Etymology From Middle English welthy, welþi, equivalent to wealth + -y. Cognate with Middle Dutch weldech, weeldech (“magnificent, luscious, lavish”).
1
Possessing financial wealth; rich.
As a result of these causes the grazier marks himself off fairly sharply from the rest of Australia. He has always spent a considerable proportion of the time in the capital cities, in each of which he has formed a club to which, besides the graziers, only a few of the wealthiest and most prominent of the city dwellers are admitted.1963, Colin Clark, Australian Hopes and Fears, page 75:
As people stall feed through the years, or if they are wealthier to begin with, the money is used to build houses and buy metal roof sheets, or to buy bicycles, ox-carts and breeding cows.1984, Cornelia Butler Flora, Animals in the Farming System:
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Gleefully and legally intruding upon the sanctum of the wealthy linksters, we walked the mitigation meadows.2010, Robert Michael Pyle, chapter 18, in Mariposa Road, Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, page 158:
In order to grant the rich these pleasures, the social contract is reconfigured. […] The public realm is privatised, the regulations restraining the ultra–wealthy and the companies they control are abandoned, and Edwardian levels of inequality are almost fetishised.2013 May 17, George Monbiot, “Money just makes the rich suffer”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 23, archived from the original on 12 Mar 2022, page 19:
ProPublica’s data shows that while some wealthy Americans, such as hedge fund managers, would pay more taxes under the current Biden administration proposals, the vast majority of the top 25 would see little change. […] No one among the 25 wealthiest avoided as much tax as Buffett, the grandfatherly centibillionaire.2021 June 8, Jesse Eisinger, Jeff Ernsthausen, Paul Kiel, “The Secret IRS Files: Trove of Never-Before-Seen Records Reveal How the Wealthiest Avoid Income Tax”, in ProPublica, archived from the original on 18 Mar 2022:
Etymology From Middle English welthy, welþi, equivalent to wealth + -y. Cognate with Middle Dutch weldech, weeldech (“magnificent, luscious, lavish”).
1
Synonym of rich: the wealthy people of a society or of the world collectively.
... whether consumption patterns of the wealthy are more or less polluting than those of the poor depends on the contaminant in question.2009 Oct., Rachel A. Bouvier, "Sulfur Dioxide Emissions and Per Capita Income", Environment & Development Economics, Vol. 14, No. 5
The wealthy pay most of the taxes but the uberwealthy hardly pay any at all: they hold stock and property and live off debt borrowed against that collateral.
F. Scott Fitzgerald never got over Ginevra King's dad reminding him he wasn't a wealthy and needed to aim lower.
it was possible for a group like the Libertarians to hope that a couple of weakminded wealthies might donate the seed money to get a campaign rolling.1975 December 6, “A Real Presidential Choice Is Being Ignored”, in Evening Independent:
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Bernice is a nice, sardonic tale of envy and young wealthies of the pre-flapper era, when a girl who bobbed her hair was thought loose by the flask-bearing blades who tried to get her tight.1977 April 4, “Public TV Presents miracle Series”, in Argus-Press:
Ending tax cuts to wealthies would only increase tax revenues by $40 - $60 billion a year - about 20% of current deficit - so it's a waste of time.2006 November 16, “Can the Democrats Deliver?”, in Washington Post: