Money Disparity

I was just looking at Barbie's friend Bunny's website and was impressed with all of the shopping that she's been doing. I met Bunny (my nickname for her) a few months ago when she came to visit Barbie here in Manhattan. Very pretty girl and quite the party girl. Her last morning in Manhattan (after 10 full days of partying everyday), I had to literally rescue her after she got stuck way uptown after an afterparty without any cash (maxed out credit card too). She literally got in a cab and she stopped and called me for help. I didn't mind too much. I like pretty party girls. I like Warhol girls.

Anyway,she has a blog and it's all in Swedish. I can't read Swedish. It's a tough language. But she posts everyday and sometimes multiple times a day. She usually has pictures on her blog and I luv the pictures. Some people just have a good eye for interesting visuals and she certainly does. So I enjoy checking her blogs out from time to time. Apparently, lately, she's been shopping and there's also a shot of her closet. Many many dresses and shoes. Her kitchen also looks very well put together and often, there are shots of her food and drinks. A feast.

So, I'm thinking... I know that she has an average job with an average pay as far as I know, how the hell does she afford all this? Her lifestyle in Sweden would be equivalent to that of someone here in Manhattan making AT LEAST $120K. Then I remember Saturday nite when I went to the Rose Bar for a few cocktails with Summer (my off and on neighborhood gal pal), we were there for awhile. She had like 5 martinis (she's a very good martini drinker) and I had 1 Stoli Tonic and like 5 beers. One of the rounds were paid by a couple of nice guys who Summer picked up outside when she went for a smoke. The bill came and the fckn thing was $189 (including 20% gratuities). Albeit it, I also bought Barbie a glass of wine ($22!). I had no idea that they would charge that much. Although, I would have bought Barbie the glass anyway. Their glass of champagne, mind you, one glass is priced at $24. Rose Bar, hands down, is the most expensive bar in Manhattan as far as I know and given the waning quality of the people there, I don't think it's worth it.

Then I remembered how frckn expensive Manhattan is. You can't get a decent studio for less than $2,500 and you can't get a decent 1 bdrm. for less than $3,500 and if one goes out for a night... a frugal nite, it's really hard to spend less than a $100(cab rides, drinks). Pretty women have it pretty easy. Guys buy everything for them in most cases. But the gals I hang out with are appreciative and fun, not like those blatant Russian gold diggers, so I don't mind at all.

The irony is that for most of the tourists who visit here (English, German, Japanese, etc.), the city is actually cheap! How the hell does that happen? I guess if I think hard enough to my macroeconimics classes and do the various graphs in my head, it would make academic sense. But it doesn't make intuitive sense.

There are so many people here in Manhattan who work their asses off barely scraping by then there are those who have lots of money who easily make more money even when they're sleeping. Think Donald Trump and hundreds of thousands of others like him.

It just boggles my mind how disparate lives are here and how life is out there in Bunnyland.