I do believe that you have to tie in what someone's expenses are because you could make $100k a year but spend $120k a year, but I assume when you state "wealthy" you are referring to "rich/affluent," correct?
To me, you can call yourself a success if you are at least Middle Class in the United States, anything above Middle Class is "thriving" in my opinion but if you can get to the Middle Class you are a success.
In terms of levels of Income and Net Worth, I believe the following based on "The Individual" not "The Household":
- I believe that you make a Middle Class level of income, if you make at least $50,000 in a lower COL area, and if you make at least $70,000 in a higher COL area.
- I believe that you make a Higher Class level of income, if you make at least $90,000 in a lower COL area and $130k in a higher COL area.
- I believe that you make a Rich/Affluent level of income, if you make at least $250,000 in a lower COL area and $400,000 in a higher COL area.
In terms of Net Worth, this obviously will depend upon your age, your race and also your Generation. My Generation has mountains of student loans to payback which drive down our Net Worth.
This is a good tool to use to determine how you stack up compared to your age group, your race, your generation as well as the country as a whole in terms of Net Worth:
http://www.stackmeup.com/net-worth/average-net-worth-by-age.php
I'm a 31 year old black guy, and my net worth is in the top 100% based on my age group and my race. My age group has an average net worth overall of anywhere from $11,000 - $15,000 and when you include race, it goes down significantly further because black people as a whole just have a very bad net worth standing across ALL age groups. So while I'm not rich/affluent (yet), I'm damn sure kicking most of the people in my age group and race's a.ss in terms of financial management
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I personally believe you can say you have a Rich/Affluent Net Worth once you get to at least $1 million. Others might disagree with me, but again all of these things are also depended upon how the person is managing their Expenses, Taxes and Investments. If you are making $100k but you have 5 kids paying $60,000 in child support payments, you aren't living a higher class lifestyle even though you make a higher class income!
Also when I calculate Net Worth, I include every single asset a person has, which includes cash, cars, clothes, jewelry, furniture, real estate equity, electronics, the value of social security benefits, obviously your business portfolios/investments, etc. Some calculations don't include every single asset which I think doesn't account for a person's true standing.