I blame my not being rich on society in general.
We don’t feel “rich” but we have a household income in the top 5% of the UK. So by most people’s standards that should make us “rich”.
But to get into that bracket you need two people each earning £34k, which gives a net household income of approx. £50k (and that takes you into the 95% household income range).
I know a lot of people for whom two £34k wages isn’t much (especially once childcare is taken into account), but nationally an globally it’s hard to argue against it counting as riches.
I think I am smart because my parents made sure I took school seriously and got good grades although I still suck at grammar and punctuation. We are well off because we inherited a pile of assets from my parents and I have been a world class money grubber since I got that $5 from Grandmother for my birthday. It also helps that my degrees were in areas where there is still a big shortage of candidates.
Oh, and I bought - and still own - Apple at $3.75. 
I find that pretty hard to believe. By that reckoning, when my wife was working full time we were also in the “top 5%” bracket, and we most certainly didn’t feel rich! That’s debt for you, I suppose - we had (and still have) next to no disposable income. So the real reason I’m not rich is: compound interest. 
I got the figures from thiswikipedia page.
I guess wealth could be defined as the delta between your income and your expenditure. So a family on £50k could (if they chose) live in a 2-bed terrace in south Wales which costs £28k; they could cycle everywhere (no petrol costs) and leave the children at grandma’s instead of paying for childcare.
That would leave them a large disposable income each month to spend on holidays, entertainment and restaurants.
But as soon as you take on two cars, a £300k house, full-time childcare for two children, shopping at Waitrose rather than Lidl etc your disposable income drops like a stone.
In fact I’ve noticed at our tennis club that a lot of people complain about having no cash at the end of the month then drive home in a 12-plate Range Rover Sport… no doubt there are hedge fund managers struggling to make ends meet as yachts don’t sail themselves.
I know what a Range Rover Sport is, but what does “12 plate” mean?
Took me some digging, but I think “12-plate” in the UK refers to license plates issued for model-year 2012 vehicles (or possibly vehicles sold as new in 2012?).
IOW, it’s slang in 2012 for “new car”. Last year people would have been talking about “11-plate” cars.
I remember one time my accountant saying I had become a rich man. A few years later I remember him telling me I was broke. My life style never changed from middle class. I went up and down like a yoyo till I was about 45 and decided to drop out of the game and just get a job. Always had good credit, a fair amount of toys, decent cloths etc. Recently retired I am secure but wll live a simple lifestyle and I am happy with that. What number of dollars in the U.S. qualifies as rich? My brain tells me about 5 million on the bottom end.
Never caught a break…
Many years ago I came up with an idea for something that would have a limited customer base, but might do well enough to set me up for my old age. While I was researching the idea and finding out how to go about making a prototype etc, I discovered I’d been beaten to the punch and a company had a product on the market.
Well at least I know it would have been successful!
Given the circumstances I could have set myself up as a breeder/producer of well trained competition horses. That would have required land, and some capital to start me off. Bank manager wasn’t interested, couldn’t see how the heck a horse would be worth anything, and nowadays horses at the top of their game (showjumping, dressage, eventing) are worth 6 and 7 figure sums of money.
I still hanker after the opportunity to do this.
le sigh
I have an idea right now I am certain would be successful. I do have a history of successful business strategies. This particular idea would require a good writer which is not me to put together the presentation for investors. I have no experience at attracting investors. The philosophy behind my business would go very well with the prevalent philosphies of TSD. I am kind of hoping to make some friends on here that might be willing to look it over or hear more about it. Based on family entertainment, camping, lifestyles, learning, science, history, art, crafts etc. This is kind of my early retirement dream project.
A lot of it is how you define “smart”. For example, there are many very clever posters on this message board but they likely aren’t rich or anywhere close. My guess is that they have limited social skills which stymie their advancement. So, in reality, they aren’t very smart at all.
why should smart lead to being rich? To me a good part of being smart is to realise that there are more important things than money.
1,345 are all true, but the third is the biggest, since it was the deciding factor. It definitely caused 1 and 4, and likely caused me not to be looking for the lucky break I’d need.
The base concept of having a lot of money is nice, but the reward is not nearly worth what you have to do to get it. I always wanted to just be comfortably middle class.
I dont know how smart I am, but I’m not rich because to be so would require giving up what I love doing and all the things that really drives me. I’m almost absolutely sure if my only intent for working/investing in something was to become wealthy, I’d be absolutley miserable, and would feel as if I truly squandered my life for cash.
However, if what I do organically leads to fortune, so be it. Although, that’ll be time to really prove how smart I am.
I was a liberal arts major but then I became a nurse. I have made a nice chunk of money since I became a nurse, but I never developed the knack of having a partner in my life who also made decent money. Seems I have been supporting people besides myself for 12 years (well also since before I became a nurse, but that’s another story) now but I’ve only been a mom for 8.
Laziness, procrastination, and, eh, I’ll tell you the rest later.
That’s just something dumb, poor people say.
Seriously though, one could question the entire premise that there is a correlation between intelligence and financial success. There are plenty of wealthy traders, stock brokers and real estate salespeople who are dumb as shit. Often they are rich because they have an almost psychotic level of condidence and tenacity. One might even argue that being thoughtful and intelligent are counterproductive to those sort of jobs.
But generally people associate “smart” with “rich” because that is how we are raised. We are told the path to financial success is study hard, get good grades, do good work and professional success will follow.
I voted for 1, but there is a good portion of 3 in it.
I’m a smart guy with a statistics PhD, if I was really motivated to I could probably have taken some strong economics and finance courses and worked as one of the financial modelers on wall street whose models cause the market to go haywire now and then, but that would be a lot of work, and probably not something that I would enjoy.
So I went with my current job which although isn’t making me rich, is keeping me comfortable enough, and probably happier than the alternative.
I was not raised like that.. I was raised to share what I have with people who have less and make people around me smile, learn a lot of different things and work on realising my dreams, give my kid an interesting life with lots of different impulsions.. personally, I find that much more satisfying than being rich and look at the others struggling. 
Being called dumb for that is slightly arrogant.. are people automatically dumb just because they do not run after the same thing you want? 