KEY POINTS:
On the surface, Mark Cain works for a time-share company. Members pay a sum to join and an annual fee. They can then book holiday time in destinations around the world.
But Solstice clients are not ordinary people. They are America's super-rich, and the company's operations reveal the vast and still widening gulf between them and the rest of America.
Solstice has only about 80 members. Platinum membership costs US$875,000 ($1.1 million) to join and then a US$42,000 annual fee.
In return they get access to 10 homes from London to California and a private yacht in the Caribbean, all staffed with cooks, cleaners and "lifestyle managers" ready to satisfy any whim from helicopter-skiing to meeting local celebrities.
As the firm's marketing manager, Cain knows what Solstice's clients want. "We are trying to feed and manage this insatiable appetite for luxury," he says with pride.
As most Americans struggle to get by, a huge bubble of multi-millionaires lives almost in a parallel world.
They have private education, private health care and gated mansions. They even travel apart, creating a booming industry of private jets and yachts.
Their world now has a name, bestowed by Wall Street Journal reporter Robert Frank, whose new book dubbed it "Richistan" - where every dream can come true.
But the emergence of Richistan is a mixed blessing for the American Dream, which promises everyone can join the elite.
"We in America are heading towards 'developing nation' levels of inequality," says Frank.
"We would become like Brazil. What does that say about us? What does that say about America?"
In 1985 the United States had 13 United States billionaires. Today, there are more than 1000.
In 2005, 227,000 new American millionaires were created.
One survey showed that the wealth of the US millionaires was US$30 trillion - more than the GDPs of China, Japan, Brazil, Russia and the European Union combined.
The rich have created their own economy for their needs, at a time when the average American worker's wage rises will merely match inflation, and when 36 million people in the country live below the poverty line.
In Richistan, sums of money are rendered almost meaningless because of their size.
The "country" also has subdivisions. There is the "Platinum Triangle", the slice of Beverly Hills where houses can cost more than US$10 million. There is the "Jewel Coast", used to describe the strip of Madison Ave in Manhattan where boutique jewellery stories have sprung up to cater for the new riches' needs. Or there is the MetCircle society, a Manhattan club open only to those worth at least US$100 million.
The reason for the wealth boom, say some experts, is the convergence of a new technology - the internet and other computing advances - with fluid and speculative markets.
It was the same in the late 19th century when the original Gilded Age of conspicuous wealth and deep poverty was spawned by railways and the industrial age.
Today, the US Government helps by doling out corporate tax breaks.
In the 1950s, 33 per cent of federal income came from company taxes; in 2003, the figure was 7.4 per cent.
Eighty-two of America's largest companies paid no tax at all in at least one of the first three years of the Administration of President George W. Bush.
Who are the new rich? Some names such as Microsoft tycoon Bill Gates and savvy stock investor Warren Buffett are familiar. But most are unknown, often coming from the secretive world of hedge funds.
They are people like James Simons, who took home US$1.7 billion last year.
Last year the 25 top hedge-fund bankers in the US made an average of US$570 million each. (The average US household income is US$50,000.)
It is such people - usually men - who feed the outlandish luxury goods economy of Richistan. They are responsible for the rebirth of the butler industry, which was all but dead in the 1970s and is now facing a shortage of trained staff. So keen is the demand that many can expect a six-figure salary when they graduate from booming butler schools.
Then there is the runaway feeder-industry of luxury consumer items. The new ultra rich turn up their noses at Rolexes; the sought-after brand is Franck Muller, which sells a high-end timepiece for US$736,000.
Or try a Mont Blanc pen, encrusted in jewels, for US$700,000. Louis Vuitton's most exclusive handbag sells for US$42,000. Only 24 were made and all were pre-sold to Richistan clients.
In places such as Manhattan and Los Angeles, restaurants and bars outdo each other in excess. New York's Algonquin Hotel has a US$10,000 "martini on a rock" - it comes with a diamond at the bottom of the glass.
City eateries sell burgers for more than US$50. One has a US$1000 omelette. In Los Angeles, there is a craze for Bling mineral water, at US$90 a bottle.
Then there are the boats. The private yacht industry in America has been caught in an arms race of size and luxuriousness.
The clear winner is Oracle founder Larry Ellison's 137m water palace, the Rising Sun. It has more than 80 rooms in five decks, a basketball court doubling as a helipad, a cinema and a landing craft that carries a Jeep.
But an Oregon company is raising the stakes by producing private submarines.
About 100 private subs are now drifting around the world's oceans.
Then there are the rockets - several billionaires are leading the way in private exploration of space.
One is Robert Bigelow, who has ploughed US$500 million into trying to build an inflatable space hotel. A miniature prototype model was launched and tested last month. Armed guards now patrol the fences of Bigelow Aerospace's headquarters wearing badges decorated with an alien as their corporate logo.
But this is not just a world of riches gone mad that the rest of America can ignore. The growth of such a large super-rich class, coupled with a deepening poverty in many communities, is starting to tear at the fabric of society.
Even some of the most wealthy - such as Gates and Buffett - have spoken of the need to address the enormous "inequality gap" that they have come to exemplify.
Some of the richest Americans are calling for themselves to be taxed. In a speech last month Buffett - the third richest man in the world - pointed out that his tax rate was 17.7 per cent of his income while his secretary was taxed at 30 per cent.
"Many of the new super-rich are looking long-term at the world, and they see a collapsing US education system and health-care system and the disappearance of the middle class and they realise this is bad for everybody," said Frank.
Defenders of low tax for the very rich cite the theory of trickledown economics - the spending power of the rich benefiting the poor.
But the earning power of the average and poor citizen has not matched the performance of the elite. In 2005, the top 1 per cent of earners in the US gained 14 per cent in income while the rest of the country gained less than 1 per cent.
"If you look at the past 20 years, it seems clear that trickledown does not work," said Paul Buchheit, economics professor at Chicago's Harold Washington College.
There are some signs of a change in attitude. Recent huge Wall St floats such as the listing of private equity giants like Blackstone have created a push in Congress for taxes on the instant billionaires they have created.
Scandals of excess such as Enron and WorldCom and the trial of Conrad Black have been high-profile. But few politicians, needing campaign cash from new millionaires, will get far preaching higher tax.
Many think this must change. To a large degree, the debate over the booming lives of the super-rich is an argument about the American soul.
The US is a country that has always worshipped wealth, where the creation of a fortune was seen as virtuous and a source of pride.
But now that huge wealth has started to squeeze the middle class out of existence, leaving the haves and have-nots in very separate worlds.
It is possible that political will may develop to address the problem ... or the problem might correct itself.
The end of the Gilded Age came in the panic of 1893 that sank America into depression, and Frank can see the signs of a new storm coming.
"The trick is to spot when prosperity turns to excess," he said. "When a large amount of people make a lot money very quickly it's a sign you are near the top of the market."
THE RAREFIED AIR ON BILLIONAIRES ROW
* There are 7.5 million United States households valued at US$10 million ($12.6 million).
* A further two million are put at US$10 million to US$100 million.
* Thousands are valued at more than US$100 million.
* There are as many millionaires in North Carolina as in India.
* John D. Rockefeller was America's first billionaire. Adjusted for inflation, he had US$14 billion.
* There were 13 US billionaires in 1985. Now there are 1000.
* "Affluent" is Richistani for "not really rich". You need US$10 million for entry-level rich.
BIG BOYS' TOYS
* There is now a two-year waiting list for 60m yachts. If they were all put end to end, the boats on that list, which cost at least US$50 million each, would stretch for an opulent 25km.
* Sebonack Golf Club on Long Island charges US$650,000 for membership. That doesn't include the US$12,000 annual fees, or tips for caddies.
* Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page get around in a private Boeing 767.
THE OTHER SIDE
* The average United States household income is US$50,000
* 36 million people live below the poverty line.
* The average worker's wage rises merely keep pace with inflation
- OBSERVER
