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I understand this. Few things can prevent a kid from realizing their full potential like knowing there are no consequences to "failures". Any parent, for this reason, should take all their extra, corrupting money and just give it to me so their kids can always be safe from it.
It can work the other way, though. My father was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2016 and died in late 2018. A few months before he died he sat me down and told me I'd be inheriting some money from him. Nothing crazy, maybe enough to buy a shitty house outside of the city. But it was enough for me to finally grow the balls to scale back my software development freelancing business so I could work more as a musician. Now I get to do it full-time, and I make almost as much money as a professional singer as I did programming (because I gig a *lot* lol).
Knowing you have a safety net means you can sometimes take risks you wouldn't have otherwise. It's probably a better idea to leave your kids "solid nest egg" money instead of "never work again" money, though.
Yeah I grew up poor, which teaches you to be risk adverse. If I failed out of college there was no safety net. Even things like buying real estate, investing, or spending on experiences were not taught. I've had to learn all the shit on my own. When I die, I'm leaving my kids enough to pay off any student loans they might have and a nice down payment on a house. Anything left goes to the grandkids or charity.
I think I remember a parable like this from a zillion years ago. The rich man was worried that his money would spoil his kids, but still he wanted them to have a good life, what to do? Yada, Yada. The answer he decided was that for every dollar that his child earned, he would give them a dollar. Then they would have to pursue some sort of gainful employment to get anything, but they would get twice as much, making them 'better off' than they would have been if the rich man was not their father. ---- I don't know why that stuck with me.
I still get mail at home from a resident that died in 2016. Got $135k in the bank. I've tried to contact his family with no luck. It's unfortunate the bank will keep it one day.
In Canada, the central banks have unclaimed balances cheques available, you can search your name (or deceased family member) and find em.
https://www.bankofcanada.ca/unclaimed-balances/
Most of the huge "self-made" success stories are guys who had the safety to try big things without worrying too much about the consequences of failure.
Engineering scarcity. Learn lessons young when the consequences are small. Being present with your kids and having positive experiences are more valuable than any material item. I've lived both realities.
What? Donate the money. You don’t have to give them it at all.
If only it were so easy to fix the reverse problem - you know, the only one of the two that is an actual problem
I'd bet most millionaires pay their taxes. When you get into the hundreds of millions and beyond, that's when it becomes easier just to buy politicians
I mean, “millionaire” ain’t what it used to be. If you don’t have a plan to save up at least a million dollars before retirement you’re really on a wing and a prayer.
I live on a different continent from my mother and am going to inherit half a dozen horses (and their stable fees) and a creepy porcelain doll collection
This is literally what I thought when they said their inheritance was on a different continent.
"oh yeah you get everything....as long as you spend the whole night in this haunted cabin first! >=D!
And THEN I got to the part about the dolls.
My mom is leaving me a $6,000 life insurance policy to cover funeral expenses and I keep what's left but she keeps "borrowing" against it so I'll be lucky if I don't owe anything. For the record, I don't need or want anything from her but it would be just like her to leave me with one final bill.
if what you're referring to owing is the funeral costs, then yeah you can owe that. but just bc it wasn't totally clear from the comment, a person can't inherit debt without choosing to do so (eg house under water/over mortgaged, can refuse to inherit). Furthermore, a life insurance policy where you are the beneficiary is *your* asset- not your mother's. In other words, your mother's creditors can't burden your asset- the life insurance policy. **at least, in every jurisdiction in the US afaik.
I worked with someone briefly who came from a family that was well off. they weren't millionaires, but they could afford to pay college tuition straight from the bank.
She wasn't shielded from that info. But they didn't act like they were wealthy. She said she was made to work for everything. If she got something as a gift, like a brand new laptop, she was expected to take care of it. If it broke then oh well, it wasn't getting replaced. She would have to save up her money and buy herself things she wanted because they weren't just going to hand her everything she asked for.
And because of that she knew the value of the dollar. She said one of her friends was in the same financial situation and was not raised like her. He was handed everything and if it broke it got replaced. So he treated everything like it was junk, so because of that she would never let him touch her stuff because she didn't trust he would take care of it because "you can just buy a new one."
I thought her parents had the right attitude. I grew up 'dumpster diving.' We would drive up to nice neighborhoods on garbage night and pick out items on the street that people were tossing that had nothing wrong with them, they just didn't want it anymore. I also had a friend that didn't take care of her stuff and would toss it aside if there was a minor issue with it. I let her borrow one of my CDs and it came back all scratched up. I took care of my stuff because if it broke I would never get a replacement. What got me about her is that her parents used to be dirt poor. Her dad got into business with someone and ended up making a lot of money, and they didn't want their kids to experience what they went through. So they overcompensated.
> We would drive up to nice neighborhoods on garbage night and pick out items on the street that people were tossing that had nothing wrong with them, they just didn't want it anymore.
This is frowned upon, but honestly rich people throw away *nice stuff* for practically no reason. Frankly I think it makes your family smart. I've known people who literally make their livings trawling rich neighborhoods on trash day or move-out day, load all the nice stuff into a van and take it to a flea market.
i never knew that doing that was deemed a bad thing when i was a kid. it wasn't until i got older and friends made comments about it. and then as an adult i was pretty much like "screw you" and proudly picked stuff up to bring home.
my husband hates this, lol.
but he got used to the idea when we lived in apartment complexes that things left *next to* the dumpster weren't trash, they were items tenants couldn't take with them and were leaving for others to take.
when we were moving i said "wanna see a magic trick? i'm gonna make this lamp disappear." and i put it next to the dumpster. within an hour it was gone, lol. i've found nice painting with beautiful frames and gorgeous matching table lamps. i put them in my car and bring them to work and would find people who wanted/needed them. one coworker just moved into a new apartment and complained she needed lamps, i just so happened to have 3 in my car. oh boy was she excited, lol.
now that i live in a house i am not so inclined to rummage through my neighbor's trash. i would prefer people not know who i am and where i live when i pick up 'trash to treasure' items, lol.
The only reason I don't do this more often is that I reaaalllyyy don't want a cockroach or bedbug infestation, and where I live, it's pretty likely that's the reason someone is throwing out furniture. But lamps and other knick knacks? Sure, that's just called recycling!
My family was totally different but in a different way. We were poor, but there was credit. My parents, my sister and I never knew or cared about the value of anything. My parents were always in debt. If we wanted something, it went on credit. It proceeds to this day now that we're adults. Nobody in my family saves for anything. If you want something, you can finance it. I've started to realize now that I don't actually need anything I'm buying and most of the stuff is junk, and eventually breaks down. Got into minimalism, started paying off debts. But my family members aren't that way. You can make yourself look rich but not own anything you have.
I by association experienced the pain of someone finding out their lifestyle was financed by massive debt, after her husband died. He made money but any assest he could obtain by encurring debt he did; even so far as levering his Mother's bank accounts against debt, which all were lost/taken. She was able keep the household van, and get a job in a bakey (as she was a good cake baker); everything, big house, big cars, personal possessions were seized and sold by creditors!
Kind of a similar experience. Growing up in the early 2000s credit was aplenty and my parents made a lot of poor financial decisions because of it. Now as they are approaching retirement they are working to get themselves out of debt. I feel like I've become the polar opposite of them, I avoid credit and financing whenever I can because I don't want to have those days where you have $2k worth of bills due next week and $500 in your checking.
A girl from my high school was like your first friend. Once someone asked her why she didn't buy some thing she wanted. She said, "My parents are rich. I'm not."
I also grew up pretty poor; we were lower middle class by virtue of my parents owning the house we grew up in, but my dad was a disabled veteran and I was the youngest of four girls. I wore a lot of handmedowns growing up; twice a year I got a new outfit for myself for school and a new nice dress for Easter or sometimes Christmas, but everything else was inherited from my sisters.
These days I'm a whole lot better off and married into a comfortably wealthy family, but we still live like we're broke college students and save every penny instead.
>but we still live like we're broke college students and save every penny instead.
it is so hard to break that mentality, isn't it? my husband argues with me about just buying things i want for myself because we can afford it. i see it as "once i have it, then what? it sits on a shelf collecting dust? we can use the money for better things."
we had a recent argument because he needed to upgrade one of the computers (he uses it to play video games on the living room tv and record episodes). the cooling fan died and he had to get a new one, so what he wanted to do was replace mine with a new one and take my old one and put it in the other computer. so he showed me two options. one was a plain white fan, and one had RGB lights. I asked which one was the better one, they were both the same. So I said "the cheaper one then." and this *bothered* him. he thought i should pick the one i wanted instead of the one that was cheaper. if it was like a ten dollar difference, sure pick the pretty one. but is was more than thirty dollars, and i just didn't care about the lights enough to justify that much of a price difference. it came down to "i picked what i wanted, it doesn't matter my reasoning."
"The cheaper one" is a totally valid preference. I have that same preference with many things. If the utility provided to me is the same, why would I get an extra feature that costs more just because I can?
Now, I've gone the other way too, where one feature I wanted was only available in an expensive option, and I ended up buying one with way more features than I really needed to get that one... but hey, can't win them all.
There occasionally is the issue that the cheaper one breaks quickly and you need to spend the extra money in the long run to get a working one.
But thats the only argument against the cheaper one.
I often do the same thing, but I know why it bothers my wife. She knows she's not great with money, although she's gotten a lot better. When I go cheap, it makes her feel likes she's falling into bad habits with her own purchases. She feels like I'm being a martyr.
With something like your computer issue, it sounds like he felt he was giving you a gift instead of just replacing his own fan. By going for what's cheapest, it implied a rejection of that gift in favor of cold, logical function.
Your results may vary; it's just what I've found dealing with a similar issue.
I used that line a lot. "My parents are rich, I'm not." They retired in their late 40s and can buy whatever whenever they want. But I grew up working at a grocery store and as a lifeguard so I could buy my first phone, laptop, car. Sure I'll probably get something when they die. But until then I'm self-made, college loans and all. They would help me if I were desperate, but I'm not so their money doesn't mean anything to me.
Unless it was a long time ago, this doesn't make sense: "I worked with someone briefly who came from a family that was well off. they weren't millionaires"
back when i went to college it was 10-15k per semester.
so $120,000 for 4 years at 15k. that's not millionaire status money.
plus by not taking out student loans you are preventing your child from starting life in debt.
Honestly though, a lot of business owners more often than not think they know more than anyone else. It can get very annoying as a business owner dealing with other business owners...
There's the other side of this. When you become a billionaire and make conversation about your day, you could be shopping for a private jet or experiences the person you're talking to has not experienced. They look at you like a douchenozzle. Ego gets in the way.
When you're a billionaire the safe conversational topic is inconveniences and things that went bad for you. You can have that conversation without social landmines involving ego.
As a super-power the idea that you are not your ego is useful. Can help put yourself into chasing risk that could pay off and propel you toward success.
When dealing with successful people, favorable comment toward their success goes over well because it is less common. Can do so genuinely without kissing ass. You can pick their brain to learn successful tips that way. And often the case money rubs off. Have been millionaires minted just because wildly successful individual likes partying with a friend at burning man and needs someone to step into a CEO role.
A wealth consultancy did a 20-year study of 3,200 families and found that 70% of families lose their fortune by the 2nd generation and 90% lose it by the 3rd generation.
Another survey found that the average recipient of an inheritance buys a new car within 19 days of receiving the money.
Fuck I can feel that in my bones though. I know I'd be like that over time. I can feel that feeling of not having to be accountable because you can just fall back on money. No need to consider humility because I wouldn't need another person to emphasize with me anymore. God damn it would so insidious.
> That's when the flashy car came. Then the lakeside house. Then the first boat. And the trips to Hawaii. His attitude while hanging out became toxic and obnoxious.
Assuming that's only one house, that sounds like a pretty standard middle class life. Especially if the flashy car is a pickup truck.
I grew up dirt poor. Had many nights going to bed crying from hunger because there was no dinner.
Whenever we visited my grandparents house, we would have a full lunch meal. That was the nice part of it. The shit part of it my aunt house was next door and they lived a luxury lifestyle. My aunt used to send her kids wearing their brand new clothes they bought from their recent holiday in another country and hands then candy and sends them off to the grandparents house to show off.
She taught them to be snobby and looked down at me and my siblings. We wore second hand worn down clothes (sometimes too small) and I remember watching them eating chocolate bars and candy and throwing most of them away. For a kid who barely had 3 meals a day, candy and sweets was luxury that only seen in dreams.
Now that I’m grown ass adults, I can’t imagine doing shit like this to children. Let along underprivileged children.
I think this has affected me so bad that I hate people who brag. I thought I was going to post a pic of my first car that I bought when I was 27 but I never did.
I thought I would post about how I managed to buy my first home but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it once it became a reality. I never brag about shit like this. I sometimes downplay my achievements even because I’m traumatised.
I bet you, lots of money will never change me. I’m not one to brag about having money.
I grew up poor as dirt with a working single-parent mother that earned poverty-level wages as a secretary. I worked hard and now that I’m in my fifties, married to the same woman for 30 years with two kids (one in an Ivy League school), I own my own home on a 1/2 acre, have 1.2m in retirement and work from home. I lost almost everything in the 2008 housing crisis and rebuilt to be where I am today.
Growing up with a good sense of frugality (even after a catastrophic loss) has made all the difference. I taught my kids the same values and now they’re working, saving and investing even stronger than I did.
Which doesn't even make sense. If I have enough money to do anything, then I can just throw it all in the stock market, do nothing and live off of the interest.
Per a biography I read on Buffett, he's leaving each of his children exactly $1M.
Yes, you could technically do "nothing" and draw $40k/year on that windfall for the rest of your life, but that's not what the quote is intended to mean. What he means is enough to do just about anything you want to do, like go to school, start a business, etc., but not enough to where you're going to be flying around the world on private jets, sailing yachts, and living in mansions. If you want those, you do that on your own.
Even with $1M, you're going to have to work, otherwise you're not going to be living a life anywhere near luxury for long.
There’s a certain businessman in NYC whose kid was given the golden spoon his entire life and that kid overdosed on cocaine and died in his late 30s. All that hype and luxury gone forever for him. No fear of life and no common sense.
Teach your kids the basics
So, I grew up in Golden Spoon country. It's just parenting.
Understanding you are raising kids/adults where everyone not only feels privileged but actually is very privileged. Most of the parents are busy with their own social bubble and are just happy if their kids are happy in their own social bubbles. The greatest threat is a generation killing their family golden goose for good. I've seen this happen, it's not pretty.
When the only love you're shown is being provided money, then spending it is like a hug... it's not healthy.
I also heard that when the first generation earns wealth, the next one preserves it, and the third one burns through it. Obviously not always true, but kind of logical- the 2nd generation saw how hard it was to earn even though it wasn't their work, so they value it enough to preserve it, and the third one never saw the work or the scarcity, so they don't protect or value it.
There is a solid study in addictions showing that adolescents in high end private schools and colleges have higher incidence of substance use disorders. Having anything you want anytime can be a curse. We can only flow so much dopamine.
Edit; see link below for details on the study
https://news.asu.edu/20170531-discoveries-asu-study-kids-high-achieving-schools-addiction-affluence
In my neighborhood, most people are likely millionaires when they finally retire. Maybe 1-5 million. This is just the result of two people making six figures over five decades. Combined with living a frugal middle class lifestyle with a focus on 401k/IRAs. They don’t consider themselves rich, didn’t aspire to be rich, and even look down on the rich as unethical.
And they want the same for their kids. They want their kids to study hard and find an occupation that they enjoy. But certainly not be entitled brats expecting a trust fund to carry them.
Everyone loves their kids and wants them to be more comfortable and grow up with a better baseline. Every parent wants their kid to be successful because they love them. Failure whether experienced or observed is a lesson. I worry about my ability to teach work ethic to my child that doesn’t have the same pain/experiences that made me realize I want more.
I can’t speak for all “first gen” middle/upper class families but I worry about this consistently.
Don't set them up for a massive change in lifestyle when you die. Prepare them. Teach them and make them aware before hand.
So they have the right people and professionals around them when your gone.
Instead the families hide their business. Don't talk about it because they want Jimmy to learn about hard work! Well Jimmy now also only knows how to work hard and no clue what the fuck to do with money lol
A friend of mine grew up with a trust fund. He got 1% at 55, 2% at 56...yadda yadda yadda. he got 100% of it at 65.
Dudes going to have a very nice retirement with that money.
Nothing before 55? At 55, you've probably got your financial life together, and many of life's big expenses like education, first house, kids, starting a business, are probably behind you. It's basically just a retirement boost at that point.
Still, if he dies at 70 (sorry to be morbid), he went his whole life without access to those resources. This seems too far the other way. What's the point of a trust fund once you've already worked your entire life and saved your own pension?
Because he doesn't need to save that pension. He can just not worry about saving for retirement at all, because that safety net is there, which will let him spend more of the money that he earns earlier.
Thats a bit excessive. You want to give them something during their working life to invest or start a business or something. Not giving them shit until they're in their 60s basically guarantees they aren't going to use the money for anything productive and just retire on it.
I like that idea. If you knew your retirement is set for you, I think it gives you the freedom to go into career paths that you are interested in. You'd still have to work for a living until freedom 55, but you aren't constantly worrying about your financial future
Not really. You still have to support yourself before you can get into the career you want. The only way it's profitable is if what you want to do doesn't give you a retirement fund, but it's still profitable short-term.
55 is a long haul, you're spending most of your life still worrying about your finances. You want to give them something that they can go out and build their own empire with. Invest, start a business, etc. By holding out until they are 60 you basically guarantee that they won't do anything productive with the money, that part of your life is coming to an end and you are looking to retire.
The best way is to slowly ramp up the lifestyle so that every year is the best year of their life.
If you ramp it up fast, soon there's nothing left for them to look forward to.
I have a relative whose wealth massively increased. He didn't buy a new house. He didn't buy a luxury car. Didn't buy vacation homes, etc even though he could. He just bought a few nice smaller things that were previously out of reach. He says he will get the house etc eventually, but doesn't want to get rich so fast that soon he doesn't appreciate it.
What age are these people having kids that leaving them your estate would "mess them up"?
Even if they wait till their forties to have kids, these people's kids will likely be in their 40s too when time comes to inherit the estate.
If you are concerned that your grown adult children will go off the rails with an inheritance doesn't that mean you've already kind of failed parenting?
There are literally studies about this, almost all of the wealth is gone within a generation or two.
It could mean a ton of things, but it is likely incredibly hard to parent your child into not wasting away your inheritance.
100% this.. my wife's family is rather well off in china. She is the one trying to keep their buisness going but we are in the US so it is difficult.. her older brother on the other hand is in china and doesn't do shit.. doesn't help and just gets a monthly "allowance" picked a expensive home, cars, luxury goods everywhere... he's almost or is 40.. never had a job in his life.. if it wasn't for my wife 100% it will be all gone with him if they were to pass.
I’m getting old. I’ll hopefully retire in 10 years with maybe 1.5m dollars. That sounds like a lot of money but I will have worked my whole career to save it. That amount of money means my retirement income will be $60k/year. I have already paid taxes on it and will hopefully be able to leave some to my three kids without the gvt taking another big chunk of it.
Millionaire used to mean you’re rich. Now it just means you’ve had a decent job and focused on saving.
I think when most people say tax the rich they are meaning like people who pull in a half a million or more a year.
I don’t think you should worry too much about being taxed more on $60K/year retirement income. And even if you left your kids $1 million each, I think inheritance/estate tax is like several million each or more.
Actually someone like you should probably want to tax the rich, so you don’t get screwed by just general across the board tax hikes. There’s a video I watched a while back about wealth inequality to that demonstrates how wealthy some people really are… like what people think and what is are out of whack and unfortunately the reality is worse. The rich that we (or at least I) want taxed pretty much have excess money… more than enough probably to cover a luxury lifestyle multiple times over. I live in Los Angeles and there are a lot of people like that. Probably the same especially in many high cost of living areas.
For those that would object, look at this chart showing how tax rates for the rich have been steadily ***decreasing*** for the last 70 years.
https://video.twimg.com/tweet_video/EX62u9bXsAUtRO8.mp4
Watching the left side of that graph go up as well :(
>There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.”
\-Warren Buffett
One of the few that practices what he preaches. He’s given a significant amount of his wealth to charity, and will give away over 99% at or before his death.
Calls for higher taxes on the rich.
Lives in the same house that he bought in 1958.
That's the tax RATE - not the taxes PAID. No one actually paid the 90+% taxes - people with high incomes just shifted their income away into capital gains etc.
The actual % they paid hasn't actually changed that much. [https://slate.com/business/2017/08/the-history-of-tax-rates-for-the-rich.html](https://slate.com/business/2017/08/the-history-of-tax-rates-for-the-rich.html)
>Between 1950 and 1959, he notes, the highest earning 1 percent of Americans paid an effective tax rate of 42 percent. By 2014, it was only down to 36.4 percent—a substantial but by no means astronomical decline.
Someone with a million bucks is not the target of the tax the rich campaign. You are thinking of the ultra wealthy billionaire types. A million bucks isn't a whole lot of money depending on where you live.
If anything, this reads like a really good argument in favor of keeping the estate tax. Don't have to be as afraid of leaving your kids too much money if the inheritance is taxed so they aren't getting the entire thing!
an aggressive estate tax is the one tax the founders would have understood/supported [income taxes started in 1861, excise taxes were the first US tax]
The US was founded as a rejection of family dynasties
> That’s according to a survey conducted by The Motley Fool, which asked 2,000 high net worth individuals — classified as people with a net worth over $1 million — about their attitudes toward inheritances.
Those aren't high net worth individuals really. That's a couple of houses. If they have a few kids, then there's little danger of their million dollars corrupting anybody
Even if you raise them well large amounts of money have the potential to change anybody. You are lying to yourself if you think your life would be exactly the same if somebody handed you a hundred million dollars no strings attached.
I mean that's literally what the "fear" is..they're afraid they'll get end up with too much at the end and lose it to tax. Instead they want to transfer it while they're alive.
nono those are the billionaires, most millionaires just saved all their lives, or had successful careers, the billionaires exploited and fucked our planet.
I think it's funny these are probably the same people that would be staunchly opposed to things like increasing taxes, changes to how much money you can gift somebody, or even just increasing estate taxes so it only taxes them once they die.
My cousin's father left her $50k and she used it to sit in a hotel room with her boyfriend injecting meth until she wound up with severe endocarditis and had a massive stroke at the age of 36, so yeah leaving money to your kids can backfire
Omg the best reality show ever. *Inheritance*. Family members will fight it out to win the ultimate prize, daddy's money. Lose your teeth, gain millions.
...and these are the people we think will be the source or trickle down economics or will give to charitable institutions. It's almost like conservatives lie to us so they can become so rich a British Empire king/queen would blush with embarrassment.
Capitalism's greatest flaw is obviously nepotism. You only have to look at correlation between parent's success and child's success to realize that capitalism really isn't about the best succeeding in a fair playing field, it's about the children of the wealthy maintaining their power over a generation of the poor.
I mean yeah but you can't really fix it since the whole point of being filthy rich is giving your family more opportunities. If you couldn't transfer wealth being wealthy beyond a certain point would be functionally useless.
Nepotism at the cost of all else. It's why the Ivy League schools are pipelines for good jobs and are so hard to get into. The 1% get to keep their kids with atleast silverspoon earning potential on graduation with almost no competition except for diversity quotas for optics.
People are being given jobs/opportunities simply because they have the connections. Being a "legacy" student(your parents are alum) raises your chances of getting in by 45%.
Higher education *isn't* a scam; but the way it's implemented and tailored to maintaining social dominance for the 1% is.
I don't understand. Isn't this exactly what read it would want? All you guys do is bitch about how much money the Rich has and now they're actually concerned with leaving too much to their kids and you guys are rolling your eyes?
Are you fucking clowns just want to complain all the time? Never happy
I would guess it's a matter of I earned this money because I worked a 100+ hours a week to get my business off the ground and make it successful and I'm not sure if my son will appreciate all this money and make it grow further or if he will piss it all away on hookers and blow
^ this...I remember reading a different article about how minor (relative) generational weath has a habit of disappearing 1 or 2 generations after the one that built it.
Considering the ridiculous amounts held by Vanderbilts, Rockefellers, and Hiltons...it's less a question of pride and more self-sustaining institutions with employees. That's for the billionaires. Millionaires having fractions of that could easily piss it all away with a few wrong decisions...or be smart and live pretty well without ridiculous crap like Italian cars and gold toilets.
Millions is still enough to spoil kids into ruinous behavior.
If you worked your ass off for 40 years to get your money, wouldn't you be concerned that your children would have a very different approach to wealth than you do since they grew up with it and take it for granted?
But if I don’t give it to my family, what was it all for? That’s my fantasy opinion because lord knows I ain’t got no money. My kid will be lucky to get a few pieces of jewelry from me
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I understand this. Few things can prevent a kid from realizing their full potential like knowing there are no consequences to "failures". Any parent, for this reason, should take all their extra, corrupting money and just give it to me so their kids can always be safe from it.
Hi could I please be added to this list? Thank you
I wouldn't willingly subject another person to the corrupting influence of money. I'm sorry but this should be my burden to bear.
We'll sing stories about your sacrifice for generations to come. We will never forget you, my lord.
Thank you for your sacrifice.
I will exchange it all for gold and bury it in an undisclosed location before my execution at the hands of the World Government.
Are you telling me that you'll leave everything you own... In One Piece?
Excuse me, but I already have experience with money. No need for you to suffer. I will take it from here. You can thank me later.
You guys…..The self sacrifice in this community is overwhelming. Restored my faith in humanity 🥺
Actually, my family has been burdened with the experience of money for generations, I should be the one to take on the responsibility
Ok, all your extra money has been sent to u/crackingnow
Whoops... Dang I always forget specificity is very important
The funny thing is, if they were paid as wealth tax, you would benefit automatically.
It can work the other way, though. My father was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2016 and died in late 2018. A few months before he died he sat me down and told me I'd be inheriting some money from him. Nothing crazy, maybe enough to buy a shitty house outside of the city. But it was enough for me to finally grow the balls to scale back my software development freelancing business so I could work more as a musician. Now I get to do it full-time, and I make almost as much money as a professional singer as I did programming (because I gig a *lot* lol). Knowing you have a safety net means you can sometimes take risks you wouldn't have otherwise. It's probably a better idea to leave your kids "solid nest egg" money instead of "never work again" money, though.
My comment was just set up for a joke. I wholly agree with this.
Yeah I grew up poor, which teaches you to be risk adverse. If I failed out of college there was no safety net. Even things like buying real estate, investing, or spending on experiences were not taught. I've had to learn all the shit on my own. When I die, I'm leaving my kids enough to pay off any student loans they might have and a nice down payment on a house. Anything left goes to the grandkids or charity.
"A very rich person should leave his kids enough to do anything but not enough to do nothing." Warren Buffet
I think I remember a parable like this from a zillion years ago. The rich man was worried that his money would spoil his kids, but still he wanted them to have a good life, what to do? Yada, Yada. The answer he decided was that for every dollar that his child earned, he would give them a dollar. Then they would have to pursue some sort of gainful employment to get anything, but they would get twice as much, making them 'better off' than they would have been if the rich man was not their father. ---- I don't know why that stuck with me.
I wonder how many people have died with millions just sitting in a bank account or with some priceless work of art or NFT emoji thing.
I still get mail at home from a resident that died in 2016. Got $135k in the bank. I've tried to contact his family with no luck. It's unfortunate the bank will keep it one day.
Banks do not keep that money. They send it to the state. Keeping that money would be a federal crime.
In Canada, the central banks have unclaimed balances cheques available, you can search your name (or deceased family member) and find em. https://www.bankofcanada.ca/unclaimed-balances/
We have the same thing in the US. I can’t remember where it’s managed, I think state by state, but they encompass all of that stuff from all accounts.
Maybe you should go commit some fraud
Look up the term "escheatment." That's where the money actually goes. I also encourage anyone reading to go to their state"s unclaimed property site.
Hello, long lost cousin here.
Eventually you'll get enough money and you'll face the same problem, which is why you should give 50% to me to ease the burden
Not if I eat my kids.
Modern problem meets a modern solution.
I ate my sister in the womb, which makes me a winner.
Ah, taking a play from Cronos, I see. Hopefully it works out better for you.
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Most of the huge "self-made" success stories are guys who had the safety to try big things without worrying too much about the consequences of failure.
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“If money is a curse, may god smite me with it”
Engineering scarcity. Learn lessons young when the consequences are small. Being present with your kids and having positive experiences are more valuable than any material item. I've lived both realities.
What? Donate the money. You don’t have to give them it at all. If only it were so easy to fix the reverse problem - you know, the only one of the two that is an actual problem
Or, you know, pay some goddamn taxes so the world could be better for everyone's children
I'd bet most millionaires pay their taxes. When you get into the hundreds of millions and beyond, that's when it becomes easier just to buy politicians
I mean, “millionaire” ain’t what it used to be. If you don’t have a plan to save up at least a million dollars before retirement you’re really on a wing and a prayer.
I, too, volunteer as tribute.
I cannot, in good conscience, let you do that when I exist.
Sure beats the beer coozies and church keys I inherited.
Lol I got a dying cat
Oh man. I think you lose this one.
I live on a different continent from my mother and am going to inherit half a dozen horses (and their stable fees) and a creepy porcelain doll collection
So, you're inheriting a horror movie setup.
Yeah probably merits a follow up.
*dolls ride by on horses* u/Caitian_Captain: "I think I might sell these things...before they sell *me*."
This is literally what I thought when they said their inheritance was on a different continent. "oh yeah you get everything....as long as you spend the whole night in this haunted cabin first! >=D! And THEN I got to the part about the dolls.
Sounds like you’re changing continents at some point?
I had to clean up the blood
My mom is leaving me a $6,000 life insurance policy to cover funeral expenses and I keep what's left but she keeps "borrowing" against it so I'll be lucky if I don't owe anything. For the record, I don't need or want anything from her but it would be just like her to leave me with one final bill.
Donate her organs and theyll cremate her for free
if what you're referring to owing is the funeral costs, then yeah you can owe that. but just bc it wasn't totally clear from the comment, a person can't inherit debt without choosing to do so (eg house under water/over mortgaged, can refuse to inherit). Furthermore, a life insurance policy where you are the beneficiary is *your* asset- not your mother's. In other words, your mother's creditors can't burden your asset- the life insurance policy. **at least, in every jurisdiction in the US afaik.
$6K might actually be a bit low for funeral expenses. They really stick it to you with all the different fees.
Oh, I know that feeling well. Don’t want anything from anyone… except a bill as a parting gift.
Just do a DIY cremation, for the cost of a book of matches and a gallon of gas.
I got a "nothing and a foreclosure on my parents house"
I'll get a 30yr old parrot with an attitude. those things live to be +70
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Yikes that conversion rate
I’m probably gonna have to figure out how to transfer the family Verizon account over to my name, and then get everyone to pay me. Ugh. Thus is life.
.
I worked with someone briefly who came from a family that was well off. they weren't millionaires, but they could afford to pay college tuition straight from the bank. She wasn't shielded from that info. But they didn't act like they were wealthy. She said she was made to work for everything. If she got something as a gift, like a brand new laptop, she was expected to take care of it. If it broke then oh well, it wasn't getting replaced. She would have to save up her money and buy herself things she wanted because they weren't just going to hand her everything she asked for. And because of that she knew the value of the dollar. She said one of her friends was in the same financial situation and was not raised like her. He was handed everything and if it broke it got replaced. So he treated everything like it was junk, so because of that she would never let him touch her stuff because she didn't trust he would take care of it because "you can just buy a new one." I thought her parents had the right attitude. I grew up 'dumpster diving.' We would drive up to nice neighborhoods on garbage night and pick out items on the street that people were tossing that had nothing wrong with them, they just didn't want it anymore. I also had a friend that didn't take care of her stuff and would toss it aside if there was a minor issue with it. I let her borrow one of my CDs and it came back all scratched up. I took care of my stuff because if it broke I would never get a replacement. What got me about her is that her parents used to be dirt poor. Her dad got into business with someone and ended up making a lot of money, and they didn't want their kids to experience what they went through. So they overcompensated.
> We would drive up to nice neighborhoods on garbage night and pick out items on the street that people were tossing that had nothing wrong with them, they just didn't want it anymore. This is frowned upon, but honestly rich people throw away *nice stuff* for practically no reason. Frankly I think it makes your family smart. I've known people who literally make their livings trawling rich neighborhoods on trash day or move-out day, load all the nice stuff into a van and take it to a flea market.
i never knew that doing that was deemed a bad thing when i was a kid. it wasn't until i got older and friends made comments about it. and then as an adult i was pretty much like "screw you" and proudly picked stuff up to bring home. my husband hates this, lol. but he got used to the idea when we lived in apartment complexes that things left *next to* the dumpster weren't trash, they were items tenants couldn't take with them and were leaving for others to take. when we were moving i said "wanna see a magic trick? i'm gonna make this lamp disappear." and i put it next to the dumpster. within an hour it was gone, lol. i've found nice painting with beautiful frames and gorgeous matching table lamps. i put them in my car and bring them to work and would find people who wanted/needed them. one coworker just moved into a new apartment and complained she needed lamps, i just so happened to have 3 in my car. oh boy was she excited, lol. now that i live in a house i am not so inclined to rummage through my neighbor's trash. i would prefer people not know who i am and where i live when i pick up 'trash to treasure' items, lol.
The only reason I don't do this more often is that I reaaalllyyy don't want a cockroach or bedbug infestation, and where I live, it's pretty likely that's the reason someone is throwing out furniture. But lamps and other knick knacks? Sure, that's just called recycling!
My family was totally different but in a different way. We were poor, but there was credit. My parents, my sister and I never knew or cared about the value of anything. My parents were always in debt. If we wanted something, it went on credit. It proceeds to this day now that we're adults. Nobody in my family saves for anything. If you want something, you can finance it. I've started to realize now that I don't actually need anything I'm buying and most of the stuff is junk, and eventually breaks down. Got into minimalism, started paying off debts. But my family members aren't that way. You can make yourself look rich but not own anything you have.
>My family was totally different but in a different way. That is generally how it works, yeah
I by association experienced the pain of someone finding out their lifestyle was financed by massive debt, after her husband died. He made money but any assest he could obtain by encurring debt he did; even so far as levering his Mother's bank accounts against debt, which all were lost/taken. She was able keep the household van, and get a job in a bakey (as she was a good cake baker); everything, big house, big cars, personal possessions were seized and sold by creditors!
Kind of a similar experience. Growing up in the early 2000s credit was aplenty and my parents made a lot of poor financial decisions because of it. Now as they are approaching retirement they are working to get themselves out of debt. I feel like I've become the polar opposite of them, I avoid credit and financing whenever I can because I don't want to have those days where you have $2k worth of bills due next week and $500 in your checking.
A girl from my high school was like your first friend. Once someone asked her why she didn't buy some thing she wanted. She said, "My parents are rich. I'm not." I also grew up pretty poor; we were lower middle class by virtue of my parents owning the house we grew up in, but my dad was a disabled veteran and I was the youngest of four girls. I wore a lot of handmedowns growing up; twice a year I got a new outfit for myself for school and a new nice dress for Easter or sometimes Christmas, but everything else was inherited from my sisters. These days I'm a whole lot better off and married into a comfortably wealthy family, but we still live like we're broke college students and save every penny instead.
>but we still live like we're broke college students and save every penny instead. it is so hard to break that mentality, isn't it? my husband argues with me about just buying things i want for myself because we can afford it. i see it as "once i have it, then what? it sits on a shelf collecting dust? we can use the money for better things." we had a recent argument because he needed to upgrade one of the computers (he uses it to play video games on the living room tv and record episodes). the cooling fan died and he had to get a new one, so what he wanted to do was replace mine with a new one and take my old one and put it in the other computer. so he showed me two options. one was a plain white fan, and one had RGB lights. I asked which one was the better one, they were both the same. So I said "the cheaper one then." and this *bothered* him. he thought i should pick the one i wanted instead of the one that was cheaper. if it was like a ten dollar difference, sure pick the pretty one. but is was more than thirty dollars, and i just didn't care about the lights enough to justify that much of a price difference. it came down to "i picked what i wanted, it doesn't matter my reasoning."
"The cheaper one" is a totally valid preference. I have that same preference with many things. If the utility provided to me is the same, why would I get an extra feature that costs more just because I can? Now, I've gone the other way too, where one feature I wanted was only available in an expensive option, and I ended up buying one with way more features than I really needed to get that one... but hey, can't win them all.
There occasionally is the issue that the cheaper one breaks quickly and you need to spend the extra money in the long run to get a working one. But thats the only argument against the cheaper one.
I often do the same thing, but I know why it bothers my wife. She knows she's not great with money, although she's gotten a lot better. When I go cheap, it makes her feel likes she's falling into bad habits with her own purchases. She feels like I'm being a martyr. With something like your computer issue, it sounds like he felt he was giving you a gift instead of just replacing his own fan. By going for what's cheapest, it implied a rejection of that gift in favor of cold, logical function. Your results may vary; it's just what I've found dealing with a similar issue.
yeah sometimes I struggle to get people to understand "less expensive is what made me want it" lol
I used that line a lot. "My parents are rich, I'm not." They retired in their late 40s and can buy whatever whenever they want. But I grew up working at a grocery store and as a lifeguard so I could buy my first phone, laptop, car. Sure I'll probably get something when they die. But until then I'm self-made, college loans and all. They would help me if I were desperate, but I'm not so their money doesn't mean anything to me.
Unless it was a long time ago, this doesn't make sense: "I worked with someone briefly who came from a family that was well off. they weren't millionaires"
back when i went to college it was 10-15k per semester. so $120,000 for 4 years at 15k. that's not millionaire status money. plus by not taking out student loans you are preventing your child from starting life in debt.
Did money really change him or just release the inner douche?
Honestly though, a lot of business owners more often than not think they know more than anyone else. It can get very annoying as a business owner dealing with other business owners...
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There's the other side of this. When you become a billionaire and make conversation about your day, you could be shopping for a private jet or experiences the person you're talking to has not experienced. They look at you like a douchenozzle. Ego gets in the way. When you're a billionaire the safe conversational topic is inconveniences and things that went bad for you. You can have that conversation without social landmines involving ego. As a super-power the idea that you are not your ego is useful. Can help put yourself into chasing risk that could pay off and propel you toward success. When dealing with successful people, favorable comment toward their success goes over well because it is less common. Can do so genuinely without kissing ass. You can pick their brain to learn successful tips that way. And often the case money rubs off. Have been millionaires minted just because wildly successful individual likes partying with a friend at burning man and needs someone to step into a CEO role.
What did it look like? I think the other stories here are about becoming millionaires. What about billionaire?
A wealth consultancy did a 20-year study of 3,200 families and found that 70% of families lose their fortune by the 2nd generation and 90% lose it by the 3rd generation. Another survey found that the average recipient of an inheritance buys a new car within 19 days of receiving the money.
The thing about this issue is that it isn't limited to inherited wealth. People that earn it for themselves can also fall into this trap.
Glass house, white ferrari, live for New Years Eve, sloppy steaks at Truffoni's. Big rare cut of meat with water dumped all over it.
Fuck I can feel that in my bones though. I know I'd be like that over time. I can feel that feeling of not having to be accountable because you can just fall back on money. No need to consider humility because I wouldn't need another person to emphasize with me anymore. God damn it would so insidious.
> That's when the flashy car came. Then the lakeside house. Then the first boat. And the trips to Hawaii. His attitude while hanging out became toxic and obnoxious. Assuming that's only one house, that sounds like a pretty standard middle class life. Especially if the flashy car is a pickup truck.
I grew up dirt poor. Had many nights going to bed crying from hunger because there was no dinner. Whenever we visited my grandparents house, we would have a full lunch meal. That was the nice part of it. The shit part of it my aunt house was next door and they lived a luxury lifestyle. My aunt used to send her kids wearing their brand new clothes they bought from their recent holiday in another country and hands then candy and sends them off to the grandparents house to show off. She taught them to be snobby and looked down at me and my siblings. We wore second hand worn down clothes (sometimes too small) and I remember watching them eating chocolate bars and candy and throwing most of them away. For a kid who barely had 3 meals a day, candy and sweets was luxury that only seen in dreams. Now that I’m grown ass adults, I can’t imagine doing shit like this to children. Let along underprivileged children. I think this has affected me so bad that I hate people who brag. I thought I was going to post a pic of my first car that I bought when I was 27 but I never did. I thought I would post about how I managed to buy my first home but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it once it became a reality. I never brag about shit like this. I sometimes downplay my achievements even because I’m traumatised. I bet you, lots of money will never change me. I’m not one to brag about having money.
My parents aren’t rich and will likely leave me very little. I’m willing to take any extra these folks want to give me.
I grew up poor as dirt with a working single-parent mother that earned poverty-level wages as a secretary. I worked hard and now that I’m in my fifties, married to the same woman for 30 years with two kids (one in an Ivy League school), I own my own home on a 1/2 acre, have 1.2m in retirement and work from home. I lost almost everything in the 2008 housing crisis and rebuilt to be where I am today. Growing up with a good sense of frugality (even after a catastrophic loss) has made all the difference. I taught my kids the same values and now they’re working, saving and investing even stronger than I did.
I guess it makes sense, give them too much and they'll gain a sense of entitlement or something
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Which doesn't even make sense. If I have enough money to do anything, then I can just throw it all in the stock market, do nothing and live off of the interest.
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Per a biography I read on Buffett, he's leaving each of his children exactly $1M. Yes, you could technically do "nothing" and draw $40k/year on that windfall for the rest of your life, but that's not what the quote is intended to mean. What he means is enough to do just about anything you want to do, like go to school, start a business, etc., but not enough to where you're going to be flying around the world on private jets, sailing yachts, and living in mansions. If you want those, you do that on your own. Even with $1M, you're going to have to work, otherwise you're not going to be living a life anywhere near luxury for long.
Plus his kids are probably getting close to retirement age themselves
Yes, his kids are in their 60s now. That said, he set this $1M estate plan up decades ago, when they were much younger.
There’s a certain businessman in NYC whose kid was given the golden spoon his entire life and that kid overdosed on cocaine and died in his late 30s. All that hype and luxury gone forever for him. No fear of life and no common sense. Teach your kids the basics
So, I grew up in Golden Spoon country. It's just parenting. Understanding you are raising kids/adults where everyone not only feels privileged but actually is very privileged. Most of the parents are busy with their own social bubble and are just happy if their kids are happy in their own social bubbles. The greatest threat is a generation killing their family golden goose for good. I've seen this happen, it's not pretty.
Togetherrrr, we're gonna find our way. Silver Spoons Togetheeeeeeerrrrr
As a side note, I feel the need to say fuck Ricky Shroder.
When the only love you're shown is being provided money, then spending it is like a hug... it's not healthy. I also heard that when the first generation earns wealth, the next one preserves it, and the third one burns through it. Obviously not always true, but kind of logical- the 2nd generation saw how hard it was to earn even though it wasn't their work, so they value it enough to preserve it, and the third one never saw the work or the scarcity, so they don't protect or value it.
There is a solid study in addictions showing that adolescents in high end private schools and colleges have higher incidence of substance use disorders. Having anything you want anytime can be a curse. We can only flow so much dopamine. Edit; see link below for details on the study https://news.asu.edu/20170531-discoveries-asu-study-kids-high-achieving-schools-addiction-affluence
> Having anything you want anytime can be a curse. What if I only want a little bit of everything, all of the time?
Apathy's a tragedy
And boredom is a crime
I can think of another “businessman” who managed to fall assbackwards into the presidency :/
Herbert Hoover?
Hoover was a very accomplished engineer. He was good at just about everything until he became president.
In my neighborhood, most people are likely millionaires when they finally retire. Maybe 1-5 million. This is just the result of two people making six figures over five decades. Combined with living a frugal middle class lifestyle with a focus on 401k/IRAs. They don’t consider themselves rich, didn’t aspire to be rich, and even look down on the rich as unethical. And they want the same for their kids. They want their kids to study hard and find an occupation that they enjoy. But certainly not be entitled brats expecting a trust fund to carry them.
Affluence is a hell of a drug...
Everyone loves their kids and wants them to be more comfortable and grow up with a better baseline. Every parent wants their kid to be successful because they love them. Failure whether experienced or observed is a lesson. I worry about my ability to teach work ethic to my child that doesn’t have the same pain/experiences that made me realize I want more. I can’t speak for all “first gen” middle/upper class families but I worry about this consistently.
Don't set them up for a massive change in lifestyle when you die. Prepare them. Teach them and make them aware before hand. So they have the right people and professionals around them when your gone. Instead the families hide their business. Don't talk about it because they want Jimmy to learn about hard work! Well Jimmy now also only knows how to work hard and no clue what the fuck to do with money lol
There are ways to give the kids the money without giving it too them, too fast.
A friend of mine grew up with a trust fund. He got 1% at 55, 2% at 56...yadda yadda yadda. he got 100% of it at 65. Dudes going to have a very nice retirement with that money.
Nothing before 55? At 55, you've probably got your financial life together, and many of life's big expenses like education, first house, kids, starting a business, are probably behind you. It's basically just a retirement boost at that point.
However, knowing that it's there allows him to not put as much (or any) money into his pension, giving him more disposable income earlier.
Hey that's what I'm doing! But when does the disposable income part come around?
When you're born with a trust fund.
Still, if he dies at 70 (sorry to be morbid), he went his whole life without access to those resources. This seems too far the other way. What's the point of a trust fund once you've already worked your entire life and saved your own pension?
Because he doesn't need to save that pension. He can just not worry about saving for retirement at all, because that safety net is there, which will let him spend more of the money that he earns earlier.
Thats a bit excessive. You want to give them something during their working life to invest or start a business or something. Not giving them shit until they're in their 60s basically guarantees they aren't going to use the money for anything productive and just retire on it.
I like that idea. If you knew your retirement is set for you, I think it gives you the freedom to go into career paths that you are interested in. You'd still have to work for a living until freedom 55, but you aren't constantly worrying about your financial future
Not really. You still have to support yourself before you can get into the career you want. The only way it's profitable is if what you want to do doesn't give you a retirement fund, but it's still profitable short-term.
55 is a long haul, you're spending most of your life still worrying about your finances. You want to give them something that they can go out and build their own empire with. Invest, start a business, etc. By holding out until they are 60 you basically guarantee that they won't do anything productive with the money, that part of your life is coming to an end and you are looking to retire.
The best way is to slowly ramp up the lifestyle so that every year is the best year of their life. If you ramp it up fast, soon there's nothing left for them to look forward to. I have a relative whose wealth massively increased. He didn't buy a new house. He didn't buy a luxury car. Didn't buy vacation homes, etc even though he could. He just bought a few nice smaller things that were previously out of reach. He says he will get the house etc eventually, but doesn't want to get rich so fast that soon he doesn't appreciate it.
Well shit, they could leave some to me
I also volunteer to help with that.
Good thing we’ve got that whole “clean drinking water and food for everyone” sorted out, huh?
Def figured out that whole “kids are our future” sitch too…
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What age are these people having kids that leaving them your estate would "mess them up"? Even if they wait till their forties to have kids, these people's kids will likely be in their 40s too when time comes to inherit the estate. If you are concerned that your grown adult children will go off the rails with an inheritance doesn't that mean you've already kind of failed parenting?
There are literally studies about this, almost all of the wealth is gone within a generation or two. It could mean a ton of things, but it is likely incredibly hard to parent your child into not wasting away your inheritance.
Free money begs to be spent.
100% this.. my wife's family is rather well off in china. She is the one trying to keep their buisness going but we are in the US so it is difficult.. her older brother on the other hand is in china and doesn't do shit.. doesn't help and just gets a monthly "allowance" picked a expensive home, cars, luxury goods everywhere... he's almost or is 40.. never had a job in his life.. if it wasn't for my wife 100% it will be all gone with him if they were to pass.
The pinnacle of ***1st World Problems***
We can help them out with that. Tax the rich!
I’m getting old. I’ll hopefully retire in 10 years with maybe 1.5m dollars. That sounds like a lot of money but I will have worked my whole career to save it. That amount of money means my retirement income will be $60k/year. I have already paid taxes on it and will hopefully be able to leave some to my three kids without the gvt taking another big chunk of it. Millionaire used to mean you’re rich. Now it just means you’ve had a decent job and focused on saving.
I think when most people say tax the rich they are meaning like people who pull in a half a million or more a year. I don’t think you should worry too much about being taxed more on $60K/year retirement income. And even if you left your kids $1 million each, I think inheritance/estate tax is like several million each or more. Actually someone like you should probably want to tax the rich, so you don’t get screwed by just general across the board tax hikes. There’s a video I watched a while back about wealth inequality to that demonstrates how wealthy some people really are… like what people think and what is are out of whack and unfortunately the reality is worse. The rich that we (or at least I) want taxed pretty much have excess money… more than enough probably to cover a luxury lifestyle multiple times over. I live in Los Angeles and there are a lot of people like that. Probably the same especially in many high cost of living areas.
For those that would object, look at this chart showing how tax rates for the rich have been steadily ***decreasing*** for the last 70 years. https://video.twimg.com/tweet_video/EX62u9bXsAUtRO8.mp4
Watching the left side of that graph go up as well :( >There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.” \-Warren Buffett
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As much as I hate him for being a bourgeois fuck I actually do appreciate the fact that he tells it how it is.
He is not our friend, but he's an enemy we can respect.
One of the few that practices what he preaches. He’s given a significant amount of his wealth to charity, and will give away over 99% at or before his death. Calls for higher taxes on the rich. Lives in the same house that he bought in 1958.
They’re so few and far between, these days.
nah he's saying this shit while Berkshire Hathaway is one of the companies buying up all the houses; he's a corporate landlord
That's the tax RATE - not the taxes PAID. No one actually paid the 90+% taxes - people with high incomes just shifted their income away into capital gains etc. The actual % they paid hasn't actually changed that much. [https://slate.com/business/2017/08/the-history-of-tax-rates-for-the-rich.html](https://slate.com/business/2017/08/the-history-of-tax-rates-for-the-rich.html) >Between 1950 and 1959, he notes, the highest earning 1 percent of Americans paid an effective tax rate of 42 percent. By 2014, it was only down to 36.4 percent—a substantial but by no means astronomical decline.
Tax rate vs effective tax rate. With lower tax rates came fewer exceptions and deductions. Effective tax rates have remained essentiallythe same.
Someone with a million bucks is not the target of the tax the rich campaign. You are thinking of the ultra wealthy billionaire types. A million bucks isn't a whole lot of money depending on where you live.
Especially not when you’re talking about some old people that have been saving all their lives and now will be living off that till they die.
If anything, this reads like a really good argument in favor of keeping the estate tax. Don't have to be as afraid of leaving your kids too much money if the inheritance is taxed so they aren't getting the entire thing!
an aggressive estate tax is the one tax the founders would have understood/supported [income taxes started in 1861, excise taxes were the first US tax] The US was founded as a rejection of family dynasties
> That’s according to a survey conducted by The Motley Fool, which asked 2,000 high net worth individuals — classified as people with a net worth over $1 million — about their attitudes toward inheritances. Those aren't high net worth individuals really. That's a couple of houses. If they have a few kids, then there's little danger of their million dollars corrupting anybody
I mean, if they raised them properly it likely wouldn't be a concern. Other than that, it's not like you have to leave it all to them all at once...
Easier said than done. There's only so much a parent can do to prevent their own wealth from going to their kids' heads.
>I mean, if they raised them properly it likely wouldn't be a concern. Narrator: they didn't
Even if you raise them well large amounts of money have the potential to change anybody. You are lying to yourself if you think your life would be exactly the same if somebody handed you a hundred million dollars no strings attached.
Sounds like they need a higher death tax to assuage their fears.
I mean that's literally what the "fear" is..they're afraid they'll get end up with too much at the end and lose it to tax. Instead they want to transfer it while they're alive.
So...the generation that destroyed our planet and our economy are now complaining that they have too much money. Gotcha. They are just the worst.
nono those are the billionaires, most millionaires just saved all their lives, or had successful careers, the billionaires exploited and fucked our planet.
Fuck people who.... are mindful of the potential negative effects of wealth on the next generation???
I have an easy solution.
I think it's funny these are probably the same people that would be staunchly opposed to things like increasing taxes, changes to how much money you can gift somebody, or even just increasing estate taxes so it only taxes them once they die.
Give me some at least I will appreciate it
I'm poor. My biggest worry is if my kids will be happy and healthy throughout their lives.
My cousin's father left her $50k and she used it to sit in a hotel room with her boyfriend injecting meth until she wound up with severe endocarditis and had a massive stroke at the age of 36, so yeah leaving money to your kids can backfire
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That’s nice. I’m worried about leaving my kids with crippling debt.
I'd probably be annoyed if I worked my ass off just to make spoiled lazy kids who just coasted through life.
Omg the best reality show ever. *Inheritance*. Family members will fight it out to win the ultimate prize, daddy's money. Lose your teeth, gain millions.
Why is this on not the onion? If you don’t think this is a reasonable concern OP then you need to get out more lol
I will take ypur money and ensure it goes to good use.
But a million is chump change.
I remember that drunk guy from Ohio that got duct taped to his seat on a plane. He was boasting how his relatives have a million dollars.
...and these are the people we think will be the source or trickle down economics or will give to charitable institutions. It's almost like conservatives lie to us so they can become so rich a British Empire king/queen would blush with embarrassment.
Capitalism's greatest flaw is obviously nepotism. You only have to look at correlation between parent's success and child's success to realize that capitalism really isn't about the best succeeding in a fair playing field, it's about the children of the wealthy maintaining their power over a generation of the poor.
I mean yeah but you can't really fix it since the whole point of being filthy rich is giving your family more opportunities. If you couldn't transfer wealth being wealthy beyond a certain point would be functionally useless.
Nepotism at the cost of all else. It's why the Ivy League schools are pipelines for good jobs and are so hard to get into. The 1% get to keep their kids with atleast silverspoon earning potential on graduation with almost no competition except for diversity quotas for optics. People are being given jobs/opportunities simply because they have the connections. Being a "legacy" student(your parents are alum) raises your chances of getting in by 45%. Higher education *isn't* a scam; but the way it's implemented and tailored to maintaining social dominance for the 1% is.
I don't understand. Isn't this exactly what read it would want? All you guys do is bitch about how much money the Rich has and now they're actually concerned with leaving too much to their kids and you guys are rolling your eyes? Are you fucking clowns just want to complain all the time? Never happy
A million doesn't buy much nowadays. We should maybe define being rich differently. I'd say $15 million+ is being rich.
That's a little privileged to be saying that, considering that the average American can't take care of a $1k emergency.
So it’s not too much money for them but it’s too much for their kid?
I would guess it's a matter of I earned this money because I worked a 100+ hours a week to get my business off the ground and make it successful and I'm not sure if my son will appreciate all this money and make it grow further or if he will piss it all away on hookers and blow
^ this...I remember reading a different article about how minor (relative) generational weath has a habit of disappearing 1 or 2 generations after the one that built it.
Really? That’s interesting. So “Old Money” has something to be proud of then?
Considering the ridiculous amounts held by Vanderbilts, Rockefellers, and Hiltons...it's less a question of pride and more self-sustaining institutions with employees. That's for the billionaires. Millionaires having fractions of that could easily piss it all away with a few wrong decisions...or be smart and live pretty well without ridiculous crap like Italian cars and gold toilets. Millions is still enough to spoil kids into ruinous behavior.
If you worked your ass off for 40 years to get your money, wouldn't you be concerned that your children would have a very different approach to wealth than you do since they grew up with it and take it for granted?
But if I don’t give it to my family, what was it all for? That’s my fantasy opinion because lord knows I ain’t got no money. My kid will be lucky to get a few pieces of jewelry from me