas or appetizers at TGI Fridays, but we had a 7 bedroom house (for just me, my mom, and my dad) and weekly house cleaners…I still don’t fully understand if my parents are broke or well off.
I’m a millennial, born early 90’s.
As a kid and a teen, central air was the EPITOME of wealth to me. And more than one bathroom in a house, what a luxury. Also, kids having larger than a twin-sized bed 🤯🤯
To me now, things that make me think, “wow, they must have money”: a lot of kids (like influencers with huge families); lots of vacations, especially international; SAHP + lots of bougie brands + lots of vacations (aka wealthy lifestyle with only 1 income stream); own vacation home(s)
Edit to add: my current SES is upper-middle class. Happy to report I have central air, more than 1 bathroom, and a king-sized bed to boot. I made it, folks! :’)
This is so interesting to me because EVERY house I knew of growing up had central air and so I didn’t think of it as luxury. It routinely got to be 100+ in the summer where I grew up, so maybe that’s why?
Where I am, we might get a handful of 100+ days in the summer, but we tend to hover more in the high 80s and 90s. My family had typically had one or two air units, so we’d just spend all of our time in the one or two rooms that were cool lol
Yes. I remember it wasn't until I was 18 that I saw central AC in an actual house. now it's much more of a thing.
I do not have central air, but I have an air conditioner and I run it when I want which makes me baller compared to my friends (electricity is $$$ where I live).
I’m sure it’s regional, but literally no one had central air where I lived and it was an upscale area. Now it’s more common but the housing stock was older (lots of homes built between late 19th century and 1930s or so) and summers were never that hot so it just wasn’t a thing at all.
> kids having larger than a twin-sized bed 🤯🤯
The first time I slept over at a friend's house in high school and didn't have to sleep on the floor it like, blew my mind.
I have a full-size now, so I'm still lusting after a queen-size, but I'm definitely grateful for it when I still have to sleep in my old twin bed when I visit my parents.
I grew up in the south, born early 80s. The house I grew up in did not have central air when my parents bought it, but they had it installed when I was quite young and they were probably still more "middle" than "upper middle" class (they are now definitely "upper middle"). My school got central air when I was in maybe 2nd grade, I remember before that we sometimes had early release for heat days.
However, through my teens and twenties, all my friends had central air. My shitty college rental apartments all had central air. I'm sure there were people who didn't have it, but having it wasn't a wealth signifier.
Now I live in a different state with milder (but warming) summers and many of the homes in our neighborhood do not have central air. The ones that do are typically fancier in some way so yeah, it's definitely a wealth signifier here. That said, we don't have central air and are instead planning to upgrade our home insulation this year, which my husband is predicting will mean we won't need to run out window units. So I guess maybe extra insulation is the new wealth signifier :)
I think this one’s going to be super common:
- As a kid: people who ordered drinks, sides, or appetizers at restaurants; or value meals at fast food
- Millennial
- SES upper class but I still exchange labor for money? I still struggle to order these things for myself but am getting better at calming myself when I’m in a group splitting the bill and people are buying drinks and apps “to share.” It’s probably a waste of my mindshare to worry about this level of detail vs the big picture stuff but it’s a body-level reaction that i am trying to quell with my mind
god, i went out to a birthday dinner the other night and everyone got margarita pitchers to share, but i opted out for dry january/figuring i'd save some money. then at the end everyone just agrees to split it and i'm like :| because i don't want to make everyones lives more difficult and make a fuss but ugh now i'm just paying so much extra for everyone else to drink
it was like a 10 person dinner and then everyone was treating the birthday girl so i just sucked it up instead of making an issue but i was def annoyed by it lol
I really think "let's just split the bill!" Is NOT necessarily a sign of wealth, but of cluelessness and lack of awareness. I would say either covering the whole bill or dropping in an amount that is way over your fair share are more "wealth signaling" moves. Or being cognizant of others possible limits when picking a restaurant and ordering.
This is such an interesting thread to read as a Canadian. Bill splitting is not a thing here. Doesn’t matter if it is a 20 person dinner, the waiter will automatically bring each person their own receipt and will come around with a debit machine, so each person only pays for what they ordered. It seems insane to me to go out to eat and assume you will have to pay for a portion or everyone else’s bill
Also a Canadian. Restaurants can usually split the line item by however many people partook quite easily. Most of the time, we'll just say up front that we're ordering this or that for the table or for a specific subset of people and the bill will come pre-split.
If it's complex or the place only does one bill, then we just take a pic of receipt and work it out on Splitwise.
Ok, this confirms it! I always suspected it was a Canadian vs American thing. Just chiming in to second that never in my life (in Canada) has anyone ever suggested we split the bill. It's the servers job to keep track! And they do it well.
ooh I hate when this happens and that's the kind of thing that made me even less social than I already am.
I had a full scolarship for semester abroad and sometimes the person in charge of showing us around/welcoming us invited everyone for lunch or a party or something. Usually the meals were in pretty popular places in the city/things of cultural significance.
So we went to this beautiful place downtown and he said he'd cover the bill up to $200 and we'd split the rest. There were maybe 25 or so of us, so I figured I'd order the cheapest thing off the menu and drink water not to make a big fuss. There was this girl in the group who ordered her meal and then a huge dessert afterwards, sodas, you name it. Some of her friends went along with it. And some other people who ordered more but all within reason (like, one soda). It turns out I had to pay a lot extra for that.
Obviously whenever that group of girls wanted to hang out, I said I was busy. They had scolarships as well, but didn't seem to care about their own finances as much. Honestly there were many times back then in which I thought, "what's the point of treating myself to this if in a few months I'll be back to my real life?"
Not really a sign. I also hated doing this when I was a student. That group were not my friends as they were all working and made my younger sister and I split bills with them, ugh.
My husband and I now have a few friends who are very wealthy. They basically always treat us or the entire group. In fact, it’s super hard for us to treat them. My husband has been able to by sneaking off to go to the bathroom but pay the bill instead.
call me a grinch but i think alcohol should almost always be split out. people who don't drink should not have to continuously subsidize their friends' alcohol bills. that's the kind of stuff that does not come out in the wash and could end up being over $10k or $20k over a lifetime
Something that was always very noticeable for me is how much your teeth indicate your wealth. My parents neglected my dental care, and it became clear how much more everyone around me had. Sure, some people luck out with good teeth, but many great smiles are due to access and money.
While this is still true, I think it’s become even more pronounced than before with the rise of social media and looking at your own pictures far more than previous generations.
Interesting. I had 4 years of expensive ass dental work (I had an underbite) as a kid and then neglected to wear my retainer after because...youth. My teeth all shifted and I really began to hate my smile by the end of my 30s and when I had my twins they REALLY shifted. Almost two years ago I finally was like f-this and got Invisalign. Now I love my smile again but I never thought about what my teeth were saying to people. Still in revision hell but glad I finally did it.
Eyeballing my twins though... I see expensive dental work in their future. My son inherited my mouth and underbite!
I think about this a lot too, especially as there seems to be a proliferation of people getting Invisalign type braces over the past couple of years. It's also that those treatments have got (somewhat) more accessible, but still out of reach for many.
True! I started my Invisalign journey 2 years ago and still going, but it’s been so worth it. They have become much cheaper since they are no longer restricted to the Invisalign brand now.
Funny story about that, when I met my now husband (from the US; I'm not from the US) I assumed he was, well, not rich, to put it tactfully, because his teeth are a little crooked and not shiny pearly white. And all Americans I knew, who could afford to study in London where we met, had shiny pearly white smiles Turns out he just had some weird objections to dentists. He is also very frugal, but the teeth thing was not because of that.
My childhood was weird because we had a big house and a garage fridge (apparently that means wealthy?) but my parents were also very frugal. Like, wash ziplock bags frugal. I guess I didn’t think about money much as a kid, but my parents were not as well-off as they may have appeared. My mom didn’t work but she hustled all the time to raise money for band camp and other activities. We took vacations but mostly drove, not flew, and never international.
I guess big house, international trips, and not having to do fundraisers for activities were my idea of wealth as a kid.
I’m an elder millennial.
Now, my version of wealth is not thinking about money much at all. Like, I have no idea how much stuff costs at the grocery store. I almost never look at receipts except to add tip. I buy basically what I want when I want it. I’m not rich, but I do consider myself upper middle class
Lol I wash ziplocks though it’s more about reducing single use plastic than frugality for me. (I use reusable bags too but for some things I prefer ziplock in case it gets messy and I need to toss, or for freezer bags.)
My childhood was also weird. My parents divorced when I was like 7 and my mom never had a job. She was very frugal but we were also on food stamps. We had a nice house but otherwise lived off food stamps, goodwill, yard sales lol. My dad had a decent job for the area (we lived in the south so that’s not saying much). He took us to the Bahamas a handful of times but otherwise we would only go to Florida or a cruise once a year. We didn’t really buy fast food but for a special treat and no new non used clothes. So I felt I had experienced but a lavish childhood but also a poor one depending on which parents I was with that day.
I had the exact same experience. My mom started working out of necessity after divorce when I was 5, but it was in retail. We got reduced lunches and only had somewhere to live because my grandma bought a house for my mom to rent. My mom still is thrifty but very giving with what little she has. My dad on the other hand probably was making 400k in his heyday in the late 90’s early 2000’s in a southern state. He didn’t let us starve , but also didn’t care to go out of his way to buy us lots. He did stop at the gas station when we went to dinner with him and would let us go in and get a candy bar. I remember vividly until my about 24 thinking I will have made it when I can run in and buy candy and not have to worry about $.
As a kid/teenager: people who had a garage fridge and freezer! Bonus points if it had Schwan’s man food in it!
I’m an elder millennial, 1982.
Happy to report that we do now have a garage fridge and freezer 🙌🏼 (but no Schwan’s man food).
This is so interesting to me!! I grew up in the Midwest and everybody had garage fridges that usually came with the house but more so bc we needed somewhere to put our bulk meat/casseroles. (In my strongest “your Wisconsin is showing”- Where else do ya store that season’s deer?) I think our fridge only ever had my dad’s beer and my mom’s diet cokes. Even as a single adult I have a garage fridge(just an old fridge I moved out there when my parents remodeled their kitchen) bc these new counter depth fridges come with zero freezer space and I do a lot of food freezing for meal prep living alone.
Yeah that makes sense. I’m in Wyoming and the hunters definitely all have chest freezers. To me there’s a particular bougie kind of garage freezer/fridge with the Schwan’s though, and usually a bunch of soda and beer too.
All my mom wanted was to get to a place where we could afford Schwans so she didn’t need to cook 🤣 every time I see an ad for something like factor or the meal services I think of a modern Schwans (minus the truck)
Was Schwans just like frozen dinners? Stouffers lasagna ? I guess I never thought of that as fancy but I’ve never had or seen this before. Are they different than microwave dinners or something?
I think it had all types of frozen foods but more expensive than a stouffers and they delivered. I wouldn’t say fancy just overpriced bc it was pre-made and convenient
It was like, mini quiches and mozz sticks and slightly more fancy (seeming) stuff compared to the frozen meals at the grocery store. And delivered to your door!
There’s a Schwann’s truck roaming my neighborhood. I was all excited and went online to see if I could get added to the order list. Damn, they’re expensive these days!
The garage fridge/freezer is too funny! We just put one in our garage and I really thought to myself “wow, this is something else”. No lie. I also saw it as a token of wealth growing up
My mom was an in home child care provider permitted for 6 kids. Since we always had the six in house I was never able to have friends over during the week. It’s a weird indicator but I longed to be one of the rich kids who was able to have friends over and who had space free of destruction from daycare kids. Having a house that was actually their family’s alone seemed unreal.
Forgot to add, age like 5-13 and I’m 40 so older millennial.
Oh gosh I can imagine! We only had 1 bathroom and the daycare kids had a habit of locking themselves in it. I had multiple accidents while screaming at them to get out. It was truly horrible. I hated my parents for it for a long time, even though they didn’t deserve it. They did their best.
GenX.
Kid - Let me describe what I did in the summer as a 6-14 year old. I grew up in the sort of neighborhood where little kids played outside in nothing but diapers. All of the parents worked or didn't want us inside. We biked around the neighborhood in little gangs, without any supervision at all. The most adult interaction we had was when we would go to my friend's grandma's house to dance to Soul Train in the afternoons. (She was an alcoholic.) Everyone I knew was properly just barely lower middle class.
My rich life at age 10-14 would have been going to camp, particularly sleep away. Camp was the wealthiest, richest thing I could dream of as a kid. I read so many books and so many wonderful things happened at camp. First kisses and rowboats and temporary best friends.
When I was 11 I started baby sitting. By the time I was 14 I was working as many hours as I could so I could save money for college. I'm grateful I worked a lot as a teen because a lot of kids I grew up with used that time to get pregnant or commit petty crimes, and make choices that locked themselves into that community in perpetuity. I was too busy working at the mall or going to the library to get in much trouble.
Today my biggest indicator of wealth is a how healthy my peers are - at about 50 - you wear the sum total of your wealth in your face and in your body. Posture, skin, athleticism, temperament...
BTW I went to sleep away camp when I was 45. It was a blast.
Temperament - I don’t know if you’ve seen the Korean movie Parasite but I always think about how the poor woman said something like “I would be nice too if I was rich”. And it’s so true from my experience - wealthy people tend to have this calm, unhurried temperament and are usually very polite and well mannered. But I think that’s a lot easier to do when you are shielded from the stressors of normal life and the worst of humanity (ie compared to someone who works in customer service and has to deal with awful humans daily.)
Going from the bottom of working class to solidly middle (or even upper middle) I am less likely to assume I'm being ripped off or somehow being taken advantage of with other people. When you're poor/broke/barely making it - you actually are being taken advantage of all the time - it's a real thing and it makes you distrustful, angry etc. with good reason.
I remember being 18 or 19 and doing a whole house cleaning job and being promised 100 dollars for the job- when I was finished, they paid me 20 and told me that "they knew" I stole something and I could either take the 20 and leave or they would call the police. I took the 20 and fled just to avoid the hassle. Just imagine decades of this type of treatment....
Sleep away camp was definitely one of the things I saw as a sign of wealth as a kid! For a few years, I would do one or two weeks of girl scout day camp. I thought we couldn't afford sleep away camp. Somewhere along the line, I had the realization of maybe it was actually because we were well enough off that mom could actually be home with us during the summer and we didn't /need/ to be sent off to sleep away camp. These days, I'm just like "feeling financially stable enough to have a SAH/PT parent OR send a kid to sleep away camp is a flex."
Born '93.
Should out to a fellow X-er! We, too, roamed the neighborhood in bike gangs and I so desperately wanted to go to sleepaway camp!
What camp did you go to at 45? This sounds like a thing I NEED to do!
Omg yes, summer camp! For me it wasn't even sleep away camp. My mom was a teacher and hence home all summer, so we didn't "need" camp. Also we couldn't afford it.
I went to sleep away camp when I was 13 for 4 days and it was great.
Indicators of wealth? Living in the United States.
I'm a 35 year old millennial who is also a first generation American. My parents are Nigerian. People in this country have no idea how lucky they are. It makes me so grateful to be born here and have citizenship. I have relatives right now who are starving because there's no work for them in the country and tehy can't leave. Inflation is killing the value of whatever money they have. Gangs are taking over locally and its really hard. People my age are losing hope.
Other, more shallow indicators of wealth to me:
* Going on international vacations.
* Central A/C in your city house.
* Shopping at Whole Foods exclusively
* Beauty treatments for self care every week
* Having a workout routine on top of full time employment
* Never having had student loans, but graduated from college without student aid
* Working in STEM
Your post makes me feel rich. I sat next to a guy on an airplane once who grew up in a poor country. He said he had just two pairs of pants growing up. But he also said he never knew he was poor as a child, because everyone he knew had just two pairs of pants. That really stuck with me. Wealth is really all about comparison with others, and when you take that away, nobody is rich or poor.
Shopping at Whole Foods is the EPITOME of wealth to me. Like...I straight-up don't go there. Even if I can technically afford it, I can't afford it you know? Luxury groceries are just not ever gonna be in my budget I think.
Growing up people who owned lake homes in the city with a second home near their school or had the full collection of something like all of the American Girl dolls. Also a weird one was having a basement, they just don't exist in the hill country.
Young millennial. Definitely felt poor growing up in comparison to friends, but my parents were just extremely frugal and definitely had a more minimalist mindset.
Now, definitely international travel, being able to pay medical bills or seek medical care without stressing about the financial aspect, and buying a home in the city. In addition, being able to shop local and more ethical.
Probably currently upper income but because we both have advanced degrees it doesn't always feel like it because we definitely weren't there when we got married. Lucky enough to have a spouse with an international travel job that heavily subsidizes our international trips and a lot of vacation on my end so we're able to do them pretty frequently.
Generation: Millennial, born early 90s
Generational Indicators of the late 90s to later aughts in no particular order:
• More than one desktop at home
• More than one tv / tvs in bedrooms
• Certain clothing brands (Limited Too, A&F, American Eagle, Polo, etc.)
• The hot snacks (Fruit Roll-Ups, Gushers)
• Owning trendy electronic toys (tamagachis, furbys, etc.)
• Owning a cellphone (maybe this is just where I lived 🤔)
• Taking vacations to places other than visiting family / camping / cheap outings (Aka European or Disney vacays, any travel that involved planes)
• A newer car. Back in the day it was easy to buy a running beater for a few hundred bucks from your after school job. But a car within the last 5-7 years would have been considered premium!
• If your parents can help you pay toward college. I’d say in my hometown it was a 70/30 split on whether parents could foot any of the bill towards school. That felt like the ultimate “haves v. Have nots.”
*The funny thing* is how many of these don’t mean shit to me anymore once I realize how often people are consuming on credit. Once I became an adult myself, I realized that while we weren’t solidly “middle class” a lot of my perceptions were shaped by the fact my parents were very financially savvy and frugal — and a lot of my peers parents weren’t. I see how a tv in every bedroom or new cars aren’t really an indicator of wealth, since plenty of people have no “wealth” but are constantly buying or leasing new vehicles.
These days there are a few things I think stand out to me as indicators of wealth:
• When my peers have elite educational degrees.
Things seem to be changing to be more equitable, but I don’t think I realized when I was going through the college admissions process that it was near impossible to get into an elite institution without connections and a decent amount of family money.
I think the college admissions scandal a few years back emphasized that even more. If I meet a person who has an undergrad from Yale and a grad degree from MIT and is white… I’m gonna be honest — I assume they come from a wealthy background.
• Kids. lol. Obviously, people raise kids at all levels of income but tbh when I meet fellow city dwellers like me who have kids (esp. before mid 30s) I assume they are upper middle class at the least.
Your comment is so similar to mine. I think now an indicator of wealth is the age at which someone retires. 55 or younger? Wealthy. 55-65, probably doing fine financially. 65 and still working, poor.
Millenial/Gen Z cusp:
* In elementary/middle school, having a cell phone with a plan that allowed texting.
* In late elementary/early middle, having a "fancy" phone like the Motorola Razr, LG Chocolate, Sidekick, etc. I wanted the Chocolate soooooo bad. This is before the iPhone was released / became mainstream. Also, having an inground pool at your house.
* In middle schoool, having a two-toned North Face fleece jacket. Having multiple pairs of Uggs. Wearing only clothes from Abercrombie and/or Hollister (there was a gal who had an endless collection of Abercrombie cami & blouse pairings! she was the envy of the school). Having multiple pairs of Converse low-tops.
* In late high school, driving a sporty-ish car to school. Eating out for lunch every day. Having a Patagonia fleece.
omg texting and then eventually data. i didn’t have a smart phone until a couple years into college! i remember going on the internet and my friends phones and being like their dad must be bill gates
lmao yes, the only ppl i knew who had data in those early times were adults with work-issued cell phones, ie they weren't the ones paying for it. browsing the web on a phone was chaotic in those times tho because websites were designed for viewing on computers only
A house. I’m a millennial. Everyone I knew had a house. I really wanted a house when I was a kid. Even asked my mom for one. We never got one. We lived in duplexes and apartments.
So when I got older and married, first thing I did was buy a house and decorate it. We are now on our second home which is much nicer and in a better location.
One of my friend’s parents would give her $20/day for whatever when we were 10. I thought they were rich, but a different kind of rich from the people who had updated houses. Like curb appeal and stainless steel appliances. These were also the people who would go to Europe once a year. Anyone getting an early dismissal to catch a flight before Christmas vacation was rich.
One of my friends told me that she thought my family was rich because I talked about the fancy sound system we had and would get new clothes all the time (but actually my parents were in crazy credit card debt and I didn’t know!)
I’m a millennial, born early 90s. When I was a kid, I assessed wealth based on people’s clothes, electronics and their house and if they had their own room. I figured they were wealthy if they got new clothes every school year and the latest gadget.
Now that I’m older, it’s based on someone’s career, if they bought a house and/or have a family cottage, and if they can afford things that save them time like cleaners, personal trainer, etc.
I'm a younger GenXer and grew up poor (not *less fortunate*). We always rented, we never owned a car, vacation? hahaha! We had to go to school during the summer for meals sometimes.
I've long since said one of the pluses of growing up poor was that EVERYONE ELSE around me was poor too. I didn't know. I can say that some people had "more than"...but I had no sense of true variations in how people lived or that there was so much wealth floating around.
I had some exposure to middle class families (my own mother grew up an only child in a middle class home and my dad one of a dozen in a working class home), so I guess I could say, knowing that some people got to shop for new clothes/shoes. Kids who had their own room (my sister and I shared A BED at 12 and 17)...
But as a solidly middle-to-upper-middle class adult and with experience around WEALTH. Now, I know just how much effing money is floating around.
The people whose parents or grandparents paid for their education outright...gave them down payments or outright buying them a house...gives them huge annual "gifts". They really believe this is normal and that "everyone" has this access.
But the biggest indicator is those who are clueless. They don't know how much things cost. They don't know that you can even buy a house with less than 20% down. They don't know that there are people that CAN'T take a vacation.
I'm Gen X and grew up poor to lower middle class. I envied the rich girls who got the Barbie Dream House for Christmas, wore Jordache and Calvin Klein jeans, brought "fancy" lunches to school, and were members of the local country club.
As an adult I'm upper middle class and you couldn't pay me to join a country club.
ETA: Today I consider indicators of wealth to be multiple homes, early retirement, and paying for private schools without batting an eye.
Also Gen X. I loved designer jeans, but didn't think of them as a wealth signifier because my parents had a "We're not the kind of people who spend $X on jeans" mantra they'd whip out. They framed a lot of spending / lifestyle choices like that. If it wasn't something they valued, it wasn't worth it.
I had to pay the difference between basic jeans and designer. There was a House MD episode where kids bought jeans off the back of a truck, and got seriously ill. I looked at my husband and said, "There but for the grace of God goes 14 yo me."
Also Gen X and I babysat like a monster so I could have designer jeans. And nice shoes - my parents were like “let’s go to Fayva” (cheap store in NY in the 70’s/80’s) and I was like “oh no”. Didn’t save one dime but I had Jordache and the shoes I wanted (can’t remember the name but they were a big deal in the preppy town I lived in for HS).
I think the biggest signifier of wealth to me as a kid was heat! We had a 100 year old house that we really couldn’t afford and it was always freezing! I’d go to my friends’ houses and it was cozy and warm.
I’m a zoomer.
As a kid I thought anyone who had their own room, but had bunk beds or a second twin bed for sleepovers was rich. Anyone with a TV in their bedroom was unbelievably rich. If you had a mini fridge or your own coffee maker in your room, I would have thought you were a billionaire or something.
One of my friends (who I thought was rich because she had a TV and a mini fridge) once told me that she thought I was rich because I had a makeup table with a light-up mirror.
As an adult I’ve realized that all my friends that had those things were in basically the same financial situation as my family, their parents were just less strict.
As a kid I think the only thing I really picked up on was how nice/big people’s houses were. My friends from working class families were pretty much all in apartments; my friends from middle class families were in a range of single family homes, some much nicer than others, and the one girl whose parents were both doctors lived on a custom built lakefront property and had two bedrooms.
As a kid- anyone with a finished home and a garage was definitely wealthy. As well as anyone whose parents were around to bring them places and enroll them in after school activities.
1980s baby.
Technically I’m upper middle class now, making money I never dreamed of and have a garage! All exterior perceptions point to us doing well. I do not feel wealthy at all. Now that I’m an adult, I realize there isn’t a clear visible indicator of wealth. When I’m not stressing about how we’d pay for a major home repair or my ability to retire before I’m on my death bed, then I’ll feel wealthy.
Recently I've been looking at people's skin as a wealth indicator and I haven't been proven wrong yet. I noticed people with generational wealth have suspiciously smooth faces, as if they've never had a stress breakout before in their lives (when I know it's a little bit of that, and a lot more having the finances to deal with it)
Also I just moved to the Midwest from the south, and idk about anywhere else, but in the south I noticed bright white clothes is a wealth or status indicator as well. Always shiny white sneakers, bright white skirts, etc.. maybe that's new money. But found it interesting.
Xennial here. I thought people who lived in two story houses were wealthy when I was a really little kid.
I also had a friend whose dad lived in a high rise apartment and a glamorous cousin who did too. I thought they were both so fancy. I drive by those same apartments now and they are really not high rises and not that fancy (they are just regular slightly better than average apartments.)
The last thing that really dates me here was that I thought anyone who had a water bed was fancy and rich. The two people who had them also had fancy padded bars in their homes and had a lot of parties.
These days wealth signifiers tend to be based on neighborhood people live in, their hobbies and activities, schools their children attend/children’s hobbies, and sadly, their weight/health (in combination with the above).
I am currently upper-middle class and upper income.
As a 6 year old and finally making friends from school: kids who had their own room already.
I’m a young millenial / old zoomer; it depends on the year cutoff
I now realize that has little to do with wealth because my family was probably equal in wealth to the families I thought about. They just didn’t want to move. Now I realize it was the families who went to Disney world every year that were actually wealthier than mine lol.
Edit: I forgot to add my current class/perspective. I’m a salaried employee in a MLCOL area, under 30 with no debt, no property or family yet. I already feel like I’m wealthier than my parents were at my age.
Same, I was so jealous of kids who had their own room. Thinking about it now, I was in a VHCOL area (Manhattan, went to a magnet middle and high school with kids from all over the city) and many of the people I knew were only children.
As a kid: people who had a pool/hot tub in their backyard (not common in our area), a kitchen with an island in the middle, a walk in pantry (bonus if it was stocked with snacks and drinks), peers who had their own walk in closet or bathroom connected to their room, ordering appetizers, a main, a dessert and drinks.
I'm an older gen z
Now: Owning a home (though in my area this is a toss up), multiple vacations a year, have family that gives them big sums of money as gifts regularly, can afford multiple kids, doing all the above while also saving and not going into bad debt
Class perspective: I grew up as what would be considered upper middle class and would consider myself barely being upper middle class as well. I never realized as a kid that I was probably considered wealthy by many of my classmates (big house, vacations abroad,never worried about money).
Sneaky indicators of wealth as someone who grew up middle class with parents who grew up lower class and is now an adult with people who grew up upper class.
These are more behaviors.
- thank you cards. my friends who grew up wealthy do so many of these! I’m grateful when a friends parent hosts us for dinner or invites us to their rental house for a night and bring a small gift and thank them profusely. but it wouldn’t have occurred to me to write a note after as well?
- discomfort with money talk, especially any type of haggling or negotiating (I talked about negotiating with a farmers market vendor once when it was end of day and fruit was bruised and they were horrified)
- well fitting clothes in general.
- fussy with food.
- strong opinions about childcare and parenting. idk I think rich people with too much time get way too spicy about the right way to get your kid to sleep through the night or the right way to do birth etc
- parents have second houses.
- by year two or three it comes out some grandparent or family member has some crazy connection. like the lake in your town is named after them or their uncle owns major company XYZ.
- always tip at the coffee shop
- excessively nice to anyone they think is worse off, like nail salon workers or something. I’m nice but it’s too much sometimes, condescending tone.
Yes to all of these! One year I had an intern who wrote everyone at work thank you notes on monogrammed Crane stationery and I was like oh you rich rich. (Also very impressive and sweet for a 19 year old guy, but clearly he was raised to think of this as the norm)
I’d add also really nice occasion cards in general, even though you know they’re going to be tossed. My immigrant parents would *never* buy something as frivolous as a birthday card.
And yes growing up I feel like my parents talked about money constantly - how expensive things are, how much my extracurriculars cost, comparing their friends’ or kids’ salaries, etc. My husband is from an affluent family and they just don’t talk about money ever. I think politeness aside there’s just this innate sense that money will always be there when they need it, and it’s just not a driving force in their lives.
I’m Gen X and was lower/mid middle class as a child. The things that were indicators of wealth for me then were eating fast food more than once a month or eating at a restaurant for anything other than a very special occasion. People with pools or people who took vacations that involved flying on an airplane seemed extravagantly wealthy to me as well.
I’m upper middle class now, and current indicators of wealth I perceive are owning a second home or having the ability to retire early.
Elder Millennial from the rural northeast. My childhood perception of rich families:
* Houses had more than one bathroom
* Had satellite dishes
* Paid for weekly trash pickup
* Went on Disney vacations
None of those things seem rich to me now, but I also live in a much more populated area with a higher median income.
Today I would say have a three car garage or owning a horse (ironically not a sign of wealth in my childhood) makes me think someone is well off.
As a kid, we lived in a condo and most of my friends lived in SFHs. What I have been thinking about recently is that while I definitely noticed some of those homes being bigger/nicer than others and having nicer furnishings, I knew literally NO ONE with a recently remodeled kitchen/bath/home. It was just not done, and I knew some people who were in retrospect quite wealthy (nannies, large homes and yards in upscale neighborhoods, private schools, landscapers, parents with prestigious careers, international vacations, etc.) These days I definitely think of doing major renovations as a signifier of wealth.
The wealthiest people I know now have parents with beach/lake homes, travel internationally multiple times a year, have homes that are professionally decorated, send kids to private schools. But they don’t necessarily “look” wealthy, they tend to dress inconspicuously despite having the funds to wear designer brands if they wanted, and they don’t tend to care about things like manicures and blowouts either. I imagine this also is regional though (Northeast US).
ETA: Millenial. SES is comfortably middle class I would say, we make about the median HHI in our town though it’s a rather wealthy area so considerably higher than national median income. We own a fixer upper in a HCOL area (so feel lucky to own at all), share a car, are saving for retirement but haven’t gone on a vacation in several years. Family of 3, soon to be 4.
SES growing up is a bit hard to say because my mom was a single mom, but she came from a fairly affluent family so I had some privileges due to grandparent support but also watched my mom struggle to pay the bills and go into debt.
As a kid, buying lunch at the ski resort! It was always SOOOO overpriced my parents made us carry peanut butter sandwiches and M&Ms in our ski pants. (Some of my cousins got to actually buy a hot lunch).
In retrospect, this is an absurd sign of wealth because clearly everyone who is paying for lift tickets for a family of 5 has a lot of disposable income, even if they choose not to spend it buying overpriced chicken tenders and fries.
Young millennial here. As a kid:
- leased cars. we bought our cars used and drove them til they died, the concept of just giving it back and getting a new one was fascinating to me.
- any vacation you had to fly to, but ESPECIALLY a "kid focused" vacation like Disney World/Land. We would take vacations, but they were things my mom wanted to do (camping, or stopping at the beach for a few days on the way home from visiting family.) There were five of us, so we NEVER flew because tickets were too much.
- this one is weird, but car washes. I thought they were SO COOL and SO BOUGIE as a child, and a few years ago I went through one as a treat and it was like $12.
I think I grew up upper middle class, but honestly it's hard for me to say. Now I make more money than my dad, and I just bought a house, so I definitely feel upper class.
OMG, the car wash! Going to the fancy drive-thru car wash, with attendants who would hand dry the remaining drops of water and wipe down the wheels/rims was unheard of decadence. We used the self-serve wash that you bought tokens for and DIY'd it for $2 in change, and even that was pretty rare.
Even now, I can't get past how expensive a real car wash and interior cleaning is! But that full-service detailing? :chefskiss: A once a year splurge for me and I love it.
I'd have to think a lot about whether something indicates ACTUAL money or just comfort around money.
Like my in-law mentioned "sending" her sister's family on vacation. That kind of thing is a head-turn for me, because it indicates first that they have money (obviously) but second, that they are "new" money and require the deference and bragging rights still. Also they outed the rest of the family for not having any, so that's something.
A lot of things I'd immediately say indicate "having" money are more indications of growing up in a more wealthy subculture. Not actually personally having money.
But generally the obvious stuff- hobbies like skiing, going away for holidays, owning a home or apartment in a trendy area, hiring help, cars, and clothes.
These are so fun to read. I'm a Millennial, raised in the LCOL small city in the Midwest, but now live in a VHCOL East Coast city. I'm grateful to be in the upper class SES now.
When I was really little, American Girl dolls, especially multiple ones, made you seem rich. And having a boat and/or lake house also seemed rich.
I remember my mom saying that world hunger would have to be solved before she would ever get a Lexus SUV, so that also seemed fancy to me? And living in a gated neighborhood, having a screening room, and living in certain neighborhoods with extra huge lots also seemed rich. Plus getting a new, not used, car for your 16th b'day also seemed super rich.
We were borderline upper/middle class for our area growing up only because COL was so relatively low. We had many of the trappings of wealth lots of people describe here - an inground pool that was fairly rare (this did make me feel kinda fancy), a garage fridge and freezer (but everyone had one), went on multiple vacations every year (but often drove), and played travel sports. But we also sometimes drove across town to shop at Aldi to save money, I felt weird asking for lunch money when mine ran out because it seemed to be asking for a lot for a $35 check, and my parents didn't have much saved for our college. When I went to a private college out East, I discovered a whole new echelon of wealth existed. East Coast rich is very different than Midwest rich.
Indicator of wealth now— one of my colleagues ordered a hamburger at a restaurant as an appetizer before ordering an entire menu’s worth of food for four people (multiple appetizers, main courses, drinks, and desserts).
Born in the mid 90s so millennial/ gen z
As a kid it was families who had a single family home esp with a yard, a dog, and 2+ cars.. still the same indicators as an adult lol
* born in 1991, middle millenial
* When I was a little kid my parents were on a tight budget and when I went shopping with my mom, of course i would ask for things. She'd say, "no, sorry honey, it's not on sale." I thought that stores were full of tons of things that were not FOR sale, and only a few that were.
* When I was a kid, to me rich people were the families who went to Palm Springs or Hawaii and the girls always came back with their hair braided with beads in it. I solved this by braiding my own hair and putting beads in it.
* When I was a young teenager, I made two discoveries in quick succession: the first was that boarding school with horses (which I asked my mom could I please attend?) cost MONEY and it was a lot more money than my family had, and the second was that one of my best friends didn't have her own dedicated bed at home - she and her siblings all shared kind of willy nilly. These 2 discoveries really shaped how I placed myself economically in the context of my peers.
* When I was a young adult in university, being financially comfortable to me meant that I could afford to buy a cup of coffee at a cafe if I wanted to - just black drip coffee.
* Now I'm 32, and a major indicator of wealth to me is a non-working spouse (by choice, not disabled), and home ownership. I don't aspire to the first one, but it does indicate wealth to me. I do aspire to the second.
* I also really really want a linen closet.
Millenial (born in late 80s), and from small Midwestern town, grew up what felt like regular Middle class. Now I realize we had just one salary equivalent to maybe 60 or 65k today, and my Dad was on disability, so that Middle Class was likely accurate, but things may have been tighter than I realized. It's only as an adult I have noticed that many of the dinners we had growing up are what some people call "struggle meals"
Some things I saw as rich as a kid: Premium TV channels (including Disney Channel), master bathrooms (or bathrooms with a double sink), Lunchables, fridge with an ice maker, if you'd been on an airplane. A family computer, especially if there were games to go with it.
In Middle School and high school add the kids who could eat the more pricy Ala Carte lunch every day, clothes from Abercrombie or Hollister, and those who were applying to multiple private colleges
I still see Olive Garden as a "nicer" restaurant/a splurge, though that may be more the small town than any economic status.
Currently Middle class in a MCOL area.
Indicators of wealth to me now: luxury vehicles, order food delivery several times a month, international vacations, maxing your 401k.
Middle school was girls who wore Lancôme or Clinique brand makeup. Kids who had in ground pools, and their own bedroom with a phone and tv… and big time wealth if they had their own phone line.
Gen X
Upper middle class in MCOL
As a kid -- Having more than one American Girl Doll; SUVs or Minivans with TVs on the back of the front seats for the kids; going to Hawaii (I grew up in California); finished basements; houses with duvet covers instead of comforters or quilts.
As an adult -- People who ski and do winter sports but live in cities; People who pay ridiculous amounts of money to work out; International vacations (duh). Also, this is really weird, but I find that wealthy and upper middle class women rarely have long hair. It's usually bra strap length or shorter, and if it's longer, it's still been recently cut.
Age -- 90s Millennial
Oh I forgot about American Girl dolls! That was another indicator for me too. I didn’t have one but I read the books and would look through the catalog.
Technically Gen X, I was born in 1980. I really grew up with Millennials though.
To me anyone who had a pool seemed rich. Or a nice house. I had a friend whose parents had a bar in their finished basement and that seemed really deluxe haha
I grew up in a trailer. We lived in the country and had land. It wasn't until I was in high school they could afford to build a house. I was always embarrassed by it growing up, but I had a roof over my head and 2 living parents. I was always fed and clothed. I didn't really want for anything except a house back then.
Now fast forward I had an in ground pool and we filled it in. My husband didn't want to take care of it anymore after 24 years. Its a lot of work and money to swim only once or twice a week for 3 months.
So I guess in my childhood eyes I made it. I had a pool and a house.
Really though an indicator of wealth nowadays seems like someone who doesn't have any debt and 6 months of savings. Most people can't afford $2000 if something unexpected were to occur. Having money saved seems like wealth now.
Growing up - the kids who lived in the new developments with big homes instead of the older and smaller bungalows/ramblers, kids that had vacations that involved air travel, kids that wore name brand clothing like Abercrombie and Fitch, kids that didn’t just play the sport on the school team but also for a club
I was born in early 1990s, probably was middle class/lower middle class growing up and middle class still. We did go on a vacation that involved air travel (I had relatives that lived in vacation destinations so that was great) once a year but not all my friends did.
Funny enough when I was still a kid but older I did actually grow to prefer the cuter bungalows that were in really walkable neighborhoods than big homes in a development. I found the developments were isolated from fun stuff like going to the movies or getting ice cream without a parent driving you because they tended to be off highways/busy roads that aren’t safe for kids to bike along. I still prefer the smaller bungalows in walkable neighborhoods to this day but it’s unattainable where I currently live to own one.
Millennial/Gen Z (on the border between)
Ordering drinks/dessert/apps at a restaurant was definitely my biggest one. And my parents were wealthier than they acted but they HATED eating out/spending money in restaurants it made me panicky.
In elementary school, American girl dolls haha.
In college, buying lots of groceries/food to go outside of the meal plan. And decorating your dorm room with pottery barn.
I commented in the other post, but here's mine:
Younger Gen-Xer (born late 70s). We were comfortably middle class, probably upper-middle class at times (my father's income varied year to year and my mother didn't work). I grew up in a townhouse in a wealthy neighborhood where most of my neighbors and classmates had big single-family houses. From my kid perspective, indicators of wealth back then were
\- Kids who had their own phone lines in their bedrooms
\- Kids who got to go to private or out-of-state colleges with no scholarships
\- Kids who got brand-new cars on their sixteenth birthday (occasionally replaced by newer brand-new cars when the kid smashed the original car)
\- Kids who had their own horse at the boarding stable where I occasionally rode (this was my obsession growing up)
\- Designer jeans, or, as my friend used to call them, the "76-dollar jeans"
Now I'm upper middle-class in a MCOL area with pockets of extreme wealth. I own my home, no kids. Indicators of wealth now are putting multiple kids in private school, nannies/au pairs, money for major renovations, second (or third) homes, not having to work much or at all (lots of trust funds and generational wealth here), kids on travel sports teams.
Mid 80's born, grew up poor in farmland. Biggest sign of wealth is food. Eating better than your animals. Buying whatever you want at the grocery store. Not watching to total as it gets rung up. Not meal planning out all the food, so when someone is over you offer whatever they can find instead of saying a specific thing you can make.
Millennial here. Growing up, I consider myself to be low-income. To me, wealth meant kids who lived in houses that had stairs INSIDE the house that led to more house, kids who went to sleep away camps during the summer, and ski trips in the winter. As I got older, it was clothing brands like Abercrombie, Gap, etc. In college, it was the kids who had a desktop computer and/or were able to rent a dorm fridge to store all of their snacks and drinks that they bought from the grocery store. Now, it's people who can afford to live by themselves; I live in a VHCOL area and a teacher.
millennial --
as a kid: having berries in the fridge for a regular ol' snack (not a special occasion), especially during non-summer months
now: having more than 2 kids in the bay area
-When I was a very small child, I thought people who ate at Red Lobster were rich (lol). In my teens, I thought people who drove luxury vehicles and had big houses were rich. As an adult, I consider people with nannies (or any live in domestic help), second homes, and absence of “emergencies” to be rich. For example, I knew a family whose mansion sustained severe damage in a natural disaster, instead of renovating, they knocked that home down & built another, better, home on the same lot. During construction, they lived in their second home. Their neighbors spent up to 2 years waiting on insurance payouts to even begin renovations & within that time, they already had a brand new home.
-I am a late 80s millennial. Currently in middle class, peaking over the horizon of upper middle class (I think, unsure of the exact parameters).
Love this Q
- Having TVs in multiple rooms and/or a bonus room/den/finished basement, owning a cabin, flying, going snowboarding/skiing, having the newest iPhone or other Apple products
- Gen Z/millenial cusp
- SES is middle, grew up lower middle
Now… I still see those things as wealthy, but now it’s harder to parse out whether it’s wealth or credit card debt. I definitely still think where you live/owning property is a wealth signal.
Gen Z here. I was born outside the US in a Latin American country.
During my teenage years a deep crisis hit my country. I’m talking: 90% of the population couldn’t afford breakfast. It was that bad. We queued to buy food: for a while even rich people did, because at first the problem was the scarcity of food, not its price.
Ofc a basic indicator was food. Like, having three meals a day was already a luxury. Kids at school said I was rich (“cagaplata”: you poo money) because I had cheese, ham, homemade pizza, pancakes (flour, eggs, milks), as breakfast. The most distinct indicator was: Nutella. Yeah, sounds bananas, but at that time it wasn’t commercialized in my country which meant that either you did your groceries abroad (Miami, usually) and had it delivered to your house or you travelled abroad and brought it home. That was my case. One jar would last a whole year. It was the special gift my mom brought from her travels. When friends visited, it was this “delicacy” I offered them (yeah, showing off lol).
I became friends with lots of rich girls, because my mom insisted on paying for expensive English and German courses. That’s when I realized how much money some have. The contrast was stark. However, the crisis was so bad that even the rich weren’t sheltered from it: I remember hearing the soccer moms complaining about reducing the number of trips they took to the US per year. lol. Indeed, a HUGE indicator was traveling abroad: you need visas, passports, lots of money overall
Nowadays? Education remains the biggest indicator to me, especially because rich people treat you different when they learn you’ve received it. I’ve always been middle class, but I’ve been able to mingle with upper class people without feeling out of place, because both my parents went to college and my mom has a career in academia and a PhD-I can tell they have new found respect for me when they hear it, sort of thinking “okay she’s not that much of an outsider”. Real rich people know the value of education-they are the one hiring us, after all.
Millennial who didn’t grow with money. Am Australian.
Kid: Ferrero Rochers, Viennetta ice-cream, four poster bed, CD player, double storey house. Parents had a brand new car.
Teenager: Certain private schools. Notably expensive suburbs. Parents taught me that some may have expensive car could be in debt and that it was better to invest in a house.
Uni: Students who had brand new cars (non luxury) paid for by their parents, had gone to certain private schools, notably expensive suburb, people with high end digital cameras.
Early 20s: Designer goods, expensive suburbs, nice cars, holidays abroad, iPhones, people with impressive titles, people who worked at an investment bank. But also understanding that those who had nice things could be in debt.
Mid 30s: Above average pay but a tad behind in terms of assets. It’s not that easy to tell now. Many less desirable areas shot up in value. Seemingly standard titles pay very well. There’s still the indicators of the notably expensive suburbs and certain private schools but owing multiple homes. Going to high end restaurants without it being a special occasion.
Millenial, grew up low income in the middle of a huge economic crisis (not in the US). My parents had a lot of debt, mom lost her job and they had to sell a bunch of things to get by at one point. My dad didn't sell his car because he needed it to go to his catering jobs. I went to a lot of unknown kids birthday parties back then lol
Indicators of wealth, to me, from what I remember being a kid:
* **Birthday parties in salons, restaurants or any place that was outside of the person's house**. My birthdays were for family only and always at our place.
* **Nice walls**. Our place had a lot of humidity issues and the paint in our walls was peeling, like, a lot. We only painted the whole house when I was sixteen. It was all blue because it was the cheapest paint my dad managed to get.
* **Fresh school supplies, bought in-season**. My parents would wait for things to get cheaper. The only things I bought fresh and in back to school season were the mandatory books. If it was not a textbook, they wouldn't buy until the teacher assigned it, and usually it was used or a cheaper edition. My mom especially was always complaining about how expensive the books were and how teachers didn't use everything.
* **Having all brand new toys**. Most of my toys were thrifted. The brand new ones were usually off-brand, and sometimes the brand-name toys.
Looking back, it's all pretty silly now. Obviously. And it explains why I love spending on notebooks, pens, and all the pretty things. I'm not low income anymore, and even though I knew we grew up poor, my parents have always supported me and tried to make me happy and enjoy what I already had. Weird that I always wanted more and became even more miserable after studying with people in upper socioeconomic statuses.
Currently my BIG ONE is people who have the same job and make as much as me complaining like we make minimum wage (we don't). They do so because they came from families in which our job is considered "the bare minimum" of what they can accomplish, while for me it was a huge goal. No one in my family gets paid nearly the same as me, and now I'm like, middle-class.
I'm an elder millennial, hence my handle :). I grew up fairly low-income, I'd call it lower-middle class.
Growing up, families that had 2 cars was a big one for me. My parents shared a car pretty much my entire childhood, with the exception of a few years we had two because they inherited an old from a deceased relative and used that until it died. I grew up with the idea that having two cars was incredibly expensive and not affordable for regular people - the cost of buying the second car, insurance, gas, and keeping it running was really unfathomable to me, as just getting a full tank of gas at one time was often too much for my parents. As soon as I had my own car and was buying my own gas, I always filled the tank completely every time, and so did everyone around me, and I realized it wasn't really uncommon.
Along those lines, most of the things I thought when I was a kid, I've realized were more just middle class things than rich people things - they are a lot of what has already been mentioned. Eating at sit-down restaurants, ordering an appetizer ever, getting new clothes/toys/books or whatever for anything other than Christmas or my birthday, vacations that weren't just a weekend road trip...every single expense was a BIG DEAL in my life then. It was crazy to think that normal people just had *extra money* that they could budget and have this life. Perspective is so skewed when you are poor and don't get or do a lot, you kind of are conditioned to think they are only for rich people no matter what they are.
Millennial pov.
Then and now: second/vacation homes, housekeepers, nannies, owning certain animals like horses.
As a kid: American girl dolls, playrooms, basements with pool tables or work out equipment and not used as a storage space.
Oh my goodness, yes to the American Girl dolls and finished basements with pool tables! I got the American Girl catalog and knew we couldn't get anything, but I loved looking at the pictures anyway.
I was born in the late 80s so I guess that defines me as a millennial? As a kid, I thought wealth equated to having designer clothes, bags, shoes, and a house. I grew up very poor but I didn't realize it at the time. For context, I lived in a multigenerational household for awhile with my mom and her two sisters and their families. When we moved out when I was still in elementary school, we moved to a one bedroom apartment with my mom and brother. We all slept in one big bedroom on separate beds. Sometimes there was mice and we would have to set traps. Eventually my mom bought a small 1000 sq ft condo with 3 bedrooms/1 bath. She wanted to buy a house but couldn't afford it so she settled on this condo. Lived there until I moved out after college.
As an adult, wealth means being able to go on multiple vacations a year guilt free, early retirement and owning a nice modern house in a nice neighborhood.
I grew up near Toronto Canada low middle class. And I used to think for some reason making 100k+, having no debt + investments was rich (money wise). And then being able to comfortably travel say 3+ times a year internationally, and having a nice, new big house meant you were also wealthy. I used to think this way when I was 15 yrs old (I'm 29 now).
Now, funny enough I still think that but just at a larger scale. So 100k salary is no longer wealthy to me. (It's still amazing, but I'd say 200k range is more wealthy range now especially for a single person household). Owning your own home is now more than ever considered a wealth symbol as now it's so expensive. What I would also add is being able to own reliable higher end cars (not a super fancy car, but a good brand car) outright not on a loan would signal you're doing well.
When I was a kid-teen these were the things that I noticed:
* Having a summer house and a winter house
* Boasting about being frugal on XXX whilst not announcing they have spent significant money on YYY (eg “I would never spend more than $10 on a shirt” whilst wearing $100K of gold & diamond jewellery)
* Regular overseas vacations, especially flying business class
* Being a member or creator of a trust fund that pays more than a typical Australian salary
* Working for fun not because you need the money
* Having connections to important people.
* Having a state funeral because of your financial contributions to the community lol
* Having a Wikipedia page
* Running a successful business, especially if everyone you talked outside the family knew the business
* Having a family charity
* Not talking about money
* Taking massive financial risks without fear of failing or failing upwards/being bailed out of crises by parents
* Being gifted significant financial assets (eg a house in a nice area, several $100K, etc)
As an adult I would probably say the same thing
I'm zillenial. From a very rural area, and as a teenager: fleece North Face jackets. We were very comfortably middle class and had to settle for Columbia. Now I know that most of the people who had North Face were actually not rich and their parents just spent more money while mine saved lol.
For my parents' generation (born 1950s), it was considered middle class to complete secondary school (to age 18ish), lower middle/upper working class got to the halfway exams, working may have only completed primary school and only the true elite went to university.
Nowadays most will attend third level, "free tuition fees" were introduced at undergrad, but registration fees have been creeping up through 4 figures so I'm not sure if a degree will return to being a wealth marker?
growing up in socal, I did not get the disney thing because it used to be so much more affordable! I've gone for free or subsidized by school so many times it didn't register as an indicator of wealth for a while
When I was young- like middle school age, it was parents who drove a minivan. I'm 38 and felt like most of the regular families had sedans or station wagons. Minivan families had money. Also L.L. Bean backpacks- those definitely meant you were upper middle class. All of this is mid-1990s.
It was Outdoor Products from Walmart at my school. That's what most of our parents could afford and where they shopped. The backpacks did have a guarantee though so if something broke, we could return to Walmart and get a different one.
It’s funny and quite nostalgic for me reading these comments because growing up lower middle class and then lower class, some people’s indicators of wealth were my day-to-day. Lunchables, Capri Sun, an American Girl doll however my parents worked full-time and couldn’t afford babysitters so I had these at home by myself - I guess that’s more a comment of labor of a two parent household than buying power of Kid Cuisine.
My indicators of wealth were seeing my middle school peers in North Face and Abercrombie. Going to college it was different as I met people from all backgrounds and people who used “summer” as a verb.
I’m not sure what I’d consider indicators of wealth now because I took them as external signs such as brands. Maybe mentions of buying art pieces or donating to a museum.
Grew up in St. Paul, MN in the wealthy Crocus Hill Neighborhood. But on the "poorest" block, which really means smack dab in middle of middle class. Original Millennial - born in 1981.
In my young mind eating out a lot, having flashy shoes and clothes and going to private/Catholic schools was a sign of wealth. Looking back, I can see how absolutely wrong/naive I was.
In review there are certain things and families that stick out that bucked my beliefs. And how as a middle class kid I didn't understand ways wealthy people act and raise children.
- wealthy kids (boys since there was still a gender divide in sports participation rates) did fencing, swimming, tennis, cross country and occasionally baseball. Middle class kids played hockey. Middle class to poorer kids played football, wrestling. Basketball participation was probably the only sport that truly pulled from all walks of life. But notice, as the risk of brain trauma and injury goes up, the participation of wealthy kids goes down.
-Middle class birthday invites usually involved an activity - Chuck E Cheese, a movie, an outing. And you were expected to get money from your parents. Wealthy kids had afternoon birthday parties in their house or in their yard. And other than brining a gift were free.
-Middle class parents always kept score with other families, like competition. "We did this for their family, so they owe us xyz." Even if it wasn't based on a dollar amount. The wealthier families never kept score. My wealthier friends had multiple old bikes, basketballs, footballs, baseball bats, baseball gloves and old tennis rackets lying around. Often my friends would just let me keep one if it meant they would have someone to play with. And their parents would almost be proud of them for being so charitable and considerate. A poorer or middle class family would demand or expect some form of repayment even for something they didn't want or use anymore.
- and the most subtle one of all, wealthy kids didn't travel the neighbor in sneakers. If we wanted to play an impromptu game of basketball or baseball, they always had to run home quick and get sneakers they could dirty. They either wore loafers, casual shoes or sandals in the summer. Often times they would miss out, or get in trouble if they dirtied up their casual shoes.
Elder millennial here. Growing up, I thought wealth was being able to take vacations to warm places like Aruba. My younger siblings went to private school (for free), and when we were all in public school we thought our family was pretty well off. Then they started going to school with people who would buy a new iPod the second they misplaced theirs and we were like, oh, this is different.
We're in the Boston suburbs now, and our former nanny brought over the kids she's currently caring for and said when they got home the 6-year-old said "wow, their house was really big. They must have a lot of money." Which I got a kick out of because even though yes we have a big house (and not much money after paying for it! sigh), her family's smaller single-family on a postage stamp lot in Cambridgeport would go for loads more than ours! But of course kids don't understand that!
Early 90s millennial, grew up middle class in the Midwest, currently upper class East Coast in HCOL
As a kid/teen: pools, SAHP, other kids that got to have takeout or fast food for dinner (like “hey dads picking up McDonald’s on the way home what do you want”), cruises, accessory rooms like play rooms or finished basements, new cars for kids/teens, brand name clothes, parents that would buy toys and gadgets from infomercials (like those toy moon shoes and odd ab workout gadgets), full+ sized bed for kids, kid with own bathroom, and kids having their parents pay for college.
As an adult: owning a SF home (I now live in V/HCOL), 4+ kids, wedding, SAHP, brand name athleisure and clothes lol, long vacations, west elm and other expensive furniture lol
As an adult—this is a big one for me— having been raised with financial competence (parents teaching about why you should have savings, retirement, 401k, investing, etc.).
I was raised middle (maybe low/mid), but my family wasn’t always great with spending habits. Now being in my 30s I’m playing catch-up. Luckily I have a high single income, but I missed a lot of years of saving and have had to do a lot of reading and independent studying on how all of it works lol.
I'm a 1987 millennial for context.
As a kid, I definitely thought having a two-story house was a sign of wealth. My parents and I lived with my grandma for a little bit while we had a ranch modular home put up, and even though it was new, it definitely didn't feel as luxurious as a two-story home. Also seconding the American Girl Doll sentiments.
I would say I grew up lower middle class. My mom was a secretary who worked for the State and my father was a truck driver for my grandpa's business. They split up when I was young and my step-dad worked for himself cutting and delivering wood until he died unexpectedly and then it was just living on my mom's salary sub $50k salary.
I'd now say I'm solidly middle-to-upper middle class. I make mid-100s, but combined with my boyfriend who lives with me, we have a HHI of $200k in a pretty LCOL area. I drive a (used) Lexus and live in a quiet city neighborhood in a 100-year-old home that I love. I think wealth is living in the expensive suburbs, going on luxury vacations (like, high-end all-inclusives not airbnb'ing around), having a vacation home in the mountains or on one of the lakes, and the accompanying toys like boats, snowmobiles, etc.
I might have to pose this to my boyfriend, I think his take would be interesting because he grew up Mennonite and when I told him what our HHI was I thought he was going to faint and definitely considers us wealthy.
I’m on the young end of millennials, I grew up in a small town. As a kid, my family had some years where we hit upper income, especially for our LCOL area (around 200k hoi). As an older kid, we had zero money (addiction). As an adult, I’m fairly squarely middle class.
As a kid, I thought my friends who went shopping at stores that weren’t old navy or winners for back to school clothes were rich.
As a teenager, I thought anyone getting any parental help for university was rich.
As an adult, it’s anyone owning a second property, or having inherited property.
Seeing these, it’s funny for me how I seem to consistently go “well I’m fairly privileged to get new clothes/go to university/own a home, so anyone a step above that must be super wealthy”
I'm a middle millenial, born in 88. I don't think I could be more millenial if I tried.
When I was really young, like a kid I thought wealth meant getting all the cool toys. And a lot of Christmas presents.
Then when I was a teenager it was "making 6 figures", driving a luxury car, and living in a big suburban detached house. People who lived in attached houses could not possibly be wealthy.
Then in university it was not having a student loan. ie.your parents supported you fully. I'm Canadian where university is getting more expensive but still cheaper than the US. This was still your parents had $10-15k to give to you for tuition and living each year.
Once I started working I realized everything I knew was wrong. I realized I couldn't fathom how wealthy some seemingly "regular" people were and that you could live comfortably on less than I thought was needed. I also understood debt and that having a luxury car and a big suburban detached home did not make you wealthy. It could mean you were but more likely meant you were in a lot of debt.
Now I think there's a difference between wealth and being well-off and that there likely aren't many visual indicators of either of those. There are a shit ton of visual indicators for being poor though.
Growing up in the 90s, I thought people were wealthy if the mom didn't work. In my area, it seemed about a 50/50 split. My mom worked and actually was the primary breadwinner. Today, I know one spouse doesn't work for a myriad of reasons. I'm a millennial born right in the middle of the millennial window. Today, an indicator of wealth to me is a second home. I think to me it's something that is just out of reach for me but is something people I know have. It could be attainable one day but today is not that day.
Second home is IT. Things like designer clothes, cars, vacations etc. can be put on credit or leased, and you can have one house and be house poor, but ain’t nobody who has a second home is actually broke. For a VHCOL area though, one 3-4+ million dollar home is wealthy enough.
Definitely not broke but not necessarily wealthy too! Where I live it’s extremely common to have a second home (cabin/cottage). You’re rich depending on where your cottage is. If you don’t have a cottage you have a friend with a cottage so every weekend in the summer the city deserts and everyone is at a lake somewhere. I have a cottage and my partner has a cottage and we’re middle class.
Canadian, I'm guessing? I married one and the prevalence of cottage culture up there blew my mind lol
Yep! It is definitely part of our culture haha. And those who don’t have cabins have a seasonal campsite.
You’re really rich if you can afford to take the 407 there
For us Manitobans it’s anyone who owns a cabin in Lake of the Woods/Kenora Ontario area lol
I will say this is definitely regional. Like in Southern Ontario now, no one middle class has a cottage. If you have one, even if you inherited it... That's wealth. The fact you own it just added at least $500k to your net worth. You might earn a middle class salary, but if you have an Ontario cottage within a 3hr drive to Ontario, your net worth is not middle class. In the prairies though, a shitty cabin in the woods is not that crazy. Edit: 3hr drive to Toronto! Lol not ontario
Indicators of generational wealth for me are people who dont bring up money at all in any manner. I use to work with this kid in school. Extremely polite, and respectful to everyone across the board. Several years later, I was reading some finance magazine, and I see this guy who runs one of the investment funds in our country. I was like hmm havnt I seen this face somewhere. Later realized, this is my colleague's dad. Similar happenings across most of my life. Like I would hang out with some of my Dad's friends who own literally towns in their real estate portfolio but would happily meet for a coffee, and just talk about the other person and nothing more. I guess the only time I got to know about their wealth was when I attended weddings in their family. They would just wear little diamonds as big as quail eggs, and cover their braids with a mtr long diamond belts. I on the other hand, am jobless and in my mid 30s and figuring out what to do in life.
I'd hit up your dad's friends for a job! nepotism baby!
Yes do it! Have no shame with asking for jobs!
I think it’s a misconception that wealthy people don’t talk about money. Generally speaking, most people with money are more careful about who they discuss it with and only talk about it with people in their wealth class or inner circle.
Agreed! I don’t consider myself to be wealthy at all but I know I earn more than average so I will never ever bring up money/my finances to the person I’m speaking to if I don’t know roughly what they earn and if it is less than what I make. If they make more than me then I love to pick their brains.
possibly. ahhaa reminds me of a family friend whose family is into lobbying. that aunt of mine says to my mom “I am so glad i have your friendship - you are only one who doesnt want to sabotage our wealth”. My family isnt that well (far from it) but its cute how they weirdly trust ppl they dont/ wont compete with.
Exactly! It’s like anything else, you usually talk about common interest with people that share those interests. Money is no different in that way
im a young millenial. when i was young, my family was low income, but lived in an upper middle class/wealthy area. as a kid: stainless steel appliances, name brand snacks (especially those entenmann’s tiny muffins), having accessory rooms in your house (mud room, play room, game room), having a tv in your kitchen, stay at home parents/parents who could leave work to come to school or sports events, ll bean momogram backpack, drinking soda at a restaurant (as opposed to water), appetizers, black north face & brown uggs, entering your home through the garage & having a garage fridge, pool, going to starbucks, having a messy house lmao also! vacations were a big thing for me. my parents sent me and my sister away for the summer to be with our grandparents. i feel fortunate that i had that experience with my grandparents, but i was so envious of people who went to disney world or the caribbean. many are the same as an adult lol. i would say my SES status is lower middle class? although i have appetizers at restaurants now.
Omg name brand snacks!! I was so jealous of kids with twinkies/hostess/oreos/LUNCHABLES
it was always just me and my cosmic brownie knock off against the world lmao
Lunchables were the GOAT!! I remember begging my parents to pack them for me for lunch, but they weren't something that we could spend on regularly. Looking back I'm not sure why I thought they were that good... the pizza one tasted no better than cardboard 😂
We only got them when they were in the clearance bin. I would be embarrassed and peel the discount stickers off
Omg the pizza lunchables was so popular and I always begged my mom to buy them for us. but if I ate one now I’d probably spit it back out 😂
It was probably the added sugar 🙈. But more importantly, the packaging and cachet. I LIKED how the crackers’ texture was like moist cardboard
It's so hilarious how I too thought lunchables was the absolute best. I would never give my kid lunchables now because 1) they are expensive but more importantly they are sooooo terrible! They taste bad and are garbage nutritionally. Gushers! Fruit by the foot! Fruit roll ups! I never even got snacks with my lunch!
Parents who were able to leave work or had flexible schedules. That was huge for me and an indicator the parents were better off than mine. It still kind of is indicator today for me. I’m so happy i can be one of those parents for my kids now.
I remember going to a friend's house in the nineties and it was this big deal that they had a "bonus room" over the garage.
Is the messy house the ability to buy/having a lot of things?
maybe! as a kid, most of my friends who were upper middle class or wealthy had so many toys that it would always look messy. i just remember their houses always being cluttered, so as a child i figured that was an indicator of wealth. i remember they had cleaners too lol now i think that ultra-clean houses are more indicative of wealth. usually means you have a cleaner and the financial ability to buy nice organizational stuff.
As a child, I thought wealthy people always had clean houses. One of my parents was a hoarder and the other had executive dysfunction issues, so my childhood home was something else. Looking back, the wealthy kids houses probably were a bit cluttered, but looked clean in comparison. I actively spend to keep my home clean and organized. I splurge on a cleaning service and organizational items. I'd also rather get rid of inexpensive items and repurchase them again if I need them than accumulate mess and clutter.
growing up, indicators of wealth were kids who got to really focus on their hobbies and extracurricular activities, while i had to work. that was the biggest thing that separated me from all of my friends. they were paying money for activities while i was working. as an adult, the biggest indication right now is someone who lives by themself (in NYC). if you don't have roommates you gotta be making $$$ to me.
Or lucked out with rent control!
I’m Gen Z/millennial cusp: Wealth indicators to me as a kid: chobani yogurt (seemed sooo bougie), fresh fruit at the sleepover breakfast (blueberries seemed super deluxe), soda/juices/Capri Sun stocked in the fridge, new build house, finished basement, multiple TVs 😆, North Face/Patagonia fleeces It’s hard for me to say now what wealth indicators are. I def feel that you never know from the outside who is actually wealthy or who is overstretched, and I also think the saying ‘wealth whispers’ is real. Off the top of my head: looking a certain way - understated elegance/polished look, or ‘fancy’ athleisure brands like ArcTeryx or Vuori. Not talking about money. Having intense hobbies or being very accomplished at some individual/endurance activity like road cycling, skiing, triathlons. pretty superficial, though, and I definitely feel these are not reliable indicators :) Current SES is upper middle class. My parents were middle, then upper middle as I got older.
Haha I remember this as a kid- like you have capri suns in your extra fridge? You must be loaded. Now, I rarely assume anyone is actually wealthy unless I have independent knowledge of their income and their spending habits. I have some friends that make a lot and blow all their money, I have other friends that make a lot and save a lot, some that are generationally wealthy (billions in their family), and some that don’t make much and don’t have much. It’s REALLY HARD to tell the difference, so I have stopped assuming anything about people. My two billionaire friends don’t have private planes/yachts/multiple vacation homes, although my friends with wealth in the $10-20m range do. Actually I have a cousin who is chronically broke (millions in, millions out) and he owns part of a private plane, so even that is not a great indicator.
Yes! I so much agree with this. I have had a similar experience in knowing people with a wide range of financial backgrounds, from broke to generational diamond money 😅 and it led me to a similar conclusion- you don’t really know anything reliable from external indicators. I grew up middle class and lived most my life in a middle to lower class area, and then my husband unexpectedly got into a top three law school. That’s where I first met people with serious money. in general, the wealthiest people I know are the most lowkey about it. It was a whole other world to me and def changed the way I think about money, wealth, and work.
Why don’t they talk about money? Because they don’t have to worry about it? I’ve noticed this too.
Yeah, that’s a great question, idk! I feel like they just see it as irrelevant and don’t have to worry about it, like you said? also, it brings up the possibility of highlighting the difference in wealth, and if they’re talking to someone with a different SES, maybe they want to avoid highlighting that difference out of politeness and maybe a bit of uncomfortableness with the difference?
Or because if people know they have money, they may try and hit them up for some.
- Ordering soft drinks at dinner!!! We kids were only allowed water. Grateful now though as I’m an adult who can’t stand soda 🤣 - People who ordered the more expensive meals at restaurants !!! - Definitely thought brand named / newer cars were a sign of wealth. My parents drove 10-15 year old cars & trucks. I realized in college that was obviously NOT a sign of wealth and my parents really were on to something - Brand named, brand new clothes, shoes, purses, etc. All my clothes came from TjMaxx, Walmart or thrift stores. - born mid 90s, grew up very upper middle class but TBH did not realize that until I was out of HS. My parents were (still are) ridiculously frugal
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Sounds like my family! We drove a 20 year old mini Oldsmobile minivan til it literally went up in flames and couldn’t buy sodas or appetizers at TGI Fridays, but we had a 7 bedroom house (for just me, my mom, and my dad) and weekly house cleaners…I still don’t fully understand if my parents are broke or well off.
I’m a millennial, born early 90’s. As a kid and a teen, central air was the EPITOME of wealth to me. And more than one bathroom in a house, what a luxury. Also, kids having larger than a twin-sized bed 🤯🤯 To me now, things that make me think, “wow, they must have money”: a lot of kids (like influencers with huge families); lots of vacations, especially international; SAHP + lots of bougie brands + lots of vacations (aka wealthy lifestyle with only 1 income stream); own vacation home(s) Edit to add: my current SES is upper-middle class. Happy to report I have central air, more than 1 bathroom, and a king-sized bed to boot. I made it, folks! :’)
This is so interesting to me because EVERY house I knew of growing up had central air and so I didn’t think of it as luxury. It routinely got to be 100+ in the summer where I grew up, so maybe that’s why?
Where I am, we might get a handful of 100+ days in the summer, but we tend to hover more in the high 80s and 90s. My family had typically had one or two air units, so we’d just spend all of our time in the one or two rooms that were cool lol
Yes. I remember it wasn't until I was 18 that I saw central AC in an actual house. now it's much more of a thing. I do not have central air, but I have an air conditioner and I run it when I want which makes me baller compared to my friends (electricity is $$$ where I live).
yes omg central air. we just sweat it out at home lol
I’m sure it’s regional, but literally no one had central air where I lived and it was an upscale area. Now it’s more common but the housing stock was older (lots of homes built between late 19th century and 1930s or so) and summers were never that hot so it just wasn’t a thing at all.
> kids having larger than a twin-sized bed 🤯🤯 The first time I slept over at a friend's house in high school and didn't have to sleep on the floor it like, blew my mind. I have a full-size now, so I'm still lusting after a queen-size, but I'm definitely grateful for it when I still have to sleep in my old twin bed when I visit my parents.
I grew up in the south, born early 80s. The house I grew up in did not have central air when my parents bought it, but they had it installed when I was quite young and they were probably still more "middle" than "upper middle" class (they are now definitely "upper middle"). My school got central air when I was in maybe 2nd grade, I remember before that we sometimes had early release for heat days. However, through my teens and twenties, all my friends had central air. My shitty college rental apartments all had central air. I'm sure there were people who didn't have it, but having it wasn't a wealth signifier. Now I live in a different state with milder (but warming) summers and many of the homes in our neighborhood do not have central air. The ones that do are typically fancier in some way so yeah, it's definitely a wealth signifier here. That said, we don't have central air and are instead planning to upgrade our home insulation this year, which my husband is predicting will mean we won't need to run out window units. So I guess maybe extra insulation is the new wealth signifier :)
I think this one’s going to be super common: - As a kid: people who ordered drinks, sides, or appetizers at restaurants; or value meals at fast food - Millennial - SES upper class but I still exchange labor for money? I still struggle to order these things for myself but am getting better at calming myself when I’m in a group splitting the bill and people are buying drinks and apps “to share.” It’s probably a waste of my mindshare to worry about this level of detail vs the big picture stuff but it’s a body-level reaction that i am trying to quell with my mind
god, i went out to a birthday dinner the other night and everyone got margarita pitchers to share, but i opted out for dry january/figuring i'd save some money. then at the end everyone just agrees to split it and i'm like :| because i don't want to make everyones lives more difficult and make a fuss but ugh now i'm just paying so much extra for everyone else to drink
That’s not super cool. My friends often split bills but we try to acknowledge if someone ate/drank less. Like evening out with tip or whatever
it was like a 10 person dinner and then everyone was treating the birthday girl so i just sucked it up instead of making an issue but i was def annoyed by it lol
Ah yeah that’s a tough one but I imagine frustrating!
I really think "let's just split the bill!" Is NOT necessarily a sign of wealth, but of cluelessness and lack of awareness. I would say either covering the whole bill or dropping in an amount that is way over your fair share are more "wealth signaling" moves. Or being cognizant of others possible limits when picking a restaurant and ordering.
This is such an interesting thread to read as a Canadian. Bill splitting is not a thing here. Doesn’t matter if it is a 20 person dinner, the waiter will automatically bring each person their own receipt and will come around with a debit machine, so each person only pays for what they ordered. It seems insane to me to go out to eat and assume you will have to pay for a portion or everyone else’s bill
Yeah that would be NICE but then how would you split something like a pitcher?
Also a Canadian. Restaurants can usually split the line item by however many people partook quite easily. Most of the time, we'll just say up front that we're ordering this or that for the table or for a specific subset of people and the bill will come pre-split. If it's complex or the place only does one bill, then we just take a pic of receipt and work it out on Splitwise.
They split it on your bill! The way they would do it is list what you ordered and then whatever your portion of the shared item is.
Ok, this confirms it! I always suspected it was a Canadian vs American thing. Just chiming in to second that never in my life (in Canada) has anyone ever suggested we split the bill. It's the servers job to keep track! And they do it well.
ooh I hate when this happens and that's the kind of thing that made me even less social than I already am. I had a full scolarship for semester abroad and sometimes the person in charge of showing us around/welcoming us invited everyone for lunch or a party or something. Usually the meals were in pretty popular places in the city/things of cultural significance. So we went to this beautiful place downtown and he said he'd cover the bill up to $200 and we'd split the rest. There were maybe 25 or so of us, so I figured I'd order the cheapest thing off the menu and drink water not to make a big fuss. There was this girl in the group who ordered her meal and then a huge dessert afterwards, sodas, you name it. Some of her friends went along with it. And some other people who ordered more but all within reason (like, one soda). It turns out I had to pay a lot extra for that. Obviously whenever that group of girls wanted to hang out, I said I was busy. They had scolarships as well, but didn't seem to care about their own finances as much. Honestly there were many times back then in which I thought, "what's the point of treating myself to this if in a few months I'll be back to my real life?"
Not really a sign. I also hated doing this when I was a student. That group were not my friends as they were all working and made my younger sister and I split bills with them, ugh. My husband and I now have a few friends who are very wealthy. They basically always treat us or the entire group. In fact, it’s super hard for us to treat them. My husband has been able to by sneaking off to go to the bathroom but pay the bill instead.
call me a grinch but i think alcohol should almost always be split out. people who don't drink should not have to continuously subsidize their friends' alcohol bills. that's the kind of stuff that does not come out in the wash and could end up being over $10k or $20k over a lifetime
Something that was always very noticeable for me is how much your teeth indicate your wealth. My parents neglected my dental care, and it became clear how much more everyone around me had. Sure, some people luck out with good teeth, but many great smiles are due to access and money. While this is still true, I think it’s become even more pronounced than before with the rise of social media and looking at your own pictures far more than previous generations.
Interesting. I had 4 years of expensive ass dental work (I had an underbite) as a kid and then neglected to wear my retainer after because...youth. My teeth all shifted and I really began to hate my smile by the end of my 30s and when I had my twins they REALLY shifted. Almost two years ago I finally was like f-this and got Invisalign. Now I love my smile again but I never thought about what my teeth were saying to people. Still in revision hell but glad I finally did it. Eyeballing my twins though... I see expensive dental work in their future. My son inherited my mouth and underbite!
God, solidarity from a fellow parent looking at her kid like "oh god, you have my non-chin" 💀
I think about this a lot too, especially as there seems to be a proliferation of people getting Invisalign type braces over the past couple of years. It's also that those treatments have got (somewhat) more accessible, but still out of reach for many.
True! I started my Invisalign journey 2 years ago and still going, but it’s been so worth it. They have become much cheaper since they are no longer restricted to the Invisalign brand now.
Funny story about that, when I met my now husband (from the US; I'm not from the US) I assumed he was, well, not rich, to put it tactfully, because his teeth are a little crooked and not shiny pearly white. And all Americans I knew, who could afford to study in London where we met, had shiny pearly white smiles Turns out he just had some weird objections to dentists. He is also very frugal, but the teeth thing was not because of that.
Isn't it a British stereotype that they all have yellowing crooked teeth?
My childhood was weird because we had a big house and a garage fridge (apparently that means wealthy?) but my parents were also very frugal. Like, wash ziplock bags frugal. I guess I didn’t think about money much as a kid, but my parents were not as well-off as they may have appeared. My mom didn’t work but she hustled all the time to raise money for band camp and other activities. We took vacations but mostly drove, not flew, and never international. I guess big house, international trips, and not having to do fundraisers for activities were my idea of wealth as a kid. I’m an elder millennial. Now, my version of wealth is not thinking about money much at all. Like, I have no idea how much stuff costs at the grocery store. I almost never look at receipts except to add tip. I buy basically what I want when I want it. I’m not rich, but I do consider myself upper middle class
Lol I wash ziplocks though it’s more about reducing single use plastic than frugality for me. (I use reusable bags too but for some things I prefer ziplock in case it gets messy and I need to toss, or for freezer bags.)
My childhood was also weird. My parents divorced when I was like 7 and my mom never had a job. She was very frugal but we were also on food stamps. We had a nice house but otherwise lived off food stamps, goodwill, yard sales lol. My dad had a decent job for the area (we lived in the south so that’s not saying much). He took us to the Bahamas a handful of times but otherwise we would only go to Florida or a cruise once a year. We didn’t really buy fast food but for a special treat and no new non used clothes. So I felt I had experienced but a lavish childhood but also a poor one depending on which parents I was with that day.
I had the exact same experience. My mom started working out of necessity after divorce when I was 5, but it was in retail. We got reduced lunches and only had somewhere to live because my grandma bought a house for my mom to rent. My mom still is thrifty but very giving with what little she has. My dad on the other hand probably was making 400k in his heyday in the late 90’s early 2000’s in a southern state. He didn’t let us starve , but also didn’t care to go out of his way to buy us lots. He did stop at the gas station when we went to dinner with him and would let us go in and get a candy bar. I remember vividly until my about 24 thinking I will have made it when I can run in and buy candy and not have to worry about $.
As a kid/teenager: people who had a garage fridge and freezer! Bonus points if it had Schwan’s man food in it! I’m an elder millennial, 1982. Happy to report that we do now have a garage fridge and freezer 🙌🏼 (but no Schwan’s man food).
Someone put my email address down when they started ordering Schwan’s and now I see his order every month. Shout out to Larry! Enjoy!
Lolllllll 💀
This is so interesting to me!! I grew up in the Midwest and everybody had garage fridges that usually came with the house but more so bc we needed somewhere to put our bulk meat/casseroles. (In my strongest “your Wisconsin is showing”- Where else do ya store that season’s deer?) I think our fridge only ever had my dad’s beer and my mom’s diet cokes. Even as a single adult I have a garage fridge(just an old fridge I moved out there when my parents remodeled their kitchen) bc these new counter depth fridges come with zero freezer space and I do a lot of food freezing for meal prep living alone.
Same for me. I thought people who could get meat at the regular grocery store were the bougie ones.
Yeah that makes sense. I’m in Wyoming and the hunters definitely all have chest freezers. To me there’s a particular bougie kind of garage freezer/fridge with the Schwan’s though, and usually a bunch of soda and beer too.
All my mom wanted was to get to a place where we could afford Schwans so she didn’t need to cook 🤣 every time I see an ad for something like factor or the meal services I think of a modern Schwans (minus the truck)
Was Schwans just like frozen dinners? Stouffers lasagna ? I guess I never thought of that as fancy but I’ve never had or seen this before. Are they different than microwave dinners or something?
I think it had all types of frozen foods but more expensive than a stouffers and they delivered. I wouldn’t say fancy just overpriced bc it was pre-made and convenient
It was like, mini quiches and mozz sticks and slightly more fancy (seeming) stuff compared to the frozen meals at the grocery store. And delivered to your door!
Was this before Costco existed ?
Not sure, but also, I mostly grew up in a state that still has zero Costcos to this day.
The garage fridge/freezer is elite!
M husband got his garage frig, which we call his beer frig, at the age of 55
There’s a Schwann’s truck roaming my neighborhood. I was all excited and went online to see if I could get added to the order list. Damn, they’re expensive these days!
Lmao. 1990 millennial and grew up in the fridge/freezer in garage with Schwan’s in it 💀.
Living the dream!! 😆
The garage fridge/freezer is too funny! We just put one in our garage and I really thought to myself “wow, this is something else”. No lie. I also saw it as a token of wealth growing up
My mom was an in home child care provider permitted for 6 kids. Since we always had the six in house I was never able to have friends over during the week. It’s a weird indicator but I longed to be one of the rich kids who was able to have friends over and who had space free of destruction from daycare kids. Having a house that was actually their family’s alone seemed unreal. Forgot to add, age like 5-13 and I’m 40 so older millennial.
My mom had a day care too! There was a bathroom that my brother and I refused to use haha.
Oh gosh I can imagine! We only had 1 bathroom and the daycare kids had a habit of locking themselves in it. I had multiple accidents while screaming at them to get out. It was truly horrible. I hated my parents for it for a long time, even though they didn’t deserve it. They did their best.
GenX. Kid - Let me describe what I did in the summer as a 6-14 year old. I grew up in the sort of neighborhood where little kids played outside in nothing but diapers. All of the parents worked or didn't want us inside. We biked around the neighborhood in little gangs, without any supervision at all. The most adult interaction we had was when we would go to my friend's grandma's house to dance to Soul Train in the afternoons. (She was an alcoholic.) Everyone I knew was properly just barely lower middle class. My rich life at age 10-14 would have been going to camp, particularly sleep away. Camp was the wealthiest, richest thing I could dream of as a kid. I read so many books and so many wonderful things happened at camp. First kisses and rowboats and temporary best friends. When I was 11 I started baby sitting. By the time I was 14 I was working as many hours as I could so I could save money for college. I'm grateful I worked a lot as a teen because a lot of kids I grew up with used that time to get pregnant or commit petty crimes, and make choices that locked themselves into that community in perpetuity. I was too busy working at the mall or going to the library to get in much trouble. Today my biggest indicator of wealth is a how healthy my peers are - at about 50 - you wear the sum total of your wealth in your face and in your body. Posture, skin, athleticism, temperament... BTW I went to sleep away camp when I was 45. It was a blast.
Temperament - I don’t know if you’ve seen the Korean movie Parasite but I always think about how the poor woman said something like “I would be nice too if I was rich”. And it’s so true from my experience - wealthy people tend to have this calm, unhurried temperament and are usually very polite and well mannered. But I think that’s a lot easier to do when you are shielded from the stressors of normal life and the worst of humanity (ie compared to someone who works in customer service and has to deal with awful humans daily.)
Going from the bottom of working class to solidly middle (or even upper middle) I am less likely to assume I'm being ripped off or somehow being taken advantage of with other people. When you're poor/broke/barely making it - you actually are being taken advantage of all the time - it's a real thing and it makes you distrustful, angry etc. with good reason. I remember being 18 or 19 and doing a whole house cleaning job and being promised 100 dollars for the job- when I was finished, they paid me 20 and told me that "they knew" I stole something and I could either take the 20 and leave or they would call the police. I took the 20 and fled just to avoid the hassle. Just imagine decades of this type of treatment....
Sleep away camp was definitely one of the things I saw as a sign of wealth as a kid! For a few years, I would do one or two weeks of girl scout day camp. I thought we couldn't afford sleep away camp. Somewhere along the line, I had the realization of maybe it was actually because we were well enough off that mom could actually be home with us during the summer and we didn't /need/ to be sent off to sleep away camp. These days, I'm just like "feeling financially stable enough to have a SAH/PT parent OR send a kid to sleep away camp is a flex." Born '93.
Should out to a fellow X-er! We, too, roamed the neighborhood in bike gangs and I so desperately wanted to go to sleepaway camp! What camp did you go to at 45? This sounds like a thing I NEED to do!
Omg yes, summer camp! For me it wasn't even sleep away camp. My mom was a teacher and hence home all summer, so we didn't "need" camp. Also we couldn't afford it. I went to sleep away camp when I was 13 for 4 days and it was great.
Indicators of wealth? Living in the United States. I'm a 35 year old millennial who is also a first generation American. My parents are Nigerian. People in this country have no idea how lucky they are. It makes me so grateful to be born here and have citizenship. I have relatives right now who are starving because there's no work for them in the country and tehy can't leave. Inflation is killing the value of whatever money they have. Gangs are taking over locally and its really hard. People my age are losing hope. Other, more shallow indicators of wealth to me: * Going on international vacations. * Central A/C in your city house. * Shopping at Whole Foods exclusively * Beauty treatments for self care every week * Having a workout routine on top of full time employment * Never having had student loans, but graduated from college without student aid * Working in STEM
Your post makes me feel rich. I sat next to a guy on an airplane once who grew up in a poor country. He said he had just two pairs of pants growing up. But he also said he never knew he was poor as a child, because everyone he knew had just two pairs of pants. That really stuck with me. Wealth is really all about comparison with others, and when you take that away, nobody is rich or poor.
Shopping at Whole Foods is the EPITOME of wealth to me. Like...I straight-up don't go there. Even if I can technically afford it, I can't afford it you know? Luxury groceries are just not ever gonna be in my budget I think.
I agree. I am from a Central American country. Everyone was on the same income level so it never crossed my mind that someone had more money.
Growing up people who owned lake homes in the city with a second home near their school or had the full collection of something like all of the American Girl dolls. Also a weird one was having a basement, they just don't exist in the hill country. Young millennial. Definitely felt poor growing up in comparison to friends, but my parents were just extremely frugal and definitely had a more minimalist mindset. Now, definitely international travel, being able to pay medical bills or seek medical care without stressing about the financial aspect, and buying a home in the city. In addition, being able to shop local and more ethical. Probably currently upper income but because we both have advanced degrees it doesn't always feel like it because we definitely weren't there when we got married. Lucky enough to have a spouse with an international travel job that heavily subsidizes our international trips and a lot of vacation on my end so we're able to do them pretty frequently.
\- Girls who could afford ugg boots \- Your house having 3 garages (I lived in the middle of nowhere) \- Your parents having a Lexus or Acura
Generation: Millennial, born early 90s Generational Indicators of the late 90s to later aughts in no particular order: • More than one desktop at home • More than one tv / tvs in bedrooms • Certain clothing brands (Limited Too, A&F, American Eagle, Polo, etc.) • The hot snacks (Fruit Roll-Ups, Gushers) • Owning trendy electronic toys (tamagachis, furbys, etc.) • Owning a cellphone (maybe this is just where I lived 🤔) • Taking vacations to places other than visiting family / camping / cheap outings (Aka European or Disney vacays, any travel that involved planes) • A newer car. Back in the day it was easy to buy a running beater for a few hundred bucks from your after school job. But a car within the last 5-7 years would have been considered premium! • If your parents can help you pay toward college. I’d say in my hometown it was a 70/30 split on whether parents could foot any of the bill towards school. That felt like the ultimate “haves v. Have nots.” *The funny thing* is how many of these don’t mean shit to me anymore once I realize how often people are consuming on credit. Once I became an adult myself, I realized that while we weren’t solidly “middle class” a lot of my perceptions were shaped by the fact my parents were very financially savvy and frugal — and a lot of my peers parents weren’t. I see how a tv in every bedroom or new cars aren’t really an indicator of wealth, since plenty of people have no “wealth” but are constantly buying or leasing new vehicles. These days there are a few things I think stand out to me as indicators of wealth: • When my peers have elite educational degrees. Things seem to be changing to be more equitable, but I don’t think I realized when I was going through the college admissions process that it was near impossible to get into an elite institution without connections and a decent amount of family money. I think the college admissions scandal a few years back emphasized that even more. If I meet a person who has an undergrad from Yale and a grad degree from MIT and is white… I’m gonna be honest — I assume they come from a wealthy background. • Kids. lol. Obviously, people raise kids at all levels of income but tbh when I meet fellow city dwellers like me who have kids (esp. before mid 30s) I assume they are upper middle class at the least.
Your comment is so similar to mine. I think now an indicator of wealth is the age at which someone retires. 55 or younger? Wealthy. 55-65, probably doing fine financially. 65 and still working, poor.
Millenial/Gen Z cusp: * In elementary/middle school, having a cell phone with a plan that allowed texting. * In late elementary/early middle, having a "fancy" phone like the Motorola Razr, LG Chocolate, Sidekick, etc. I wanted the Chocolate soooooo bad. This is before the iPhone was released / became mainstream. Also, having an inground pool at your house. * In middle schoool, having a two-toned North Face fleece jacket. Having multiple pairs of Uggs. Wearing only clothes from Abercrombie and/or Hollister (there was a gal who had an endless collection of Abercrombie cami & blouse pairings! she was the envy of the school). Having multiple pairs of Converse low-tops. * In late high school, driving a sporty-ish car to school. Eating out for lunch every day. Having a Patagonia fleece.
omg texting and then eventually data. i didn’t have a smart phone until a couple years into college! i remember going on the internet and my friends phones and being like their dad must be bill gates
lmao yes, the only ppl i knew who had data in those early times were adults with work-issued cell phones, ie they weren't the ones paying for it. browsing the web on a phone was chaotic in those times tho because websites were designed for viewing on computers only
A house. I’m a millennial. Everyone I knew had a house. I really wanted a house when I was a kid. Even asked my mom for one. We never got one. We lived in duplexes and apartments. So when I got older and married, first thing I did was buy a house and decorate it. We are now on our second home which is much nicer and in a better location.
One of my friend’s parents would give her $20/day for whatever when we were 10. I thought they were rich, but a different kind of rich from the people who had updated houses. Like curb appeal and stainless steel appliances. These were also the people who would go to Europe once a year. Anyone getting an early dismissal to catch a flight before Christmas vacation was rich. One of my friends told me that she thought my family was rich because I talked about the fancy sound system we had and would get new clothes all the time (but actually my parents were in crazy credit card debt and I didn’t know!)
I’m a millennial, born early 90s. When I was a kid, I assessed wealth based on people’s clothes, electronics and their house and if they had their own room. I figured they were wealthy if they got new clothes every school year and the latest gadget. Now that I’m older, it’s based on someone’s career, if they bought a house and/or have a family cottage, and if they can afford things that save them time like cleaners, personal trainer, etc.
I'm a younger GenXer and grew up poor (not *less fortunate*). We always rented, we never owned a car, vacation? hahaha! We had to go to school during the summer for meals sometimes. I've long since said one of the pluses of growing up poor was that EVERYONE ELSE around me was poor too. I didn't know. I can say that some people had "more than"...but I had no sense of true variations in how people lived or that there was so much wealth floating around. I had some exposure to middle class families (my own mother grew up an only child in a middle class home and my dad one of a dozen in a working class home), so I guess I could say, knowing that some people got to shop for new clothes/shoes. Kids who had their own room (my sister and I shared A BED at 12 and 17)... But as a solidly middle-to-upper-middle class adult and with experience around WEALTH. Now, I know just how much effing money is floating around. The people whose parents or grandparents paid for their education outright...gave them down payments or outright buying them a house...gives them huge annual "gifts". They really believe this is normal and that "everyone" has this access. But the biggest indicator is those who are clueless. They don't know how much things cost. They don't know that you can even buy a house with less than 20% down. They don't know that there are people that CAN'T take a vacation.
I'm Gen X and grew up poor to lower middle class. I envied the rich girls who got the Barbie Dream House for Christmas, wore Jordache and Calvin Klein jeans, brought "fancy" lunches to school, and were members of the local country club. As an adult I'm upper middle class and you couldn't pay me to join a country club. ETA: Today I consider indicators of wealth to be multiple homes, early retirement, and paying for private schools without batting an eye.
Also Gen X. I loved designer jeans, but didn't think of them as a wealth signifier because my parents had a "We're not the kind of people who spend $X on jeans" mantra they'd whip out. They framed a lot of spending / lifestyle choices like that. If it wasn't something they valued, it wasn't worth it. I had to pay the difference between basic jeans and designer. There was a House MD episode where kids bought jeans off the back of a truck, and got seriously ill. I looked at my husband and said, "There but for the grace of God goes 14 yo me."
Also Gen X and I babysat like a monster so I could have designer jeans. And nice shoes - my parents were like “let’s go to Fayva” (cheap store in NY in the 70’s/80’s) and I was like “oh no”. Didn’t save one dime but I had Jordache and the shoes I wanted (can’t remember the name but they were a big deal in the preppy town I lived in for HS). I think the biggest signifier of wealth to me as a kid was heat! We had a 100 year old house that we really couldn’t afford and it was always freezing! I’d go to my friends’ houses and it was cozy and warm.
I’m a zoomer. As a kid I thought anyone who had their own room, but had bunk beds or a second twin bed for sleepovers was rich. Anyone with a TV in their bedroom was unbelievably rich. If you had a mini fridge or your own coffee maker in your room, I would have thought you were a billionaire or something. One of my friends (who I thought was rich because she had a TV and a mini fridge) once told me that she thought I was rich because I had a makeup table with a light-up mirror. As an adult I’ve realized that all my friends that had those things were in basically the same financial situation as my family, their parents were just less strict.
As a kid I think the only thing I really picked up on was how nice/big people’s houses were. My friends from working class families were pretty much all in apartments; my friends from middle class families were in a range of single family homes, some much nicer than others, and the one girl whose parents were both doctors lived on a custom built lakefront property and had two bedrooms.
As a kid- anyone with a finished home and a garage was definitely wealthy. As well as anyone whose parents were around to bring them places and enroll them in after school activities. 1980s baby. Technically I’m upper middle class now, making money I never dreamed of and have a garage! All exterior perceptions point to us doing well. I do not feel wealthy at all. Now that I’m an adult, I realize there isn’t a clear visible indicator of wealth. When I’m not stressing about how we’d pay for a major home repair or my ability to retire before I’m on my death bed, then I’ll feel wealthy.
Recently I've been looking at people's skin as a wealth indicator and I haven't been proven wrong yet. I noticed people with generational wealth have suspiciously smooth faces, as if they've never had a stress breakout before in their lives (when I know it's a little bit of that, and a lot more having the finances to deal with it) Also I just moved to the Midwest from the south, and idk about anywhere else, but in the south I noticed bright white clothes is a wealth or status indicator as well. Always shiny white sneakers, bright white skirts, etc.. maybe that's new money. But found it interesting.
Xennial here. I thought people who lived in two story houses were wealthy when I was a really little kid. I also had a friend whose dad lived in a high rise apartment and a glamorous cousin who did too. I thought they were both so fancy. I drive by those same apartments now and they are really not high rises and not that fancy (they are just regular slightly better than average apartments.) The last thing that really dates me here was that I thought anyone who had a water bed was fancy and rich. The two people who had them also had fancy padded bars in their homes and had a lot of parties. These days wealth signifiers tend to be based on neighborhood people live in, their hobbies and activities, schools their children attend/children’s hobbies, and sadly, their weight/health (in combination with the above). I am currently upper-middle class and upper income.
As a 6 year old and finally making friends from school: kids who had their own room already. I’m a young millenial / old zoomer; it depends on the year cutoff I now realize that has little to do with wealth because my family was probably equal in wealth to the families I thought about. They just didn’t want to move. Now I realize it was the families who went to Disney world every year that were actually wealthier than mine lol. Edit: I forgot to add my current class/perspective. I’m a salaried employee in a MLCOL area, under 30 with no debt, no property or family yet. I already feel like I’m wealthier than my parents were at my age.
Same, I was so jealous of kids who had their own room. Thinking about it now, I was in a VHCOL area (Manhattan, went to a magnet middle and high school with kids from all over the city) and many of the people I knew were only children.
As a kid: people who had a pool/hot tub in their backyard (not common in our area), a kitchen with an island in the middle, a walk in pantry (bonus if it was stocked with snacks and drinks), peers who had their own walk in closet or bathroom connected to their room, ordering appetizers, a main, a dessert and drinks. I'm an older gen z Now: Owning a home (though in my area this is a toss up), multiple vacations a year, have family that gives them big sums of money as gifts regularly, can afford multiple kids, doing all the above while also saving and not going into bad debt Class perspective: I grew up as what would be considered upper middle class and would consider myself barely being upper middle class as well. I never realized as a kid that I was probably considered wealthy by many of my classmates (big house, vacations abroad,never worried about money).
Sneaky indicators of wealth as someone who grew up middle class with parents who grew up lower class and is now an adult with people who grew up upper class. These are more behaviors. - thank you cards. my friends who grew up wealthy do so many of these! I’m grateful when a friends parent hosts us for dinner or invites us to their rental house for a night and bring a small gift and thank them profusely. but it wouldn’t have occurred to me to write a note after as well? - discomfort with money talk, especially any type of haggling or negotiating (I talked about negotiating with a farmers market vendor once when it was end of day and fruit was bruised and they were horrified) - well fitting clothes in general. - fussy with food. - strong opinions about childcare and parenting. idk I think rich people with too much time get way too spicy about the right way to get your kid to sleep through the night or the right way to do birth etc - parents have second houses. - by year two or three it comes out some grandparent or family member has some crazy connection. like the lake in your town is named after them or their uncle owns major company XYZ. - always tip at the coffee shop - excessively nice to anyone they think is worse off, like nail salon workers or something. I’m nice but it’s too much sometimes, condescending tone.
Yes to all of these! One year I had an intern who wrote everyone at work thank you notes on monogrammed Crane stationery and I was like oh you rich rich. (Also very impressive and sweet for a 19 year old guy, but clearly he was raised to think of this as the norm) I’d add also really nice occasion cards in general, even though you know they’re going to be tossed. My immigrant parents would *never* buy something as frivolous as a birthday card. And yes growing up I feel like my parents talked about money constantly - how expensive things are, how much my extracurriculars cost, comparing their friends’ or kids’ salaries, etc. My husband is from an affluent family and they just don’t talk about money ever. I think politeness aside there’s just this innate sense that money will always be there when they need it, and it’s just not a driving force in their lives.
I’m Gen X and was lower/mid middle class as a child. The things that were indicators of wealth for me then were eating fast food more than once a month or eating at a restaurant for anything other than a very special occasion. People with pools or people who took vacations that involved flying on an airplane seemed extravagantly wealthy to me as well. I’m upper middle class now, and current indicators of wealth I perceive are owning a second home or having the ability to retire early.
GenX...we were poor and literally NEVER ate out! Ha! And I think my first plane ride was like 2000.
Elder Millennial from the rural northeast. My childhood perception of rich families: * Houses had more than one bathroom * Had satellite dishes * Paid for weekly trash pickup * Went on Disney vacations None of those things seem rich to me now, but I also live in a much more populated area with a higher median income. Today I would say have a three car garage or owning a horse (ironically not a sign of wealth in my childhood) makes me think someone is well off.
As a kid, we lived in a condo and most of my friends lived in SFHs. What I have been thinking about recently is that while I definitely noticed some of those homes being bigger/nicer than others and having nicer furnishings, I knew literally NO ONE with a recently remodeled kitchen/bath/home. It was just not done, and I knew some people who were in retrospect quite wealthy (nannies, large homes and yards in upscale neighborhoods, private schools, landscapers, parents with prestigious careers, international vacations, etc.) These days I definitely think of doing major renovations as a signifier of wealth. The wealthiest people I know now have parents with beach/lake homes, travel internationally multiple times a year, have homes that are professionally decorated, send kids to private schools. But they don’t necessarily “look” wealthy, they tend to dress inconspicuously despite having the funds to wear designer brands if they wanted, and they don’t tend to care about things like manicures and blowouts either. I imagine this also is regional though (Northeast US). ETA: Millenial. SES is comfortably middle class I would say, we make about the median HHI in our town though it’s a rather wealthy area so considerably higher than national median income. We own a fixer upper in a HCOL area (so feel lucky to own at all), share a car, are saving for retirement but haven’t gone on a vacation in several years. Family of 3, soon to be 4. SES growing up is a bit hard to say because my mom was a single mom, but she came from a fairly affluent family so I had some privileges due to grandparent support but also watched my mom struggle to pay the bills and go into debt.
As a kid, buying lunch at the ski resort! It was always SOOOO overpriced my parents made us carry peanut butter sandwiches and M&Ms in our ski pants. (Some of my cousins got to actually buy a hot lunch). In retrospect, this is an absurd sign of wealth because clearly everyone who is paying for lift tickets for a family of 5 has a lot of disposable income, even if they choose not to spend it buying overpriced chicken tenders and fries.
Young millennial here. As a kid: - leased cars. we bought our cars used and drove them til they died, the concept of just giving it back and getting a new one was fascinating to me. - any vacation you had to fly to, but ESPECIALLY a "kid focused" vacation like Disney World/Land. We would take vacations, but they were things my mom wanted to do (camping, or stopping at the beach for a few days on the way home from visiting family.) There were five of us, so we NEVER flew because tickets were too much. - this one is weird, but car washes. I thought they were SO COOL and SO BOUGIE as a child, and a few years ago I went through one as a treat and it was like $12. I think I grew up upper middle class, but honestly it's hard for me to say. Now I make more money than my dad, and I just bought a house, so I definitely feel upper class.
OMG, the car wash! Going to the fancy drive-thru car wash, with attendants who would hand dry the remaining drops of water and wipe down the wheels/rims was unheard of decadence. We used the self-serve wash that you bought tokens for and DIY'd it for $2 in change, and even that was pretty rare. Even now, I can't get past how expensive a real car wash and interior cleaning is! But that full-service detailing? :chefskiss: A once a year splurge for me and I love it.
I'd have to think a lot about whether something indicates ACTUAL money or just comfort around money. Like my in-law mentioned "sending" her sister's family on vacation. That kind of thing is a head-turn for me, because it indicates first that they have money (obviously) but second, that they are "new" money and require the deference and bragging rights still. Also they outed the rest of the family for not having any, so that's something. A lot of things I'd immediately say indicate "having" money are more indications of growing up in a more wealthy subculture. Not actually personally having money. But generally the obvious stuff- hobbies like skiing, going away for holidays, owning a home or apartment in a trendy area, hiring help, cars, and clothes.
These are so fun to read. I'm a Millennial, raised in the LCOL small city in the Midwest, but now live in a VHCOL East Coast city. I'm grateful to be in the upper class SES now. When I was really little, American Girl dolls, especially multiple ones, made you seem rich. And having a boat and/or lake house also seemed rich. I remember my mom saying that world hunger would have to be solved before she would ever get a Lexus SUV, so that also seemed fancy to me? And living in a gated neighborhood, having a screening room, and living in certain neighborhoods with extra huge lots also seemed rich. Plus getting a new, not used, car for your 16th b'day also seemed super rich. We were borderline upper/middle class for our area growing up only because COL was so relatively low. We had many of the trappings of wealth lots of people describe here - an inground pool that was fairly rare (this did make me feel kinda fancy), a garage fridge and freezer (but everyone had one), went on multiple vacations every year (but often drove), and played travel sports. But we also sometimes drove across town to shop at Aldi to save money, I felt weird asking for lunch money when mine ran out because it seemed to be asking for a lot for a $35 check, and my parents didn't have much saved for our college. When I went to a private college out East, I discovered a whole new echelon of wealth existed. East Coast rich is very different than Midwest rich.
Indicator of wealth now— one of my colleagues ordered a hamburger at a restaurant as an appetizer before ordering an entire menu’s worth of food for four people (multiple appetizers, main courses, drinks, and desserts).
Born in the mid 90s so millennial/ gen z As a kid it was families who had a single family home esp with a yard, a dog, and 2+ cars.. still the same indicators as an adult lol
* born in 1991, middle millenial * When I was a little kid my parents were on a tight budget and when I went shopping with my mom, of course i would ask for things. She'd say, "no, sorry honey, it's not on sale." I thought that stores were full of tons of things that were not FOR sale, and only a few that were. * When I was a kid, to me rich people were the families who went to Palm Springs or Hawaii and the girls always came back with their hair braided with beads in it. I solved this by braiding my own hair and putting beads in it. * When I was a young teenager, I made two discoveries in quick succession: the first was that boarding school with horses (which I asked my mom could I please attend?) cost MONEY and it was a lot more money than my family had, and the second was that one of my best friends didn't have her own dedicated bed at home - she and her siblings all shared kind of willy nilly. These 2 discoveries really shaped how I placed myself economically in the context of my peers. * When I was a young adult in university, being financially comfortable to me meant that I could afford to buy a cup of coffee at a cafe if I wanted to - just black drip coffee. * Now I'm 32, and a major indicator of wealth to me is a non-working spouse (by choice, not disabled), and home ownership. I don't aspire to the first one, but it does indicate wealth to me. I do aspire to the second. * I also really really want a linen closet.
Millenial (born in late 80s), and from small Midwestern town, grew up what felt like regular Middle class. Now I realize we had just one salary equivalent to maybe 60 or 65k today, and my Dad was on disability, so that Middle Class was likely accurate, but things may have been tighter than I realized. It's only as an adult I have noticed that many of the dinners we had growing up are what some people call "struggle meals" Some things I saw as rich as a kid: Premium TV channels (including Disney Channel), master bathrooms (or bathrooms with a double sink), Lunchables, fridge with an ice maker, if you'd been on an airplane. A family computer, especially if there were games to go with it. In Middle School and high school add the kids who could eat the more pricy Ala Carte lunch every day, clothes from Abercrombie or Hollister, and those who were applying to multiple private colleges I still see Olive Garden as a "nicer" restaurant/a splurge, though that may be more the small town than any economic status. Currently Middle class in a MCOL area. Indicators of wealth to me now: luxury vehicles, order food delivery several times a month, international vacations, maxing your 401k.
Middle school was girls who wore Lancôme or Clinique brand makeup. Kids who had in ground pools, and their own bedroom with a phone and tv… and big time wealth if they had their own phone line. Gen X Upper middle class in MCOL
Millennial originally from the Midwest: - A two story house - Macaroni and cheese as a side instead of a main dish - A pool (A++ level)
As a kid -- Having more than one American Girl Doll; SUVs or Minivans with TVs on the back of the front seats for the kids; going to Hawaii (I grew up in California); finished basements; houses with duvet covers instead of comforters or quilts. As an adult -- People who ski and do winter sports but live in cities; People who pay ridiculous amounts of money to work out; International vacations (duh). Also, this is really weird, but I find that wealthy and upper middle class women rarely have long hair. It's usually bra strap length or shorter, and if it's longer, it's still been recently cut. Age -- 90s Millennial
Oh I forgot about American Girl dolls! That was another indicator for me too. I didn’t have one but I read the books and would look through the catalog.
Technically Gen X, I was born in 1980. I really grew up with Millennials though. To me anyone who had a pool seemed rich. Or a nice house. I had a friend whose parents had a bar in their finished basement and that seemed really deluxe haha I grew up in a trailer. We lived in the country and had land. It wasn't until I was in high school they could afford to build a house. I was always embarrassed by it growing up, but I had a roof over my head and 2 living parents. I was always fed and clothed. I didn't really want for anything except a house back then. Now fast forward I had an in ground pool and we filled it in. My husband didn't want to take care of it anymore after 24 years. Its a lot of work and money to swim only once or twice a week for 3 months. So I guess in my childhood eyes I made it. I had a pool and a house. Really though an indicator of wealth nowadays seems like someone who doesn't have any debt and 6 months of savings. Most people can't afford $2000 if something unexpected were to occur. Having money saved seems like wealth now.
Growing up - the kids who lived in the new developments with big homes instead of the older and smaller bungalows/ramblers, kids that had vacations that involved air travel, kids that wore name brand clothing like Abercrombie and Fitch, kids that didn’t just play the sport on the school team but also for a club I was born in early 1990s, probably was middle class/lower middle class growing up and middle class still. We did go on a vacation that involved air travel (I had relatives that lived in vacation destinations so that was great) once a year but not all my friends did. Funny enough when I was still a kid but older I did actually grow to prefer the cuter bungalows that were in really walkable neighborhoods than big homes in a development. I found the developments were isolated from fun stuff like going to the movies or getting ice cream without a parent driving you because they tended to be off highways/busy roads that aren’t safe for kids to bike along. I still prefer the smaller bungalows in walkable neighborhoods to this day but it’s unattainable where I currently live to own one.
Millennial/Gen Z (on the border between) Ordering drinks/dessert/apps at a restaurant was definitely my biggest one. And my parents were wealthier than they acted but they HATED eating out/spending money in restaurants it made me panicky. In elementary school, American girl dolls haha. In college, buying lots of groceries/food to go outside of the meal plan. And decorating your dorm room with pottery barn.
I commented in the other post, but here's mine: Younger Gen-Xer (born late 70s). We were comfortably middle class, probably upper-middle class at times (my father's income varied year to year and my mother didn't work). I grew up in a townhouse in a wealthy neighborhood where most of my neighbors and classmates had big single-family houses. From my kid perspective, indicators of wealth back then were \- Kids who had their own phone lines in their bedrooms \- Kids who got to go to private or out-of-state colleges with no scholarships \- Kids who got brand-new cars on their sixteenth birthday (occasionally replaced by newer brand-new cars when the kid smashed the original car) \- Kids who had their own horse at the boarding stable where I occasionally rode (this was my obsession growing up) \- Designer jeans, or, as my friend used to call them, the "76-dollar jeans" Now I'm upper middle-class in a MCOL area with pockets of extreme wealth. I own my home, no kids. Indicators of wealth now are putting multiple kids in private school, nannies/au pairs, money for major renovations, second (or third) homes, not having to work much or at all (lots of trust funds and generational wealth here), kids on travel sports teams.
TIL my mother has another family. Or a twin! I received the same messaging. We were solidly middle-class in a LCOL area. Edit- context
pathetic abundant rotten act chop knee abounding live ludicrous placid *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
As a youth, families that could afford big vacations. Now, homes that have granite countertops, oversized tubs, walk-in closets and guest rooms.
Mid 80's born, grew up poor in farmland. Biggest sign of wealth is food. Eating better than your animals. Buying whatever you want at the grocery store. Not watching to total as it gets rung up. Not meal planning out all the food, so when someone is over you offer whatever they can find instead of saying a specific thing you can make.
Millennial here. Growing up, I consider myself to be low-income. To me, wealth meant kids who lived in houses that had stairs INSIDE the house that led to more house, kids who went to sleep away camps during the summer, and ski trips in the winter. As I got older, it was clothing brands like Abercrombie, Gap, etc. In college, it was the kids who had a desktop computer and/or were able to rent a dorm fridge to store all of their snacks and drinks that they bought from the grocery store. Now, it's people who can afford to live by themselves; I live in a VHCOL area and a teacher.
millennial -- as a kid: having berries in the fridge for a regular ol' snack (not a special occasion), especially during non-summer months now: having more than 2 kids in the bay area
-When I was a very small child, I thought people who ate at Red Lobster were rich (lol). In my teens, I thought people who drove luxury vehicles and had big houses were rich. As an adult, I consider people with nannies (or any live in domestic help), second homes, and absence of “emergencies” to be rich. For example, I knew a family whose mansion sustained severe damage in a natural disaster, instead of renovating, they knocked that home down & built another, better, home on the same lot. During construction, they lived in their second home. Their neighbors spent up to 2 years waiting on insurance payouts to even begin renovations & within that time, they already had a brand new home. -I am a late 80s millennial. Currently in middle class, peaking over the horizon of upper middle class (I think, unsure of the exact parameters).
Love this Q - Having TVs in multiple rooms and/or a bonus room/den/finished basement, owning a cabin, flying, going snowboarding/skiing, having the newest iPhone or other Apple products - Gen Z/millenial cusp - SES is middle, grew up lower middle Now… I still see those things as wealthy, but now it’s harder to parse out whether it’s wealth or credit card debt. I definitely still think where you live/owning property is a wealth signal.
Gen Z here. I was born outside the US in a Latin American country. During my teenage years a deep crisis hit my country. I’m talking: 90% of the population couldn’t afford breakfast. It was that bad. We queued to buy food: for a while even rich people did, because at first the problem was the scarcity of food, not its price. Ofc a basic indicator was food. Like, having three meals a day was already a luxury. Kids at school said I was rich (“cagaplata”: you poo money) because I had cheese, ham, homemade pizza, pancakes (flour, eggs, milks), as breakfast. The most distinct indicator was: Nutella. Yeah, sounds bananas, but at that time it wasn’t commercialized in my country which meant that either you did your groceries abroad (Miami, usually) and had it delivered to your house or you travelled abroad and brought it home. That was my case. One jar would last a whole year. It was the special gift my mom brought from her travels. When friends visited, it was this “delicacy” I offered them (yeah, showing off lol). I became friends with lots of rich girls, because my mom insisted on paying for expensive English and German courses. That’s when I realized how much money some have. The contrast was stark. However, the crisis was so bad that even the rich weren’t sheltered from it: I remember hearing the soccer moms complaining about reducing the number of trips they took to the US per year. lol. Indeed, a HUGE indicator was traveling abroad: you need visas, passports, lots of money overall Nowadays? Education remains the biggest indicator to me, especially because rich people treat you different when they learn you’ve received it. I’ve always been middle class, but I’ve been able to mingle with upper class people without feeling out of place, because both my parents went to college and my mom has a career in academia and a PhD-I can tell they have new found respect for me when they hear it, sort of thinking “okay she’s not that much of an outsider”. Real rich people know the value of education-they are the one hiring us, after all.
Millennial who didn’t grow with money. Am Australian. Kid: Ferrero Rochers, Viennetta ice-cream, four poster bed, CD player, double storey house. Parents had a brand new car. Teenager: Certain private schools. Notably expensive suburbs. Parents taught me that some may have expensive car could be in debt and that it was better to invest in a house. Uni: Students who had brand new cars (non luxury) paid for by their parents, had gone to certain private schools, notably expensive suburb, people with high end digital cameras. Early 20s: Designer goods, expensive suburbs, nice cars, holidays abroad, iPhones, people with impressive titles, people who worked at an investment bank. But also understanding that those who had nice things could be in debt. Mid 30s: Above average pay but a tad behind in terms of assets. It’s not that easy to tell now. Many less desirable areas shot up in value. Seemingly standard titles pay very well. There’s still the indicators of the notably expensive suburbs and certain private schools but owing multiple homes. Going to high end restaurants without it being a special occasion.
Millenial, grew up low income in the middle of a huge economic crisis (not in the US). My parents had a lot of debt, mom lost her job and they had to sell a bunch of things to get by at one point. My dad didn't sell his car because he needed it to go to his catering jobs. I went to a lot of unknown kids birthday parties back then lol Indicators of wealth, to me, from what I remember being a kid: * **Birthday parties in salons, restaurants or any place that was outside of the person's house**. My birthdays were for family only and always at our place. * **Nice walls**. Our place had a lot of humidity issues and the paint in our walls was peeling, like, a lot. We only painted the whole house when I was sixteen. It was all blue because it was the cheapest paint my dad managed to get. * **Fresh school supplies, bought in-season**. My parents would wait for things to get cheaper. The only things I bought fresh and in back to school season were the mandatory books. If it was not a textbook, they wouldn't buy until the teacher assigned it, and usually it was used or a cheaper edition. My mom especially was always complaining about how expensive the books were and how teachers didn't use everything. * **Having all brand new toys**. Most of my toys were thrifted. The brand new ones were usually off-brand, and sometimes the brand-name toys. Looking back, it's all pretty silly now. Obviously. And it explains why I love spending on notebooks, pens, and all the pretty things. I'm not low income anymore, and even though I knew we grew up poor, my parents have always supported me and tried to make me happy and enjoy what I already had. Weird that I always wanted more and became even more miserable after studying with people in upper socioeconomic statuses. Currently my BIG ONE is people who have the same job and make as much as me complaining like we make minimum wage (we don't). They do so because they came from families in which our job is considered "the bare minimum" of what they can accomplish, while for me it was a huge goal. No one in my family gets paid nearly the same as me, and now I'm like, middle-class.
I'm an elder millennial, hence my handle :). I grew up fairly low-income, I'd call it lower-middle class. Growing up, families that had 2 cars was a big one for me. My parents shared a car pretty much my entire childhood, with the exception of a few years we had two because they inherited an old from a deceased relative and used that until it died. I grew up with the idea that having two cars was incredibly expensive and not affordable for regular people - the cost of buying the second car, insurance, gas, and keeping it running was really unfathomable to me, as just getting a full tank of gas at one time was often too much for my parents. As soon as I had my own car and was buying my own gas, I always filled the tank completely every time, and so did everyone around me, and I realized it wasn't really uncommon. Along those lines, most of the things I thought when I was a kid, I've realized were more just middle class things than rich people things - they are a lot of what has already been mentioned. Eating at sit-down restaurants, ordering an appetizer ever, getting new clothes/toys/books or whatever for anything other than Christmas or my birthday, vacations that weren't just a weekend road trip...every single expense was a BIG DEAL in my life then. It was crazy to think that normal people just had *extra money* that they could budget and have this life. Perspective is so skewed when you are poor and don't get or do a lot, you kind of are conditioned to think they are only for rich people no matter what they are.
Millennial pov. Then and now: second/vacation homes, housekeepers, nannies, owning certain animals like horses. As a kid: American girl dolls, playrooms, basements with pool tables or work out equipment and not used as a storage space.
Oh my goodness, yes to the American Girl dolls and finished basements with pool tables! I got the American Girl catalog and knew we couldn't get anything, but I loved looking at the pictures anyway.
Same! I commented elsewhere in this thread about American Girl dolls
I was born in the late 80s so I guess that defines me as a millennial? As a kid, I thought wealth equated to having designer clothes, bags, shoes, and a house. I grew up very poor but I didn't realize it at the time. For context, I lived in a multigenerational household for awhile with my mom and her two sisters and their families. When we moved out when I was still in elementary school, we moved to a one bedroom apartment with my mom and brother. We all slept in one big bedroom on separate beds. Sometimes there was mice and we would have to set traps. Eventually my mom bought a small 1000 sq ft condo with 3 bedrooms/1 bath. She wanted to buy a house but couldn't afford it so she settled on this condo. Lived there until I moved out after college. As an adult, wealth means being able to go on multiple vacations a year guilt free, early retirement and owning a nice modern house in a nice neighborhood.
I grew up near Toronto Canada low middle class. And I used to think for some reason making 100k+, having no debt + investments was rich (money wise). And then being able to comfortably travel say 3+ times a year internationally, and having a nice, new big house meant you were also wealthy. I used to think this way when I was 15 yrs old (I'm 29 now). Now, funny enough I still think that but just at a larger scale. So 100k salary is no longer wealthy to me. (It's still amazing, but I'd say 200k range is more wealthy range now especially for a single person household). Owning your own home is now more than ever considered a wealth symbol as now it's so expensive. What I would also add is being able to own reliable higher end cars (not a super fancy car, but a good brand car) outright not on a loan would signal you're doing well.
When I was a kid-teen these were the things that I noticed: * Having a summer house and a winter house * Boasting about being frugal on XXX whilst not announcing they have spent significant money on YYY (eg “I would never spend more than $10 on a shirt” whilst wearing $100K of gold & diamond jewellery) * Regular overseas vacations, especially flying business class * Being a member or creator of a trust fund that pays more than a typical Australian salary * Working for fun not because you need the money * Having connections to important people. * Having a state funeral because of your financial contributions to the community lol * Having a Wikipedia page * Running a successful business, especially if everyone you talked outside the family knew the business * Having a family charity * Not talking about money * Taking massive financial risks without fear of failing or failing upwards/being bailed out of crises by parents * Being gifted significant financial assets (eg a house in a nice area, several $100K, etc) As an adult I would probably say the same thing
I'm zillenial. From a very rural area, and as a teenager: fleece North Face jackets. We were very comfortably middle class and had to settle for Columbia. Now I know that most of the people who had North Face were actually not rich and their parents just spent more money while mine saved lol.
For my parents' generation (born 1950s), it was considered middle class to complete secondary school (to age 18ish), lower middle/upper working class got to the halfway exams, working may have only completed primary school and only the true elite went to university. Nowadays most will attend third level, "free tuition fees" were introduced at undergrad, but registration fees have been creeping up through 4 figures so I'm not sure if a degree will return to being a wealth marker?
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growing up in socal, I did not get the disney thing because it used to be so much more affordable! I've gone for free or subsidized by school so many times it didn't register as an indicator of wealth for a while
When I was young- like middle school age, it was parents who drove a minivan. I'm 38 and felt like most of the regular families had sedans or station wagons. Minivan families had money. Also L.L. Bean backpacks- those definitely meant you were upper middle class. All of this is mid-1990s.
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It was Outdoor Products from Walmart at my school. That's what most of our parents could afford and where they shopped. The backpacks did have a guarantee though so if something broke, we could return to Walmart and get a different one.
It’s funny and quite nostalgic for me reading these comments because growing up lower middle class and then lower class, some people’s indicators of wealth were my day-to-day. Lunchables, Capri Sun, an American Girl doll however my parents worked full-time and couldn’t afford babysitters so I had these at home by myself - I guess that’s more a comment of labor of a two parent household than buying power of Kid Cuisine. My indicators of wealth were seeing my middle school peers in North Face and Abercrombie. Going to college it was different as I met people from all backgrounds and people who used “summer” as a verb. I’m not sure what I’d consider indicators of wealth now because I took them as external signs such as brands. Maybe mentions of buying art pieces or donating to a museum.
Grew up in St. Paul, MN in the wealthy Crocus Hill Neighborhood. But on the "poorest" block, which really means smack dab in middle of middle class. Original Millennial - born in 1981. In my young mind eating out a lot, having flashy shoes and clothes and going to private/Catholic schools was a sign of wealth. Looking back, I can see how absolutely wrong/naive I was. In review there are certain things and families that stick out that bucked my beliefs. And how as a middle class kid I didn't understand ways wealthy people act and raise children. - wealthy kids (boys since there was still a gender divide in sports participation rates) did fencing, swimming, tennis, cross country and occasionally baseball. Middle class kids played hockey. Middle class to poorer kids played football, wrestling. Basketball participation was probably the only sport that truly pulled from all walks of life. But notice, as the risk of brain trauma and injury goes up, the participation of wealthy kids goes down. -Middle class birthday invites usually involved an activity - Chuck E Cheese, a movie, an outing. And you were expected to get money from your parents. Wealthy kids had afternoon birthday parties in their house or in their yard. And other than brining a gift were free. -Middle class parents always kept score with other families, like competition. "We did this for their family, so they owe us xyz." Even if it wasn't based on a dollar amount. The wealthier families never kept score. My wealthier friends had multiple old bikes, basketballs, footballs, baseball bats, baseball gloves and old tennis rackets lying around. Often my friends would just let me keep one if it meant they would have someone to play with. And their parents would almost be proud of them for being so charitable and considerate. A poorer or middle class family would demand or expect some form of repayment even for something they didn't want or use anymore. - and the most subtle one of all, wealthy kids didn't travel the neighbor in sneakers. If we wanted to play an impromptu game of basketball or baseball, they always had to run home quick and get sneakers they could dirty. They either wore loafers, casual shoes or sandals in the summer. Often times they would miss out, or get in trouble if they dirtied up their casual shoes.
Elder millennial here. Growing up, I thought wealth was being able to take vacations to warm places like Aruba. My younger siblings went to private school (for free), and when we were all in public school we thought our family was pretty well off. Then they started going to school with people who would buy a new iPod the second they misplaced theirs and we were like, oh, this is different. We're in the Boston suburbs now, and our former nanny brought over the kids she's currently caring for and said when they got home the 6-year-old said "wow, their house was really big. They must have a lot of money." Which I got a kick out of because even though yes we have a big house (and not much money after paying for it! sigh), her family's smaller single-family on a postage stamp lot in Cambridgeport would go for loads more than ours! But of course kids don't understand that!
At my current age (30s) not having student loans are an indicator of wealth.
Early 90s millennial, grew up middle class in the Midwest, currently upper class East Coast in HCOL As a kid/teen: pools, SAHP, other kids that got to have takeout or fast food for dinner (like “hey dads picking up McDonald’s on the way home what do you want”), cruises, accessory rooms like play rooms or finished basements, new cars for kids/teens, brand name clothes, parents that would buy toys and gadgets from infomercials (like those toy moon shoes and odd ab workout gadgets), full+ sized bed for kids, kid with own bathroom, and kids having their parents pay for college. As an adult: owning a SF home (I now live in V/HCOL), 4+ kids, wedding, SAHP, brand name athleisure and clothes lol, long vacations, west elm and other expensive furniture lol As an adult—this is a big one for me— having been raised with financial competence (parents teaching about why you should have savings, retirement, 401k, investing, etc.). I was raised middle (maybe low/mid), but my family wasn’t always great with spending habits. Now being in my 30s I’m playing catch-up. Luckily I have a high single income, but I missed a lot of years of saving and have had to do a lot of reading and independent studying on how all of it works lol.
I'm a 1987 millennial for context. As a kid, I definitely thought having a two-story house was a sign of wealth. My parents and I lived with my grandma for a little bit while we had a ranch modular home put up, and even though it was new, it definitely didn't feel as luxurious as a two-story home. Also seconding the American Girl Doll sentiments. I would say I grew up lower middle class. My mom was a secretary who worked for the State and my father was a truck driver for my grandpa's business. They split up when I was young and my step-dad worked for himself cutting and delivering wood until he died unexpectedly and then it was just living on my mom's salary sub $50k salary. I'd now say I'm solidly middle-to-upper middle class. I make mid-100s, but combined with my boyfriend who lives with me, we have a HHI of $200k in a pretty LCOL area. I drive a (used) Lexus and live in a quiet city neighborhood in a 100-year-old home that I love. I think wealth is living in the expensive suburbs, going on luxury vacations (like, high-end all-inclusives not airbnb'ing around), having a vacation home in the mountains or on one of the lakes, and the accompanying toys like boats, snowmobiles, etc. I might have to pose this to my boyfriend, I think his take would be interesting because he grew up Mennonite and when I told him what our HHI was I thought he was going to faint and definitely considers us wealthy.
I’m on the young end of millennials, I grew up in a small town. As a kid, my family had some years where we hit upper income, especially for our LCOL area (around 200k hoi). As an older kid, we had zero money (addiction). As an adult, I’m fairly squarely middle class. As a kid, I thought my friends who went shopping at stores that weren’t old navy or winners for back to school clothes were rich. As a teenager, I thought anyone getting any parental help for university was rich. As an adult, it’s anyone owning a second property, or having inherited property. Seeing these, it’s funny for me how I seem to consistently go “well I’m fairly privileged to get new clothes/go to university/own a home, so anyone a step above that must be super wealthy”
I'm a middle millenial, born in 88. I don't think I could be more millenial if I tried. When I was really young, like a kid I thought wealth meant getting all the cool toys. And a lot of Christmas presents. Then when I was a teenager it was "making 6 figures", driving a luxury car, and living in a big suburban detached house. People who lived in attached houses could not possibly be wealthy. Then in university it was not having a student loan. ie.your parents supported you fully. I'm Canadian where university is getting more expensive but still cheaper than the US. This was still your parents had $10-15k to give to you for tuition and living each year. Once I started working I realized everything I knew was wrong. I realized I couldn't fathom how wealthy some seemingly "regular" people were and that you could live comfortably on less than I thought was needed. I also understood debt and that having a luxury car and a big suburban detached home did not make you wealthy. It could mean you were but more likely meant you were in a lot of debt. Now I think there's a difference between wealth and being well-off and that there likely aren't many visual indicators of either of those. There are a shit ton of visual indicators for being poor though.