ideally you want everyone to assume you're middle class or relatively poor than rich. being perceived as rich has a bunch of interesting downsides: - ppl project expectations onto you. - you often attract parasites, not allies, unless they are also rich. - you get priced up (literally + socially). - you lose freedom to move invisibly. - you become a symbol instead of a person. - you invite resentment from ppl who don’t even know you. - you might start performing richness to maintain the illusion (& effectively be spiritually bankrupt). being assumed poor (or at least normal) has a lot of upside: - you often get truth, not theater. - you get actual signal on relationships (e.g. avoiding ppl who would like to have a relationship with you for your money, this one is huge imho). - you stay underestimated. - you can observe without being observed. - you avoid the weird social tax of status. obviously there are benefits to the former but i gravitate towards stealthy more often than not for some weird reason.