Interactive tool quantifies what a dollar is really worth across income and wealth levels
AaronBergman18 · x · 2026-10-17
A new interactive tool, What's a Dollar Worth, converts the subjective value of money between different income and wealth levels using the elasticity of marginal utility of income (η).
- Default η=1.6 (meta-analytic consensus; range 1.2–2.0): $1,000 to someone earning $100k feels like $10k to someone earning $1M. Moving η from 1.0 to 1.6 shifts rich-vs-poor comparisons by roughly an order of magnitude.
- Net wealth is converted to an annual equivalent via the standard annuity formula, with η adjustable from 0.5 to 2.5 (at η=2.0, a dollar is 100× more valuable to the poor).
- The page reviews three evidence streams for estimating η, including Stevenson & Wolfers (2013) finding a log-linear income–well-being relationship with no satiation point.
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