Before you answer think real hard, How important is keeping up with the Jones's to you?

It isn’t. I can’t think of anyone I feel I need to compete with.

I had to think really hard here and read the question a couple of times. I don’t actually know any Jones’s, so can’t really keep up with them at all. I have a sister who constantly tells me she ‘needs to catch up’ with me, which suggests I’m ahead of her, so perhaps I’m already ahead of the Jones’e too?

Only if the Jones’ have better memories than I do, and I really doubt that’s going to happen.

It’s not and I don’t have to think about it.

I have the advantage of living in the rural Midwest, US. The biggest problem with wearing $200 jeans is finding someone else that knows they were once $200, retail.

I have a fairly modern, ranch style house, late model vehicles and clothes that appear to be fashionable (I blend recent trends as they come available to me at the thrift store.).

If I’m honest, I guess I’m pacing the Jones’ in my circle, but with minimal effort and minimal expense. Around here if you’re clean and neat you’re pretty well assured of ‘keeping up’.

There’s another whole tier of doctors and lawyers that live in $300,000+ houses and have their own circle of Jones’. Yet, they rarely stand out in a mixed crowd of locals. Like I said, you have to stick to your own if you’re going to wear a $300 pair of tennis shoes around here and expect anyone to notice.

For the most part, I don’t really care. The major exception is my front yard. If I was in an isolated area and didn’t have neighbors who had to look at it, my yard would probably be in much worse shape than it is. My neighbor across the street is a professional golfer and has an immaculate front lawn. I don’t feel the need to try to keep up with that level, but it does guilt me into doing more yard work than I’d otherwise do.

Well knowing that the Jones’ are near bankrupt trying to impress other people I will just compete with myself. Slow and steady wins the non race.

I’m my own Jones, I only care about what I care about. Sooo..the answer is not in the least.
The Jones 60k car could allow me to not work for 2 years and just have a great time. lol

Keeping up with the Joneses seems rather frivolous these days. That silliness is the stuff of bygone days. These days it’s about keeping ahead of the wolf.

I really wish I wasn’t surrounded by the “keep up with the Jones” mindset. Here people seem to like to compare just about anything: wealth, new things, good job, good children… and the children have to meet their “requirement” to feed their ego. They have to get high grades, win some competition, have some notable achivement at school… well, they have to run to keep up with adults’ desire to “keep up with the Jones”. They are compared to other children like they never have any strength.

They think if they don’t keep up with people, they will be ridiculed or degraded. But I find having to constantly keep up with everyone is so tiring. Isn’t it better just to think everyone is different and be happy with what we have? I don’t like that kind of competition, but I was brainwashed from my youth to compete, so in my subconscious mind I still compare sometimes. I want to stop it but it can be hard…

Sorry it sounds like a ranting but this is one of the things I find irritating.

I got over that a long time ago, when I was a teenager. I grew up in a neighborhood where some kids had pools and cars, I had a paper route.

Thinking about it, I guess I have a vague drive to keep the things I can control above average. It’s not really anyone in particular I’m competing with, and it’s not even really “average”, I just don’t want to be sadder or have less options than I can.

It wasn’t always that way, I was totally happy scraping by for a long long time and seeing how little obligation I could get by with.

I think there’s two reasons it changed

1) My wife and daughter deserve someone who can be part of their support system in every way I can. So do my parents if they ever need anything.
2) I was given a lot. I got great parents, I’m fully able, I have some skills and interests. At some point it started feeling like I wasn’t honoring all that by coasting along.

So like @Mimishu1995, I think I compare sometimes, but it’s mostly to see if I’m just being a stubborn fool and missing something. If someone else is living a balanced life that I’d prefer, how are they doing it?

The only way that I keep up with the Jones’s is if they have a pay-off mortgage, no debt and have a monster retirement nest-egg.

I am sure, that if they have something important to say, they will tell me.

Why the fuck would amyone need to think hard on this?
I never have & never will feel the need to “keep up” with anyone.
Herd mentality bullshit, for the birds man.

Personal choice, I think.

If you really feel you should cut off the connection with them, even though you may don’t want it, just keep in mind that no one can’t go on with his life without another person.

Not very important for most things. The only bit of pressure I feel is how I look, and it’s only around certain people that I feel that way. I’m talking hair and makeup and clothing. Luckily, I’m not around those people a lot. Unluckily, my husband comes from women like that and works with women, and women who work tend to be put together. Then what? Comes home to me looking like a schlub? <Sigh> I just think it would be better if my hair was 30% thicker and my weight 10 pounds lighter. My husband can’t stand women who are all about spa treatments and fancy clothes, but there is somewhere in the middle that he appreciates.

I don’t have anything to attempt to keep up with people anyway lol.

Not in the lists of things I think are important to my survival and contentment. (In my ‘hood, we jokingly brag about our thrift-shop and consignment finds.)

For me, hanging out with Quakers reinforced this world view. It was more like keeping down with the Jones…anti-labeling, anti-branding and anti-displaying. It was ironically almost like who could be more unpretentious, which is a form of pretension, I suppose.

Far, far less than when I was younger and employed full-time. But every once in a while…

The ONLY reason I want to keep up with the Joneses if if they have stuff I actually want. I don’t want high tech gadgets to impress people, I want to play with them. I don’t want exotic vacations to impress the neighbors. I want to actually go and have fun there. I may envy the neighbors, but I don’t feel like i have to keep up appearances.

Can we define who the “Jones’” are?
Because I don’t have a neighbor and I don’t have TV.
I interact with a relatively small group of people from a rural background and similar socio-economic background. I don’t even know what 75% of them drive, much less where they live.

Keeping up with my Jones’ requires few polite social norms like you do not stink , you do not curse loudly in public, and you don’t exhibit any overt substance abuse. If someone gets something flashy, they’re usually pretty meek about it and expect the rest of us to snigger and congratulate them.

I buy what I can afford. Like @keobooks, if I acquire something flashy or out-of-the-ordinary, it’s because I have a special interest in that item/device/technology. I have a neighbor with a very intricate brick, built in bar-be-que. I have no interest even though I can compliment him on it. Just don’t want one even if I could afford it. I like my big screen TV though and don’t care who else has one. So I guess the bottom line is, I like nice things but I don’t really care who else has them or if they have better. I’m only competing with myself.

It isn’t important to me. Once upon a time it might have been but I’ve grown out of that. The rat race is for rats.

I don’t know why I would have to think hard about this. I flat don’t care much about what my co-workers, neighbors, friends and family do in their lives in any kind of envious or competitive way. I care about those people: I’m a good co-worker, neighbor, friend and family member, but I celebrate their successes and accomplishments and toys for their positive impact on those people; I feel no need to keep up. That’s pretty much been the story of my life, in fact.

As for my own possessions, toys, accomplishments and successes, I don’t go lording it over anyone, either. I am becoming comfortably well-off in my latter years, but my neighbors won’t know that by watching what I park in my driveway or the gala parties that I (don’t) throw, etc. I don’t flaunt my success, in other words. No one I know feels a need to keep up with me.

I don’t think I am. At this point in my life I am looking for ways to downsize and not keep up with someone elses idea of success.

I want out of this town into a more laid back, rural environment where progress is not necessarily measured in more; more people, more businesses, more “improvements”, more taxes. more whatever.

For me, it’s kind of like buying real estate. You don’t want to be the worst house on the block. Or the nicest house on the block.

^^GA

We bought the “worst” house on the block in my neighborhood. It doesn’t have a basement and all the other houses have one. It’s valued 15k-20k cheaper than the other houses, and we bought it as a foreclosure so it was ridiculously cheap. We bought it for 70–80k cheaper than what the houses are going for in my neighborhood.

Because we bought a much cheaper house than everyone else AND the house was at a greatly reduced price, we are the poor folk of the neighborhood. Everyone else has nicer stuff than we do. It doesn’t bother me at all (unless I actually WANT what they have,..)

I enjoy my neighborhood and don’t mind if we’re the poorest people in it. It’s a nice place to livel.

—-Marcie- @keobooks, the Bohemian.—

I’ve always preferred a smaller home with property. My last house was only about 1.500 sq. feet, 2 bedrooms, but had a great deck and sat on 5 private acres. Even if I had the money no way would I buy some ostentatious huge home in some elite neighborhood. My snooty neighbors would not appreciate my geese honking and splashing in their kiddie pools in the yard. haha

Hell..even out here in the hills I have had city transplant neighbors that complained about my rooster crowing. Really? Go back to your condos. Pffft!

Yes, @Coloma, when I bought my current home a lot of the appeal was that I could never have a neighbor in sight.

Who needs fences?

All I want is enough to be able to attract a mate.

It used to be, and now I think it’s very silly. All my neighbours were consumed by it, and were snoopy and weird. The ostentatiousness of it all began to make me very, very depressed. In my current life, I have to be a certain size, look a certain way, because my livelihood depends on it. But my house, because I have teenagers who are into cars, looks like a crack den. I don’t care.