Earning a six-figure income was once a major benchmark for people trying to improve their finances and become wealthy in the U.S. Today, though, only 23% of Americans believe that earning $100,000 or more annually makes someone wealthy, according to a recent LendingTree survey.
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So if earning six figures isn’t what Americans think makes you wealthy, what is?
Now, people are placing a greater emphasis on more personal, flexible financial goals, like eliminating debt and feeling financially secure.
When someone says they want to be wealthy, they probably aren’t picturing bank accounts with specific balances or bars of gold. Instead, they’re most likely thinking about the problems that having plenty of money could solve for them. One of the biggest signs of wealth is simply not having to worry about money anymore.
That was the No. 1 answer Americans gave when asked what being wealthy meant to them: being able to live comfortably without financial concerns [1].
Most people aren’t in that position. More than 70% of Americans point to money as a significant source of stress in their lives [2]. Many have also had to cut their spending in categories like travel, home improvements and clothes to be able to stick to their budgets [3].
Wealth would mean not having to worry about having enough money to cover all of the essentials, and some extras that make life more comfortable.
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Americans also responded that feeling financially secure is what it really means to be wealthy [1]. But how much money does it take to feel financially secure?
The answer naturally varies from person to person, depending on their expenses, financial goals and perspective. Around half of U.S. adults surveyed said earning $100,000 or more would be enough to make them feel financially secure [4]. So in that way, a $100,000 salary does mean being wealthy to many people.
However, many Americans disagreed with the idea that earning $100,000 annually would be enough to feel financially secure. Around 25% said they’d need to earn at least $150,000 per year, and another 16% said they would need to make at least $200,000 [4].
Ask yourself what feeling financially secure means to you. How much would you need to earn? Would any of your expenses or other circumstances need to change for you to reach that feeling of security? Once you have a concrete idea of what you’d need, you can better focus your efforts toward achieving financial security.
finance.yahoo.com
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