Two people each have net wealth of three million euros. One describes extraordinary financial freedom. The other says the truly rich are the people they do business with. They see themselves as comfortable, certainly, but not rich. Both could accurately state their assets and still answer differently about their prosperity.
This sounds like one of those quirks of perception easily mocked. People with millions who do not feel rich rarely attract much sympathy. Understanding the feeling does not require pitying it, though. And a fortune of millions remains an enormous economic resource even if its owner has another impression of their social position.
I am interested in why self-assessments vary so much. Being rich describes an economic condition that can be assessed objectively; feeling rich contains a personal judgement. The two are related without being identical.
What does the number on paper tell us?
First, we should clarify what we mean. An annual income of €300,000 differs from net wealth of three million. Wealth comprises assets less debts. Much may be tied up in property, company shares or other illiquid holdings. Available income and daily financial flexibility can therefore look quite different from what the wealth figure suggests.
Someone with debt-free wealth mostly held in accessible investments can make different choices from someone whose business shares have the same calculated value. The business owner may be affluent but need to consider commercial consequences before withdrawing substantial personal funds. This does not explain every subjective feeling of wealth, but shows why a total says less about freedom than it initially promises.
Differences between assets also matter empirically. In a German study published in 2024, Antje Jantsch, Julia Le Blanc and Tobias Schmidt examined income, assets, debts and life satisfaction. Financial assets were more clearly associated with satisfaction than certain tangible assets. Unsecured debt showed a negative association. The authors examined household data, not whether millionaires explicitly call themselves rich.
That boundary matters. Life satisfaction, available funds and feeling rich are related but distinct. Drawing direct conclusions about one from research into another makes science a remarkably elastic affair.
The invisible reference group
Everyone has surroundings against which they judge ordinary and extraordinary. For some, owning a home, secure employment and savings are exceptional privileges. Others move in circles where multiple properties, business holdings and a high six-figure annual income appear almost incidental.
Social comparison need not be conscious or envious. Regularly hearing business partners discuss sums others would work a lifetime to earn may alter what seems normal. Names, projects and orders of magnitude arise in conversation. Certain amounts eventually seem less spectacular through constant exposure.
In a 2005 study, economist Erzo Luttmer found that, holding people's own income comparable, higher neighbourhood earnings were associated with lower self-reported happiness. These findings concern income and well-being in the surveyed population. They do not prove wealthy people automatically become dissatisfied when richer neighbours arrive. They show that the economic situation around us can matter in assessing our own.
Feeling rich therefore raises more than the question of how much someone owns. Whom they compare themselves with, and the image of prosperity prevailing in that circle, also matter.
Income, rank and self-image
Research on subjective social status clarifies the distinction. People may be asked to place themselves on an imagined social ladder. The answer is not identical to calculating income or wealth. It incorporates their own perception of position and circumstances.
In a small US study in 2000, Nancy Adler and colleagues examined objective and subjective status measures alongside psychological and health variables. The sample comprised 157 healthy white women. Subjective status showed stronger relationships in several areas than objective measures. This limited sample cannot establish claims about wealthy people worldwide. It does make the distinction between measurable and perceived position visible.
A much broader 2020 meta-analysis by Jacinth Tan and colleagues combined 357 investigations involving over 2.3 million participants on objective and subjective socioeconomic status and well-being. Again, this concerns general socioeconomic position, not specifically millionaires' self-images. It shows why researchers take perceived status seriously as a variable in its own right.
In everyday terms, a wealth report can identify your place in a statistic. It cannot fully explain where you place yourself in society.
An interesting disagreement in the research
The question becomes particularly intriguing when asking whether actual money or relative rank matters most. In 2010, Christopher Boyce, Gordon Brown and Simon Moore reported income rank within a reference group predicting overall life satisfaction in their analysis, while other income measures showed no independent effect in the model examined.
That is notable. It should not become a claim that money itself is irrelevant and everything concerns rank alone. Other studies and measurement models produce more differentiated findings.
A 2026 experiment by Xiaogeng Xu and colleagues illustrates this particularly well. Researchers gave a representative sample of mid-career people in Finland information about their income rank within different reference groups. It clearly influenced income satisfaction. Effects on overall life satisfaction were weaker. Responses were stronger when comparisons concerned a close reference group rather than the whole nation.
That fits a sensible distinction. Comparison can shift income evaluations without redefining an entire life. Comparing yourself with neighbours, colleagues, former school friends or national statistics apparently matters too.
What research says about wealth itself
More directly relevant are studies actually measuring wealth. Jantsch and colleagues' German study examined relative positions as well as relationships between asset types and life satisfaction. People facing lower assets or higher debts than their reference group reported lower satisfaction on average. Patterns differed by age.
The picture is not uniform. In their 2020 paper, Conchita D'Ambrosio, Markus Jäntti and Anthony Lepinteur examined income and wealth in Germany. Higher permanent income in the reference group was associated with lower life satisfaction, while greater permanent wealth around someone showed a positive association. The authors discussed the possibility that others' wealth might signal one's own future opportunities.
Another counterexample comes from Jin Huang, Shiyou Wu and Suo Deng's 2016 analysis of urban Chinese households. Household assets were positively associated with happiness. The relative position of assets showed no corresponding relationship, although relative income mattered.
Three studies, different data, different results. This does not show science is arbitrary. It shows how definitions, reference groups and populations can influence findings. I would be uncomfortable turning these results into a rule that millionaires necessarily envy people with more millions.
A prosperous city is not a personal bank balance
Location provides another benchmark. The same sum may create different possibilities in areas with higher housing and living costs. Wealth consisting mainly of an expensive owner-occupied home does not automatically fund an endlessly lavish routine.
That does not make someone with several million euros on paper equivalent to someone unable to pay rent. High property value remains an economic advantage and often a substantial safety reserve despite limited liquidity. Discussing differences in access to spendable money should not obscure differences in actual ownership.
I consider this boundary particularly important. "I do not feel rich" can honestly describe someone's reference point. It remains a subjective statement. People for whom an unexpected car repair creates financial difficulty need not accept it as a description of economic equality.
The US Consumer Financial Protection Bureau describes financial well-being through, among other things, meeting ongoing obligations, absorbing setbacks, pursuing goals and making free choices about life. This institutional definition is not designed specifically for wealthy people. It illustrates why financial room to act differs from social rank.
Why a millionaire can feel small and someone else well-off
Earlier circumstances sometimes determine the assessment. Someone accustomed to living with little may experience savings as extraordinary, even if their statistical position in an expensive environment is not especially high. Someone raised among substantial assets may inherit a benchmark where millions are welcome but hardly exceptional.
Personal ideas matter too. Someone comparing themselves with globally active entrepreneurs may use different standards from someone measuring life through freedom gained. A person can feel proud of financial possibilities and consider them limited at once. Another can feel rich without consuming much. These are plausible illustrations, not fixed personality types.
Taking feelings of prosperity seriously requires considering several things: wealth, accessibility, living costs, reference groups and money's personal meaning. They cannot be compressed into one psychological formula.
How much is enough? examines how people establish their needs and sense of sufficiency. Here, the focus is deliberately the other side: assessing what is already there.
When perception overtakes reality
Subjective judgement sometimes takes on a remarkable life of its own. Years spent mainly among richer people can leave someone permanently locating themselves near the bottom of a very affluent group. Within that group, not feeling among the genuinely rich can be logical. Outside it, the assessment quickly loses perspective.
Conversely, a financial improvement can initially make someone feel very affluent although their security remains limited. That also deserves a clear-eyed view. Feeling free and actually being able to bear risks are not always the same.
I therefore think both perspectives need a place. Objective assets prevent us confusing personal comparisons with real security. Subjective assessment explains why economically similar people can experience prosperity differently. Neither has to invalidate the other.
When assessment of existing wealth becomes concern about losing it, another question begins. Fear of losing money when there is already more than enough explores that. Can money make you happy? examines relationships with different forms of well-being more broadly.
Being rich and feeling rich need not coincide
The idea behind Tired of Wealth approaches substantial wealth unusually. It assumes no psychological explanation for how anyone ought to feel about money. I am equally interested in people telling very different stories about identical possessions.
Perhaps the biggest mistake is trying to elevate personal perception into objective truth. Owning millions does not oblige you to feel rich each morning. Feeling rich does not require an eight-figure account. Differences between financial security and financial hardship do not disappear because of that.
A bank balance can be accurate while your own assessment remains heavily shaped by your surroundings. Seeing both takes more effort than a quick comparison with the neighbours. It is also considerably more revealing.
Sources
Jantsch, Antje, Julia Le Blanc and Tobias Schmidt (2024). “Beyond Income: Exploring the Role of Household Wealth for Subjective Well-Being in Germany”. Journal of Happiness Studies, 25, Article 101. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10902-024-00811-1
Luttmer, Erzo F. P. (2005). “Neighbors as Negatives: Relative Earnings and Well-Being”. The Quarterly Journal of Economics, 120(3), pp. 963–1002. https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/120.3.963
Adler, Nancy E., Elissa pp. Epel, Grace Castellazzo and Jeannette R. Ickovics (2000). “Relationship of Subjective and Objective Social Status With Psychological and Physiological Functioning: Preliminary Data in Healthy White Women”. Health Psychology, 19(6), pp. 586–592. https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-6133.19.6.586
Tan, Jacinth J. X., Michael W. Kraus, Nichelle C. Carpenter and Nancy E. Adler (2020). “The Association Between Objective and Subjective Socioeconomic Status and Subjective Well-Being: A Meta-Analytic Review”. Psychological Bulletin, 146(11), pp. 970–1020. https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000258
Boyce, Christopher J., Gordon D. A. Brown and Simon C. Moore (2010). “Money and Happiness: Rank of Income, Not Income, Affects Life Satisfaction”. Psychological Science, 21(4), pp. 471–475. https://doi.org/10.1177/0956797610362671
Xu, Xiaogeng, Satu Metsälampi, Michael Kirchler, Kaisa Kotakorpi, Peter Hans Matthews and Topi Miettinen (2026). “Which Reference Groups Matter and How? A Relative Income Information Experiment with Administrative Data”. American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 18(3), pp. 145–177. https://doi.org/10.1257/app.20240181
D'Ambrosio, Conchita, Markus Jäntti and Anthony Lepinteur (2020). “Money and Happiness: Income, Wealth and Subjective Well-Being”. Social Indicators Research, 148, pp. 47–66. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-019-02186-w
Huang, Jin, Shiyou Wu and Suo Deng (2016). “Relative Income, Relative Assets, and Happiness in Urban China”. Social Indicators Research, 126(3), pp. 971–985. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-015-0936-3
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (n.d.). “Why financial well-being?”. Institutional description of financial security and freedom of choice, accessed 7 November 2026. https://www.consumerfinance.gov/consumer-tools/financial-well-being/about/