If you want another reason why having a high net worth is better than having a high income, all you’ve got to do is look at who gets stimulus checks from the new CARES Act.

If your latest tax return shows an adjusted gross income of under $75,000 for single filers or $150,000 for joint filers, you get a $1,200 or $2,400 stimulus check. With each child, you get an additional $500. Once you make over $98,000 as an individual without children, and $198,000 as a couple without children, you no longer get any benefits.

To make between $75,000 – $150,000 a year in investment income at a 4% rate of return requires having a portfolio of $1,875,000 – $3,750,000. At a 3% rate of return or withdrawal rate requires having a portfolio of $2,500,000 – $5,000,000. Therefore, plenty of millionaires who are retired or semi-retired will be eligible for stimulus checks.

Yes, many of these people are the same millionaires who are also getting healthcare subsidies under the Affordable Care Act. Even though the ACA is supposed to help make healthcare affordable to the middle class and poorest of Americans, I guess you can’t blame these millionaires for legitimately taking advantage of the system.

Based on all these benefits offered by the government, if you want to be a millionaire who lives the best lifestyle while also getting continuous maximum government benefits, then strive to have a net worth between $2,000,000 – $5,000,000.

Out of curiosity, I asked several millionaire stimulus check receivers about what they plan to do once the free money arrives. Here are their profiles and what they had to say.

Are you a little befuddled that with every record-breaking unemployment claim, the S&P 500 surges higher? After 6.6 million jobless claims on April 9, 2020 and even more the first week of May, the total number of jobless claims in 2020 stands at roughly 30 million or almost 20 percent of the working population.

With a once working American population of ~158 million, I’m now wondering how many Americans will have to file for unemployment before stocks stop rallying.

Is the inflection point at 50 million unemployed? Or how about 100 million unemployed? Whatever the case may be, the stock market continues to perform well into the unemployment crisis, the lockdowns, and the global pandemic.

Nobody knows for sure, but what we do know is that stocks rally after dismal unemployment figures because investors expect the Fed and the Government will provide even more monetary and fiscal stimulus. The worse the numbers, up to a certain point, the more monetary and fiscal stimulus.

Given I’ve got plenty of extra time to think and write during the lockdown, I thought it might be interesting to see what life would be like under maximum unemployment of 70%. 30% of the American working population still needs to work in order to run the government, provide food, shelter, clothing, energy, and technology. So let’s just agree that 70% or 110 million people is the maximum unemployment level.

Given we already have 17 million registered for unemployment, at a rate of 6 million unemployment claims a week on average, we will get to 110 million unemployed in 16 weeks, or by July 30, 2020.

Similar to Governor Gavin Newsom’s bold proclamation on March 18, 2020, that 25.5 million Californians will get coronavirus by May 14, 2020, I will make the assumption that by July 30, 2020, 110 million Americans will find themselves unemployed if lockdowns extend until then. This is a possibility since the decision of how long we should shutdown is being made entirely by extremely wealthy people who are getting paid either way.

For those wondering, as of April 9, roughly 19,131 Californians or 0.07% of the Governor’s estimate have gotten the coronavirus. So with only 25.49 million more people to go, I guess presidential hopeful Gavin still could be right just like how I still have a shot at making the NBA.

This article looks at the best paying government jobs. Government jobs may not pay as well, but the benefits and pension are very attractive.

Recently, I read two articles that blew my mind. Perhaps they will blow your mind too.

First Article About The Government

The first article talks about how the US Army fudged $6.8 trillion in accounting entries back in 2015 to balance its books. The Defense Department’s Inspector General said the Army lacked receipts and invoices to support those numbers or simply made them up. What?

“At first glance adjustments totaling trillions may seem impossible. The amounts dwarf the Defense Department’s entire budget. Making changes to one account also require making changes to multiple levels of sub-accounts, however. That created a domino effect where, essentially, falsifications kept falling down the line. In many instances this daisy-chain was repeated multiple times for the same accounting item,” Scot J. Paltrow writes.

While the government goes after regular folks who get their taxes wrong because there are so many rules, it turns a blind eye on $6.8 TRILLION in accounting errors? This seems like a huge double standard and an abdication of responsibility. An army spokesman later downplayed the significance of the improper charges, and said the real error in question is “only” about $62.4 billion. Come on now. $62.4 billion is still a massive amount of money that has vanished into thin air.

$62.4 billion a year in misappropriated funds can:

• Create 1,248,000 new social worker jobs paying $50,000 a year

• Create 624,000 new teaching jobs that pay $100,000 a year

• Line the pockets of 62,400 corrupt officials by $1,000,000 a year

• Really line the coffers of 1,000 contractors by $62,400,000 a year

“Nobody knows where the money is going,” said Franklin Spinney, a retired military analyst for the Pentagon and critic of Defense Department planning. But actually we do know where the money is going.

It’s going into the pockets of the top 0.1% government employees charged with handling the budget in the form of under the table money, salaries and bonuses and the pockets of companies that receive defense contracts.

Second Article About The Government

The second article talks about how San Francisco has an annual budget of $9.6 billion, more than 13 other States in America!

Reporter Heather Knight writes, “In 2010, the budget totaled $6.4 billion in a city with 805,000 people, meaning the city spent nearly $8,000 per capita. Six years later, the $9.6 billion budget is paying for services for 865,000 residents, or $11,100 per capita. Inflation explains a little of that increase, but certainly not all of it.” In other words, the city of San Francisco grew by 7.45%, but the budget ballooned by 50% in six years. That is out of control!

We know it’s much easier to vote to raise taxes on other people especially if you don’t have to pay more yourself. Illustrative of this is a SF law passed in 2011. As originally proposed, all SF residents would pitch 1-3% of their gross income in to raise $6.8B for public education.

The majority pushed back against this proposal and the legislation was changed to charge only those making $200,000 or more, ignoring entirely the fact that there are people making less than $200,000 who also have kids. As a result, only $2.5B was raised. But the majority is the majority, and in an election, the majority always wins.

Inefficient Government Spending

In San Francisco, if someone graffiti’s your garage door, you will get fined by the city if you don’t remove the graffiti at your own expense within a short window of time. Homeowners are responsible for maintaining all the trees on public property outside their house even if they didn’t plant them.

Further, if the public sidewalk outside your property is cracked, you must pay to fix it too. You would think with a $9.6 billion budget, the city would be responsible for maintaining its own property. Nope. Let’s not get started about the homeless situation and the poor public transportation system.

Finally, roughly 20,000 of San Francisco’s 39,000 employees make over $100,000 a year. Now that is impressive! So that’s where the $9.6 billion budget is mostly going annually.

Amazingly, in 2020, San Francisco has a budget of over $12 billion now. Got to love it!