A: John seems to be living comfortably off now.

B: He was just promoted and is enjoying his place in the sun.

Note: This idiom refers to an advantageous or favorable position or situation. This term may have been coined about 1660 by French philosopher Blaise Pascal but became well known only in the late 1800s, when it was applied to Germany’s position in world affairs, especially concerning its desire for more lands. In 1897 German Chancellor Prince Bernhard Von Bulow made a speech in the Reichstag in which he declared, “We desire to throw no one into the shade [in East Asia], but we also demand our place in the sun.”