Yesterday, we found out that billionaires like Tea Party fan David Koch and Mayor Bloomberg are getting more billionaire-y. Now the U.S. Census reveals that one in five New York City residents lives in poverty. The NY Times reports, "From 2009 to 2010, 75,000 city residents were pushed into poverty, increasing the poor population to more than 1.6 million and raising the percentage of New Yorkers living below the official federal poverty line to 20.1 percent, the highest level since 2000. The 1.4-percentage-point annual increase in the poverty rate appeared to be the largest jump in nearly two decades." more ›

You know how the economy is still in a recession and too many people are unemployed and people hate taxing the wealthy? Well, chew on this: New York City's richest man, David Koch, the industrialist and the shadowy Tea Party patron, is worth $25 billion, up from $21.5 billion last year, according to new data from Forbes. Mayor Bloomberg clocks in as the Big Apple's second rich guy—he was only worth $18 billion last year, but now Forbes estimates his wealth at $20 billion. That's more money for million-dollar couches and six-figure lighting fixtures! more ›

The NY Times is continuing its ascent into "what rich people do with all their stinking money besides $50,000 playhouses, chartering private planes for their kids to go to camp, home bartenders, and clubs for multimillionaires" with this important information: "Nordstrom has a waiting list for a Chanel sequined tweed coat with a $9,010 price. Neiman Marcus has sold out in almost every size of Christian Louboutin “Bianca” platform pumps, at $775 a pair [pictured]. Mercedes-Benz said it sold more cars last month in the United States than it had in any July in five years." Yes, the rich are spending more, because as a retail consultant says, "If a designer shoe goes up from $800 to $860, who notices?" more ›

If you enjoyed the recent NY Times features on $50,000 tree houses, must-have home bartenders, and buying your kids an apartment to teach them financial responsibility, you're sure to love today's exclusive on another rich people trend: flying charter planes to summer camp. "More of the nation’s wealthier families are cutting out the car ride and chartering planes to fly to summer camps," reports Christine Haughney. "One private jet broker, Todd Rome of Blue Star Jets, said his summer-camp business had jumped 30 percent over the last year." One small airport manager in Maine even hired two extra people last weekend to handle all the traffic—and yet Democrats still want to raise taxes on job creators like Melissa Thomas, a Connecticut mom who brought her daughter home from camp in Maine in turboprop Pilatus PC-12. more ›

We haven't heard much from mysterious Malaysian party boy Taek Jho Low in a while, but just because the paparazzi hasn't snapped him pouring Cristal down Lindsay Lohan's throat lately doesn't mean he's been off his game—he was just saving up for his new $31 million penthouse in the Time Warner Center, bros! more ›

Yesterday, Dealbreaker posted an image of an ATM receipt found at an East Hampton Capitol One bank, revealing a shocking $99,864, 731.94 savings account balance ($2.75 poorer after ATM fee). Speculation was that the fat cat was hedge fund manager David Tepper, but he told the Post that he "wasn't in the Hamptons in June at all," plus, "I would never do something as irresponsible as leaving $100 million in a savings account." Yeah, when you've got the coin to pay $43.5 million cash on a house (just to tear it down), you keep your money in a vault so you can swim in it. more ›

New York City is great, but it's even better when you have unlimited funds... we hear. Just ask the 18 celebrities on the Forbes Celebrity 100 list that live in the city—together they earned over $872 million dollars in the past year. more ›

Michael Bloomberg may have a few more years as the mayor of New York, but his reign as the richest New Yorker (according to Forbes) is over: The new Big Apple fat cat is David Koch, the oilman and Tea Party backer, who you may be more familiar with after this New Yorker profile (besides oil refineries, "Koch Industries owns Brawny paper towels, Dixie cups, Georgia-Pacific lumber, Stainmaster carpet, and Lycra, among other products"). more ›

Last Friday, Mayor Bloomberg allowed reporters to take a peek at his taxes. Guess what—he's still crazy rich, since he's able to not only put $500,000 into a trust for his ex-wife, he's also put over $1 million into a trust for an ex-girlfriend! more ›

A new book, The Devil's Casino: Friendship, Betrayal and the High Stakes Games Played Inside Lehman Brothers, depicts the lives of Lehman Brothers wives as pampered, yes, but also lonely and rather mundane. One wife gave "tours of her vast shoes closets," and lived with her husband Joe Gregory on an annual personal budget of $15 million. They had both "a seaplane and a helicopter ready for the daily commute," but beyond all that stuff, keeping up appearances was simply exhausting. more ›

In a year when charitable giving dropped among the nation's wealthiest people, Mayor Bloomberg handed out $254 million in donations—making him not only richest man in New York City but also the country's fourth biggest giver. According to the Chronicle of Philanthropy, Bloomberg—who is worth an estimated $17.5 billion—donated money to 1,358 different nonprofits and dedicated $125 million to help six charities devise a plan to help reduce traffic accidents in developing countries. more ›

Much like Halley's Comet, a playboy that spends as much money as mysterious Malaysian man Taek Jho Low only "comes around once in a lifetime," according to Manhattan nightclub owners. The city's club owners have been fighting to woo the Wharton Business School alum, who has spent tens of thousands of dollars purchasing more than 100 bottles of Cristal champagne in a single night, according to Page Six. Little is known about the 28-year-old other than his big spending habits, his address at the ritzy the Park Imperial, and his celebrity pals — and sources say he'd like to keep it that way. A friend, who described Low as a "dealmaker with interests in the Mideast and Asia in construction, oil and gas," told the paper: "He's not an arms dealer. And he doesn't want all this publicity." more ›

With its latest list of the 400 richest Americans, Forbes finds that Mayor Bloomberg is holding steady at as NYC's richest rich person. He's number 8 on the list between a Walton (of Wal-Mart) and Charles Koch. more ›

Don’t feel so smug if you belong to that tiny percentage of Americans who earn $400,000 a year (or more); to astonishingly wealthy plutocrats like Mayor Bloomberg, you’re still just small potatoes. Asked about the manufactured Republican outcry over Barack Obama’s allegedly extravagant date night in New York, Bloomberg defended the First Couple’s getaway, telling reporters, “The president does not get paid that much. He is on a budget, too.” Well, from Bloomberg’s rarefied perch atop Mount Moneypiles, we probably all look like Dickensian waifs struggling to sell our hair to the wig maker for halfpence, but to the average American, Obama’s hardly “on a budget.” City Room breaks down Obama’s current income: $400,000 a year salary, a $50,000 expense account, a $100,000 nontaxable travel account and a $19,000 entertainment budget. His total compensation package, $569,000 a year, is 11 times the median household income in the U.S., which is around $50,000. Of course, when you've got two private jets; homes in Bermuda, Florida, Colorado and London; and $16 billion in walking around money, you must wonder how poor souls like the President make do on half a million. more ›

That NYC cab driver turned billionaire has pleaded guilty to charges that he violated the Endangered Species Act by attempting to import 29 rare dead animals into the US aboard his yacht. You may recall Tamir Sapir as the Georgian man who rose from immigrant hack to Russian oil and real estate tycoon, ultimately buying the city's most expensive townhouse across from the Metropolitan Museum for $40 million in 2006. But Florida Customs officers who peered inside his yacht in 2007 know him better as a dealer in dead endangered wildlife. more ›

'Eek, don't raise taxes on the rich!' Bloomberg and other plutocrats warn, or else they'll defiantly tie their sweaters around their necks and move somewhere else, where the lower orders have a better appreciation for trickle-down economics. But according to a pretty thorough article in today's Times, there's actually scant evidence that an income tax hike on the wealthy will engender a Park Avenue strewn with tumbleweed. In fact, after 9/11, the state and the city imposed a temporary surcharge on incomes of more than $100,000, and a comptroller study suggests it had little impact on those who make over $250K. more ›

Mayor Bloomberg repeated a familiar refrain during his radio show on WOR yesterday: Why taxing the rich isn't a great idea. He said, "We can tax the rich, except that, if you haven't looked at the stock market lately, they aren't making any money." more ›

Time to break out the world's smallest violin again: With President Obama's proposed $500,000 cap on executive compensation—at firms receiving federal bailout money—the plight of the rarefied rich is examined in the NY Times. Today, the Times gives us details like this: "Private school: $32,000 a year per student. Mortgage: $96,000 a year. Co-op maintenance fee: $96,000 a year. Nanny: $45,000 a year. We are already at $269,000, and we haven’t even gotten to taxes yet." Then there's the personal trainer, the gowns for the galas, children's private tutors, four-star vacations... OMFG, Houston is looking pretty good! Holly Peterson, who wrote The Manny and whose dad Peter founded the Blackstone group, puts it dramatically: "Five hundred thousand dollars means taking their kids out of private school and selling their home in a fire sale.” A few days ago, the Times asked some people to remember back when they made $500,000. more ›

In his $6.6 million divorce settlement two years ago, big shot real-estate lawyer Steven Simkin (pictured) paid his ex-wife Laura Blank $2.7 million to buy out her half of their Madoff investment, which he thought was worth $5.4 million. Now, according to his attorneys, the "account" is worthless, "literally not worth the paper on which the parties' valuation rested." So Simkin wants some of that money back, because "Laura has been unjustly enriched, having received millions of dollars based on an illusory and exaggerated value attributed to the 'account.'" Blank, who works for CUNY, tells the Post she isn't really feeling Simkin's pain: "What he's doing is outrageous. He made a poor investment choice and it's his problem." Just as every bum's lot in life is his own responsibility, regardless of who he chooses to blame! more ›

As he grapples with a $15.4 billion budget deficit for this year and next, Governor Paterson voiced his opposition to taxing the rich. According to the Post, Paterson explained, "What I'm saying is if you tax the rich right now, while the economy is disintegrating, you're going to lose jobs and you're also going to lose from the tax base as people leave the state. In my opinion, you're [compounding] the problem, not eradicating it. I don't think that taxing the rich is the best way to go right now." (That's also a refrain Mayor Bloomberg has made.) On the other hand, Assembly Leader Sheldon Silver is all for taxing upper income brackets: In remarks to the United Teachers Federation, Silver said, "Clearly, as a state, we need to ask ourselves if the best way to balance the budget is to make deep cuts in our classrooms or to ask the wealthiest New Yorkers to contribute a little bit more?" Which makes the Legislature's and Paterson's apparent agreement on a budget (press conference happening in Albany now) more interesting! more ›

Federal Magistrate Ronald Ellis's decision to allow scammer Bernard Madoff to remain out on bail means that his neighbors at 133 East 64th Street must endure more, most likely, unwelcome attention to their rarefied Upper East Side co-op. The NY Times' Susan Dominus revealed that Madof sent them a note ("printed out on simple white paper, with letterhead formatted by word processor") a few weeks ago:

Dear neighbors, more ›

Meet Mathias Guerrand-Hermes: Polo player, heir to the French fashion house Hermès, petulant crotch-grabber. The 36-year-old socialite is in the papers today after being arraigned in Brooklyn federal court over a nasty incident aboard an Air France flight from Paris to JFK on Tuesday. Prosecutors say it all started when Guerrand-Hermes—loaded on booze and the pain medication Propofan—began pestering a female passenger in first class. When her husband told him to step off, Guerrand-Hermes, who was perched on the lady's armrest, simply moved in closer. more ›

There's an entire Flickr set of photos designed to make you boil over with envy on this fine summer day, it's called: Rich People Rooftops NYC. While they are all lacking a Ronald McDonald--gardens, hot tubs, patio furniture and multi-level luxury are all present and accounted for in the rooftop wonderlands. Too bad there's not an aerial shot of the roof house on 13th and 3rd, but these images will probably stir up enough jealousy for one day. [via Curbed] more ›

Millionaire Richie Randazzo, the lotto-winning Park Avenue doorman who wanted to keep it real by keeping his job at the luxury condo, has been fired at last, the Post reports. Last week Randazzo told the tabloids that the management had been threatening to terminate him because he was "spending too much time outside the building." It continues to be a rough week for the blue collar playboy; on Monday news broke that his new bombshell girlfriend is charged with “promoting prostitution” at a Jersey strip club. But despite rumors that the strippers/hookers hated her, one dancer at the club defends Randazzo’s special lady friend: “They're just mad because she got the $5 million doorman. That's what they all dream about.” more ›

Despite winning $5 million with the "Set for Life" scratch-off game last May, Park Avenue doorman Richie Randazzo is determined to keep his job, where he earns $40,000 a year plus tips. But his attempt to move into the building was stymied, and now he says the management is trying to fire him “for spending too much time outside the building and wearing short-sleeve shirts.” Randazzo tells the Post, "They are jealous. They're running [the apartment building] like the Gestapo. You're required to stand all the time. They want you to look like a soldier." Other unreasonable demands include opening doors and signing for deliveries. more ›

The Federal Reserve Board may be sending distress signals about a “prolonged and severe economic downturn,” but ultrarich individuals like hedge fund manager Lee Tachman aren’t sweating it; the 38-year-old Tachman just spent $50,000 on a four day vacation to Miami with three of his bros. According to a ‘Happy Monday’ article in the Times, Tachman’s crew rolled with a “private jet, helicopter, Hummer limousine, Ferraris and Lamborghinis; stayed in V.I.P. rooms at Casa Casuarina, the South Beach hotel that was formerly Gianni Versace’s mansion; and played 'extreme adventure paintball' with former agents of the DEA.” more ›

Taxes Paid: $33,783,507Clinton campaign spokesman Jay Carson's statement also says, "The Clintons have now made public thirty years of tax returns, a record matched by few people in public service. None of Hillary Clinton's presidential opponents have revealed anything close to this amount of personal financial information. " As Politico's Ben Smith points out, there's still $18 million of the Clintons' income that's not accounted for. more ›

Yesterday Forbes magazine, in their annual ranking of the rich, declared New York City is no longer the billionaire capital of the world. Where have all the dollar signs gone? To Moscow, of course, who beat us out by 3 billionaires (they have 74 to our 71). more ›