Nice try, but all it says is that James supported them during the war. Nothing about him doing it for the rest of his life.

 

Shouldn't the question be. How can any wizard not being rich?
I'm wondering why there wasn't a fic yet which theorized that the whole wizard/muggle split wasn't done for the protection of the magic world but to protect the economical advantage of a certain pureblood elite against the lower class pure/halfbloods. That could also explain why muggleborns are so dangerous to them, not for cultural reasons, but for the economical threat they represent if they use their magical abilities effectively.

If you think it through it makes no real sense that an ancient family wouldn't have been able to collect as much gold as possible through the centuries if they operated even legally in the muggle world. If they operate illegal in it in the last 100-200 years nothing could stop them from getting rich.

 

How the fuck have you posted 136 times and not fixed your English?

 

I think you're assuming that magical = smart. If anything, magic would tend to discourage long-term investing. With a competent wizard or witch, whatever they want at the moment is not far from their reach. What point is there in tracking margins in interest rates to increase your accounts by 1%, if you can turn 1 bottle of wine into 100? Or 1 well-made chair into 100?

Over the last 200 years, the value of 'rich' has changed from $20,000 in the bank to $2 million. A person with business savvy can anticipate the developments around the corner, but magic also <> omniscience or even foreknowledge. It's easy to say, 'if you knew the Great Depression was coming, you could come out of it rich'. but that's not the kind of certainty that Divination offers.

So, for the Potter's to have a physically impressive pile of gold in a vault is probably a fair fortune in their world, and one they earned by protecting it from frivolous spenders.

 

Sirius got money from his disowned uncle, Alphard, after he ran from hom. (OotP) so it's best to leave him out of this.