Are you Rich or Poor?

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The Federal Reserve's most recent stimulus is expected to boost home prices and the stock market, but what if you're too poor to invest in either? The massive bond-buying initiative, called quantitative easing, aims to prop up the economy through a few key channels -- namely the housing market and the stock market.
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Duhhhh?  What if you are too poor to invest in either?  What kind of a question is that?  I'm sorry but my mother and father had a second grade education, taught themselves how to write and read, and my father lived his life going door to door selling dry goods purchased from the garment district in New York City.  He came from the middle east with $24 in his pocket in the 1920's.  My mother came decades later in 1945 with my sisters as I had yet to be invented, from an embryological point of view.  Every penny that my father earned was a product of his unrelenting 16 hour work days, 7 days a week.

It doesn't make you rich to own a house; it doesn't make you rich if you own stock.  You may be better off if you owned neither in this day and age.  Indeed, most people who own their own home are owned by their home because they have mortgages to pay, and most people who own stock have nothing to show for the stock except for the slow disappearing act due to the volatility and poor showing of the market.  Only if it were so easy to classify Americans in two categories based on the above definition.  

Except for CNN, I think defining rich is difficult and depends upon your perspective.  I think most people in the US would be considered rich as compared to people living in most 3rd world countries. I think some people who are considered poor believe that they are rich.  

Maybe its easier to define poor in the US, as the growing number of Americans who receive food stamps.....~ 47 million as of June 2012.  With about 315 million people living in the US, that accounts for about 15% of the population. 

But then again, not all of those who receive food stamps are poor......Crackdown on Food Stamp Fraud: A $750M a Year Scam Read more at http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2012/05/24/Crackdown-on-Food-Stamp-Fraud-A-$750m-a-Year-Scam.aspx#l1BiKVxQDPIfqeKS.99

Now I am confusing myself.  If you can't define rich by what you ostensibly own, or define poor by what you are receiving from the government, maybe we are left with having to calculate net worth to determine levels of richness or poorness.  

And then you have to consider that some rich in assets are poor in intellect, integrity, self respect and dignity, while poor people with little to show for live a simple life that is full and rich and happy.......and long.....  

In the end, I think you are rich if you can live a long happy life regardless of the things you own or think you own.