[appplication]

An acquaintance of mine was accidentally wired about $100k when it was supposed to be $5k. Before it could be reversed, they moved accounts and immediately bought a one way flight out of country. They then changed all socials and handles. They are now ignoring all court documents and are on track to get a default judgement against them.

Their rationale? “It’s mine, they owed me this”. They are 100% convinced that they are in the right, not just that they can keep it but that they actually intended to send them this to begin with. I get it $100k isn’t nothing but they’re also throwing their life away for less than what they used to make a year in salary.

People do weird things when given sudden access to money or power.

[SteveGerencser]

I had a client send me an ACH that was legitimately a fat finger extra zero. For me, it was a "lot" of truck payments. For them, it was a rounding error that they were unaware of until I reached out and let them know about their mistake. I couldn't wait to make it right with them because it bothered me so much because suddenly I had a pile of money that was theirs and not mine.

[fibonachos]

I had a similar situation where someone had their email client configured with my address in the reply-to header. We shared a first initial, last name, and isp… also happened to be my email address. His email was firsnamelastname, or something similar. I emailed the guy several times explaining how to fix it, and that I was getting a lot of his business correspondence. Never heard from him.

Then one day I get a Chase Zelle email saying that someone was sending me money. Something like $500. Logged into the Chase app and sure enough, could have taken it with the click of a button.

I contacted the sender to explain the situation and recommended they call the intended recipient for a correct email address.

Couldn’t image just taking it knowing it wasn’t intended for me.

[sfn42]

Had a similar experience. Was at a party when I suddenly received a notification from our country's equivalent to cashapp/Venmo. It was about $450, so not a lot but enough to be significant to many people. About a minute later I get a call from a seemingly young man who's very stressed telling me he sent the money to the wrong number and asking me to send it back. I told him don't worry I'll get your money back but I need to contact customer service first just to make sure it's safe for me to do so. I wanted to avoid some kind of charge back scam or similar.

So I called CS, they said it was safe to return the money and so I did and the guy called back just to thank me.

[xp84]

This reminds me of the terribly designed timesheet system I was using earlier this year, where I accidentally logged like 55 hours of work for something instead of 55 minutes… I got a shocking direct deposit that week and had to mail them back a large check. Really hope they definitely don’t mess up the 1099!

[danudey]

Not to mention that, despite having done nothing wrong, you can still be blamed and suffer the consequences. Imagine that company did notice, and the person who sent the payment went into a panic. They call their bank, that bank calls your bank, they put a hold on your entire account, and now your payroll, bills, leases, etc. all start bouncing and you can't accept payments from other clients to cover anything in the short term.

Now you've done nothing wrong, maybe even haven't noticed yet, and suddenly they kill your business overnight.

[palmotea]

> An acquaintance of mine was accidentally wired about $100k when it was supposed to be $5k. Before it could be reversed, they moved accounts and immediately bought a one way flight out of country. They then changed all socials and handles. They are now ignoring all court documents and are on track to get a default judgement against them.

$95k does not seems like enough money to totally upend your life like that for.

[embedding-shape]

> $95k does not seems like enough money to totally upend your life like that for.

That's because most of us here are so used to the amount of money we earn. But for people who literally struggling with month-to-month payments, 100K feels like a life-changing amount of money. If they were just saving month by month, they might have never reached that amount in their entire life.

Our perspectives here on HN are very one-sided when it comes to things like this, anyone who been poor previously (or is currently) could attest to this.

[isleyaardvark]

There was a thread here not too long ago about employees getting fired because they were cheating on their expense accounts. C-level execs cheating on pretty trivial amounts. And others brought up star athletes getting paid millions, then getting busted placing thousands of dollars on insider bets. There's a lot of irrationality in these decisions.

[joe_mamba]

Greed knows no limits. That's how polls showed the happiest people earn around 60-80k a year, and both the people below and above that threshold, reported to be less and less happy the less they made and also the more they made.

It's as if the more money you make, the more you need to feel fulfilled, so people start stealing and scamming to cover a self inflicted psychological money deficit.

[ninjagoo]

> That's how polls showed the happiest people earn around 60-80k a year, and both the people below and above that threshold, reported to be less and less happy the less they made and also the more they made.

This is a myth. The original 2010 Kahneman-Deaton study showed that how favorably people judged their overall lives continued to improve beyond $75k. Daily emotional well-being appeared to stop improving around that level. [1]

A larger 2021 study by Killingsworth using real-time reports found no happiness plateau at $75k; instead, well-being continued increasing with income, including above $200k. The relationship was logarithmic - going from $40k to $80k mattered more than going from $160k to $200k, but the benefit didn't disappear. [2]

So of course, in 2023, Kahneman and Killingsworth jointly re-analyzed to resolve the conflict, leading to more nuanced conclusions: in the least-happy 15-20%, unhappiness declined as income went up but eventually leveled off; for the majority of people, happiness continued rising with income beyond $75k; in the happiest people, the association sometimes became stronger at higher incomes. [3]

Science, baby!

[1] https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1011492107

[2] https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2016976118

[3] https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2208661120

[joe_mamba]

>This is a myth.

Not if the jump from 80k to 120k also means a jump from working 40h to 60h.

[WalterBright]

If anyone here makes more than 80k and is unhappy, I can help! Simply wire me the excess.

[swiftcoder]

I don't know, the very same comment mentions that the person was earning 6 figures. Less-than-a-year's-salary is definitely a weird thing to throw a comfortable 6 figure income out the window for - it's not like 95k is "never work a day in your life" money.

[embedding-shape]

> I don't know, the very same comment mentions that the person was earning 6 figures.

What does that mean for where and how the person live though? How much money were they realistically having left at the end of the month? 6 figures surely means a lot in some places, in others not so much and maybe they didn't have much left after all. Even with 1K left in a month on average, that's 95 months (~8 years) of saving for the same amount, maybe it was always the plan to just get the fuck out once they got close to 100K or whatever.

Humans do rash things, especially when some shortcut appears. But all this is also speculation and hypothesizing, who knows the real reasons behind it for sure.

[swiftcoder]

> What does that mean for where and how the person live though?

It means they lived somewhere where a 6-figure income is feasible, which already puts it on the expensive end of the spectrum. If they are fleeing to somewhere where 95k looks like retirement money, that's not going to be a place where replacing that 6-figure income is feasible (especially with a default judgement against them blocking access to the whole US-influenced banking network)

[spwa4]

Is that allowed to be discussed? That the main factor in income is not even job, but merely location and access to work visa?

Talk about deeply unfair ...

[mr_toad]

People can earn six figures and still be living paycheque to paycheque, and up to their ears in debt.

[danudey]

Now he's up to his ears in debt and a felon in his original country, plus he's not likely to get another six-figure job from any country willing to do a background check. I hope that extra $95k was sufficient to set him up for life.

[swiftcoder]

I don’t think that changes the equation any? If you are underwater on 100k/year, you sure as shit are going to end up underwater on 95k for the entire rest of your life…

[joe_mamba]

If you're so financially fucked that you can't live on 100k/year then you're still be fucked even with an illicitly obtained extra 95k.

Crazy how many people try to find excuses for crime. There's people living on fractions of that that don't commit crime. No, income is no excuse.

[danudey]

But the poster said that that was basically his yearly salary. He fled the country and has to spend the rest of his life worrying about extradition (and/or having people find out he's a felon) for a year's pay.

[davidwritesbugs]

Indeed, a lot of HN readers don't realise their good luck in life. It takes a dose of poverty to bring perspective.

[small_model]

Yes seems like would cost a portion of it to execute the escape. Should have just bet it on a 10/1 shot and then kept the 900k if it worked out.

[jurgenburgen]

And gone to jail when it doesn’t pan out?

[small_model]

Not your problem they made the mistake, cant get blood from a stone, sue me etc etc.

[chongli]

The person had a 6 figure job. They’d end up having their salary garnished to pay the debt. It would be far worse than just giving the money back.

[small_model]

Yes I mean vs what they did, at least there would be a chance of a good outcome, just returning the money would have been optimal.

[ElProlactin]

> People do weird things when given sudden access to money or power.

It's more that money and power enable you to be who you really are, and amplify your worst traits if you're lacking self-awareness.

There are many people who are rich/wealthy and/or powerful and they're decent individuals living relatively ordinary lives. You don't read about most of them because they're "normal".

[hawaiianbrah]

> It's more that money and power enable you to be who you really are

If you’re only a certain way when you have money and power, is it really “who you really are”?

[pdpi]

If the only reason you didn't behave that way to begin with is that you lack the money and power to evade the consequences, then yes. You really are that person.

[chii]

while i somewhat agree with that reasoning, it can go too far - most people would murder and kill if there weren't any consequences to doing so. But is it right to say who they really are as being murderers?

[danudey]

> most people would murder and kill if there weren't any consequences to doing so

This is what Christians tell themselves and others to explain why believing in their religion is so important, but it's not even remotely true. Humans evolved community and society long before we evolved organized religion.

I constantly see Christians pitching this like some kind of gotcha: "If you don't believe in God, then how do you know what's right or wrong?" The simple answer is that I have empty and I care about how other people feel; I try to do things that make things better and avoid things that make things worse, both for me and for others.

If the only reason that you don't rape and murder is because you're worried about consequences then that makes you a horrible person whether you act on it or not.

Conversely, it seems as though Christians see these 'teachings' as a get out of moral quandary free card; if the Bible implies it's okay, or you can justify an interpretation where that's the case, then it's completely fine to do whatever you like. Harass or attack trans people, bomb Iran, make miscarriages illegal but refuse to feed the poor or help with daycare - all because one reading of the bible supports the things you want to do (even though it doesn't) but doesn't require what you don't want to do (even though it does, actually).

[pdpi]

It's especially interesting when you consider that doing the Right Thing despite the consequences (like when challenging a tyrant) is seen as heroic. The logical consequence is that, if you view God as the ultimate tyrant, challenging him is supremely heroic.

[pdpi]

Most people would what? No, I don’t believe that’s true.

[airstrike]

you should probably seek mental help and read them this specific thread to cut to the chase instead of paying for 10 sessions

[ninjagoo]

> most people would murder and kill if there weren't any consequences to doing so

Do you have any evidence to support this? Feels like this opinion is made up, for unknown reasons.

In reality, psychopathic tendencies are about 4.5% in the general adult population, a far cry from 'most people', with the gold standard assessment being only 1.2%. [1]

From that same article, "The construct of psychopathy is understood generically as a type of personality disorder characterized, among other important features, by the presence of behaviors that conflict with the social, moral, or legal norms of society, giving rise in many cases to clearly criminal behaviors ..."

There's also the bagel experiment described in Freakonomics. [2]

[1] https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10....

[2] https://pricetheory.uchicago.edu/levitt/Papers/WhatTheBagelM...

[jamiek88]

That says a huge amount about YOU and nothing about ‘most people’. What a very revealing thing to say. Wow.

[matwood]

> most people would murder and kill if there weren't any consequences to doing so

Citation needed. There are a lot of ways I can improve as a person, but I can promise you I am not and not ever been a murderer or killer regardless of consequences. Even if someone threatened me or someone else, I would do my best to not kill them and simply diffuse the situation.

Maybe take some time to reflect.

[hgffrur]

> most people would murder and kill if there weren't any consequences to doing so

…yeah, it’s fitting that sama was the top user here. What a wretched hive of scum and villainy.

[dvfjsdhgfv]

I believe the original statement is an oversimplification. What actually happens is that extreme situations, both positive and negative, can help you discover things about you that you didn't know before.

Apart from that, the problem with "who you really are" is that individual is more of a process than a static thing, so any such reification becomes invalid in the next instant.

[ElProlactin]

You're right that people aren't static, but we should also acknowledge there are lots of people who become rich and powerful and they don't do horrid things. Many are perfectly decent people who care for their families, help those around them, contribute to their communities and use their wealth and power to support causes that are important to them.

You don't hear about these people as much because they're not out looking for attention, making outlandish statements or even trying to "change the world" in a narcisstic Silicon Valley way.

"Who you are" at your core drives the direction you go in when you acquire wealth and power.

[sfn42]

I'd say who you really are is whoever you really are. If you're acting like a dick then you really are a dick, I don't care whether your financial situation influences your behavior.

[xnx]

Yes. "Power doesn't corrupt, it reveals"

[msdz]

Same goes for money: It enables greedy jerks to be more greedy and more of a jerky, and it enables people who e.g. voluntarily donated already to do much more in that direction, too.

[Gooblebrai]

Spot on

[SXX]

> People do weird things when given sudden access to money or power.

Given your story its not sounds like this is power grab. More like they actually on spectrum and have some mental issues on top this. Or had mental breakdown because something happened before that money arrived.

Situations when people do something weird, bad or just plain evil for money and power are usually logical. E.g people think they got access to more money they percieve they can earn in next decade, or ever, something that settles them for life.

Earning more than $100,000 and throwing everything away for $95,000 only make sense if you are terminally ill. Or if it was never your real identify in first place and its well planned scam.

[decimalenough]

If you're earning $100k in Silicon Valley, your expenses will swallow up almost all of that. A sudden $100k windfall, on the other hand, tax free and suitably invested,will let you live for years quite comfortably in many poor countries.

[SXX]

Sorry to disappoint you, but no you cannot live "comfortably" in "poor countries" for $100,000 for "years". Well, unless you mean like two years.

I lived across South East Asia for more than decade and now live here full time. I have to live on around $20,000 / year most of the time since starting my company. And I do not live anywhere close to what average US / EU citizen will call "comfortable" let alone people from valley.

Stories of rich living for cheap in poor countries its just that: stories. It only possible if you preserve your US salary. For $50,000 post tax a year you can live well unless you have kids that need not a "poor country education".

[sdsdssweew213]

I live in what according to Wikipedia is 18th most expensive country in the world. Average person working full time as a nurse here earns about 30k dollars a year after taxes. If they can survive here, 20k a year in most of South East Asia should be perfectly fine for comfortable life.

[csomar]

Surviving is different from living. You can survive in the Philippines for $100/month. I do not wish it on anybody.

[decimalenough]

Sure, if you're starting from nothing and expect to live a Western lifestyle. But you can draw down $5000/year from that sum for a very long time, and make twice the average Indian yearly income.

[SXX]

One more thing about life in developing countries, ones with seemingly super low GDP per capita. Its that low because a lot of economy in rural areas is simple unaccounted for: communities build their own housing, grow their own food or work in family business usually with no accounting or taxes whatsoever.

If you're born there you unlikely to ever end up in US on $100,000+ job unless your whole family or village invest in it.

If you're expat you will soon end up finding out that as expat you'll pay completely different prices and starting local business is just impossible unless you become part of a family.

[SXX]

Okay lets say you are a person who want and able to live on average Indian yearly income in rural India.

How the hell you end up in US on $100,000+ job? How much time it took and how much you spent on education / job search / migration to US?

If you're from India then likely all your relatives invested into your education and migrarion.

[coccinelle]

50,000 sounds like a lot. Most people in West European countries don’t make that much.

[ElFitz]

EU average is ~€39.000, gross, before taxes. And only nine countries have above average average salaries.

And that’s not available income. France median pre-tax "net" income is ~€2.100 / month.

[SXX]

EU have free healthcare and education. Also not everyone, but alot of people still own their own houses and appartments or they can get relatively cheap mortage.

Nothing of it available in cheap country for expat. If you move to developing country you better pay for health insurance like 80-250 EUR / month / person.

Also if you have a partner who is not remote worker they might not be able to find well paid job there. If you have kids then giving them good modern education in English is exorbitantly expensive.

I wont even start about fact that government of cheap country might change and you lose your residence permit, social circle or even property. And in most of countries that are easy to enter never give permanent residences and passports. You have to pay pay pay all the time or jump countries.

[LtWorf]

We're talking about an engineer here…

[zdc1]

The question is still what number people need to live "comfortably" (i.e. upper middle class). The average salary there may not quite provide for the amenities the average American considers "comfortable".

[SXX]

For expat most important part of comfort its entertainment and socialization. In cheap areas you will only have locals who depend on country might want or not to socialize with you, but either way cultural gap will be massive and finding friends will be a struggle for most.

There of course cities with a lot of expats and activities, but imagine what - living there is not cheap. Cheaper than US / EU, but you still gonna need that $2000 / month.

Wont even start on topic of lost opportunities from lack of networking since we talk of some extreme downshifting here. But most people need friends and safety net at least.

[lstodd]

Well you can live quite comfortably on $1500/mo in former Yugoslavia on the seafront for example. Those $100K will last what, 5.5 years?

[Danox]

You need half a million 500,000 dollars @ 4% interest (major US Bank) savings account = 1666.66 per month $1,000,000 = $3,333.33 per month $1,500,000 = 5,000 per month $2,000,000 = $6,666.66 per month

So with half $500,000 US dollars you could survive on 1666.66 per month in Yugoslavia most people, however, will spend beyond that amount however, the temptation is too high. Soccer players and basketball players, well actually most people will simply not have the discipline.

[lstodd]

we weren't talking about depositing misappropriated cash, yes?

So one ends with $100k and out of US. What can be done? Adriatic is one option. $100K will last long enough for something else to come up.

Also idk where you get data on "most people". My "most people" consider "(major US Bank) savings account" a losing proposition against even inflation.

[lobsterthief]

I agree (from semi-relevant experience). Also, any “poor” country that’s inexpensive enough to fit this requirements probably isn’t one you’d voluntarily live in.

Side note for the original commenter: It would be kinder and more accurate to state “lower cost of living countries” than “poor countries”. There are numerous lower COL countries that offer a higher quality of life a than that of the US but they aren’t “poor” (I moved to one).

[SXX]

And likely "suitable" countries are not the ones you want to do any investments or even transfer 100,000 to local bank.

I understand that side note wasnt for me, but yeah most of cheaper developing South East Asia countries are not "poor". Though there are ones you can call that, but again in a such countries you dont really want anyone to know you have $100,000 somewhere on a bank because its can get unsafe very fast. Its either "live just a little better than locals" or get in trouble.

PS: I talking of Myanmar, most of Laos and Cambodia.

[Paradigm2020]

I've lived in Vietnam on and off for several months at a time. One of the safest countries anywhere ( as long as you don't badmouth the government)

Easy to live on sub 700$ a month if you're happy with air conditioned studio, mostly asian food, scooter and not going to high end bars.

Get the 1 bedroom apartment, quite often takeaway/delivered western food sub 1500$ a month.

Go eat out western food everyday, live in a 3 bedroom in the nicest district go to fancy bars etc and yeah maybe you can reach your 5k a month...

People have no clue / are not willing to experience adjustment for 3 weeks... But easily possible to live here for budgets mentioned above...

[Der_Einzige]

If "poor country" includes "places US foreigners won't go" than you sure as shit can survive longer than 2 years.

For example, Thailand would be 2 years like you say. Neighboring Burma/Myanmar would be EASILY 5 years, possibly 10 depending on how long the civil war goes. That's assuming you don't work and live in the capital Yangon.

[SXX]

Sure man. And for Syria or South Sudan $95,000 is enough to live there for the rest of your life, but I'll pass on this opportunity.

[LPisGood]

50,000 post tax is enough to live well in most US cities, let alone the rest of the country.

[Jensson]

The person was probably from a poor country already and was used to that.

[SXX]

I do get that $100,000 in expensive parts of silicon valley likely will buy you a room, some food and commute to work, but math dont make sense here.

Person from that kind of country likely had to spend $100,000 just to find job and move to US and survive there for the first time.

Legal migration to US is super hard and super expensive. You have to be both very successful in what you do and very dedicated in order to do it. Or very rich. And it take years.

People who choose to migrate to US and manage to do it isnt the type to throw it away on small scam.

And if they managed to get in easy, fast and illegally then they wont be the ones competing for $100,000+ job.

[JumpCrisscross]

> they moved accounts and immediately bought a one way flight out of country

To be fair this is smarter than like 95% of white-collar criminals.

[danudey]

The number of people we got to see on TikTok discover that you can write yourself a cheque for $100k and then get access to that money as though it was some kind of infinite money glitch that no one had ever thought of, manufacturing money out of nowhere that no one would try to get back... ridiculous.

[delusional]

> They are 100% convinced that they are in the right, not just that they can keep it but that they actually intended to send them this to begin with.

They quite clearly do not believe that. If they did, they wouldn't need to go into hiding or leave the country.

[mnahkies]

Finance somehow accidentally paid me approximately a whole years salary at once when they did the first payroll run after we were acquired.

My first thought was I hope they didn't make this mistake for everyone, and second thought how do I safely return this.

(Turns out it was a one off mistake, and returning the excess was pretty straightforward though probably the largest bank transfer I've ever made)

[rmnclmnt]

> People do weird things when given sudden access to money or power.

10 years ago my last boss told me one last advice before going onto entrepreneur ventures: « be careful, people do become crazy and stupid with money » (and I guess he knew what he was talking about…)

[throw-the-towel]

Hell, I used to know a guy who did this to steal a monitor from work. Went all the way down to Panama or something.

[catlifeonmars]

Maybe there were other factors? Maybe they were leaning towards leaving anyway and this influx of cash enabled them to do so? It’s a stupid idea, for sure, but I think the explanation that “people do weird things when faced with a lot of money” is not really all that explanatory.

[test6554]

This reminds me of the kids in MR. Deeds.

Kid 1: What are you going to do with your $20,000

Kid2: quit school

Homeless man: good idea, school is for fools!!

[ChrisMarshallNY]

They upended their life for $100K?

I wouldn’t do that for a million (these days).

[FireBeyond]

Was talking to a lawyer, and tells me how often he has clients say (after a crime, and while trying to resolve things), "We've got this far [in trying to fix it], don't worry, I'm not stupid enough to screw it up". His response, generally, "My career is built on people who did dumber things, and for less, so..."

[nathan_compton]

100k really isn't that much money in the grand scheme of things, especially because they will probably get caught anyway.

[UltraSane]

$95,000 isn't that much to destroy your life over.

[swat535]

I think we should consider our privilege if we are in a position to think that 95,000 isn't that much money..

[csomar]

What privilege? Anyone's life (someone who lives in the Valley) is worth more than 95k. Anyone who is a software engineer at Apple, is definitively worth more than 95k. The kid is dumb. Not sure how Apple interview processes are these days.

[bloppe]

I'll do it for free

[joe_mamba]

There's homeless people living on the streets or people in jail who destroyed their lives for way less than 95k. Often for nothing, like throwing a punch over a parking spot argument.

You'd be surprised how far down poor impulsive choices can drag you down even when there's no money on the line.

[gcanyon]

There's a line from the movie The Way of the Gun that I love about this. The number is higher, but it still applies. Some criminals are loading a $15 million ransom into the back of a truck, and a younger criminal says, "Boy, $15 million is a lot of money, huh?" and James Caan, playing an older, wiser criminal says,

"Money? $15 million is not 'money'. It's a motive, with a universal adapter on it."

[amazingman]

This honestly sounds like mental illness.

[soraminazuki]

Nah, it doesn't even sound true.

[appplication]

Honestly yes, that’s most likely a major factor

[groundzeros2015]

> immediately bought a one way flight out of country

Is this referring to a foreign national who can leave at any time?