Stinkin' Rich!

Today, I come to find out, I am stinkin’ rich.

No, no lottery ticket. No inheritance. No pool of natural gas beneath my yard. Turns out that my retirement income puts me comfortably into the Top 1%--in the world.

Around $32,000 for household income does it. Me, a 1-percenter. Here in the US that would be about the 25^th percentile, but I fall in roughly with the 40^th percentile club. That’s household income, not individual.

Over $400,000 is needed to elevate into the Top 1% here in the US. Uh, that would not me.

About 1 in 10 in the world are without safe water. I have safe water. (Or so I think.) One in 3 do not have access to a toilet. Toilet? Check. Actually, check check.

Nearly 20% of the world’s population is without electricity. Me? Check.

As much as 60% of the world awaits the arrival of the internet. For better or worse. Okay, for better. Here, check.

Apparently around 15% of the 8 billion of us still don’t have a cell phone—not even a flip phone like my trusty old model. Check.

And as for food, somewhere between 10-13% world-wide are going hungry. Remember, we’re talking around 800,000,000. That’s about the population of the US, once, and again, and more than half again.

Food? Check.

I have an extraordinary standard of living. By world standards. Perspective, you say? Sure enough. Nearly a decade ago, I moved from one school district in the county to the other. In that relocation, I went from the 65^th percentile in household earnings to the 95^th. Without a change to income.

My income has dropped by 25% in retirement. House, water, electricity, internet, toilets, truck, appliances—check and check and check again. A one-percenter, still.

I am. Stinkin’. Rich.