Yup. Done alright for himself in his £8 million North London pad. Lazard investment bank advisor and major financial interests in energy companies (that's why he outspokenly opposes any form of energy price freezing).

Amusing and depressing all at the same time. However, if you throw enough sticks you can get most things out of trees.

Watching the Labour Party at the moment is like watching the favourite in a horse race who you've put the mortgage money on because you just KNEW it couldn't lose and there's one furlong to go and your horse is still at the back and you're waiting for it to make its move any time now - and it doesn't.

With the appointment of K Forbes to the MPC, get used to more austerity for the masses. Her greatest claim to fame is an academic piece that short and medium term inequality is good for economic growth. I would imagine medium term will extend through any number of Tory terms of office.

You need something that is tangible - happiness for example isn't tangible

Thats an accountant speaking



Of course YOU need something tangible to tick off on your clipboard list, but the secret of contentment with your lot and being in an easy place is not linked to lots of £20 notes in your pocket and a Porsche in the drive, far from it actually.

That's the trouble, you know the cost of everything but the value of nowt.

Perhaps [iyou're[/i led to believe [iyou[/i do.
But not everyones the same.
Far from it.

Yep. My previous job was very stressful. My current one far less so, it's improved my life/happiness no end. I also took a pay cut in return for fewer hours at work so I could spend more time with my family. I'm far happier now than a few years ago and it's not it do with money.

Now on the flip side, I'm on enough money to live a comfortable life, if I weren't then I'm sure more money would probably increase my happiness!

I'm doing nothing and haven't for quite a period and I'm fairly enjoying it even without two pennies to rub together.

The pursuit of wealth driven simply by the desire to have wealth will never end, a millionaire will always be disapointed that he/she is not a billionaire - there is an article in the ST by Libby Caudwell, daughter of billionaire John Caudwell (Phones4U) which underlines his relentless chasing of more and more wealth and his disappointment that he is slipping down The Times Wealth List because his estate is "only" valued at just under £2bn and there are 56 more wealthy people than him in the UK this year.

To her credit his daughter asked him to stop her "few thousand" a month allowance and took herself off to Australia where she worked for a living for a year, now it was only a year and she is back living in one of daddy's pads again but she claims that its taught her a lesson, that when she had to save a months salary to buy a lamp for her rented room she realised the cushion that untold wealth gives you.

Hopefully she genuinely means that and she seems to be getting involved with one of her fathers trusts (he has proclaimed that he will "give away" half of his wealth before he dies) that provides support to families of very sick and terminally ill children, if so then some good can come of untold wealth if only the lesson that eventually you realise that having £2billion worth of assets and a Ferrari for every day of the year is ultimately f'kin pointless unless you do something with it that will benefit someone other than your own selfish persona.

The selfish are unaware of their selfishness.
Only the unselfish are at liberty to see their pain.

Well, we truly are all in it together, as the Sunday Times rich list proves...

Oh... wait..

Nothing to prevent you trying to join the rich list.

Most of the rich on the list are self made entrepreneurs whose businesses create employment and contribute to a growing economy and improved living standards for all.

But I guess it's just easier to sit there and moan about how unfair life is.

Indeed and it is a lazy stab at making a point. I'd like to see what the contribution to the tax take is against those figures, I have suspicions one or two are tipping up a decent share but also there will be quite a few dodging theirs.

Take a look at the top ten names and have a wild speculation at whether their total annual income is taxed under UK laws or indeed whether all or most of their estimated wealth (its all guesswork by the ST) is held or invested anywhere within the UK borders.

The trickle down theory takes some swallowing when you read an article that I did yesterday on housing poverty in London, mainly because the most wealthy go to extraordinary lengths to ensure that their wealth does not trickle down - Take That! as you please.

I'd speculate that there are a large number further down the list too, if I were someone from HMRC I'd see that as a shopping list for the next few months. There are some on there though that pay their fair share, it also shouldn't be used as a stick the way poster used it, to make a point. Many on that list made their own fortunes and quite a few started out with less than I've got. Now a list of who pays what to HMRC as a percentage of their income would make interesting reading.

Trickle down has been proved not to work, pointing this out isn't news.

Don't you have to speculate to accumulate? I think you'll find most of us don't have the "speculation" to start with. Even the Candy Brothers had a loan from their gran. Find me a bank that will lend to the unemployed/zero hours contract/part time workers and I'm sure they'd give it a pretty good go of it.

A friend of mine is John Cauldwell's personal finance director, not for his company but for his personal wealth and financial affairs. He says that "JD" is a very generous man and someone who takes social responsibility very seriously.

That's good to know. Shame your mate doesn't take client confidentiality that seriously.

Yes, if his mate has a professional qualification that post could get the mate in serious trouble.

Don't be daft, he doesn't disclose numbers or personal information. To say someone is generous and has a sense of social responsibility in no way breaches any professional code whatsoever.

He's also quite open about his charitable trusts and is interviewed in the ST along with his daughter, its not the worlds best kept secret.

Your post seems to suggest that it is not possible for 'poor' people to ever go on and become highly successful and wealthy but there are plenty of ways to fund a business venture rather than simply going cap in hand to your bank.

It sounds harsh but it is this type of attitude that pretty much rules people like you out of ever joining the rich list by 'self made' means. No drive to succeed.

My post suggests that after paying rent/mortgage, bills and pension out of an average wage there is nothing left to fund a successful business venture, and what makes you think "people like me" want to be rich? I want enough to pay the bills and have a little bit of a life including leisure time like rugby which I have. I don't have a burning desire to join the rich list thank you. Money isn't everything to have a drive to succeed you know which is typical tory desire. My drive to succeeding is having enough money to pay the mortgage at the end of the month, something which Tories just don't understand as getting rich is everything to them.