mo money, mo problems?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the research says that people who earn $85k+ are happier than those who earn less than $85k, but happiness generally plateaus after that inflection point.

I think that people with sudden windfalls or influxes of cash are more likely to have more problems, but people with generally ascents into wealth probably have no real problems worth complaining about.

I'm not sure how this came to be part of the conventional wisdom - probably far too many journalists regurgitating one person's misunderstanding of the study - but the research does not say this, at all. The research indicates that emotional well-being didn't increase past $75k (in 2010), but life satisfaction (read: happiness) absolutely does keep increasing past $75k.

This is the latest study: https://www.pnas.org/content/118/4/e2016976118

"Here, over one million real-time reports of experienced well-being from a large US sample show evidence that experienced well-being rises linearly with log income, with an equally steep slope above $80,000 as below it. This suggests that higher incomes may still have potential to improve people’s day-to-day well-being, rather than having already reached a plateau for many people in wealthy countries."

Key insight - it is log-linear to 500K. (More is outside dataset/sample)

so

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Raising humble, hard working and appreciative kids

yup...have this problem. Oftentimes I question if we did something wrong raising our kids, who BTY are doing well...hard working, etc. However, I find their
selfish and entitled attitudes highly disturbing.

What would you change?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:*shrug*. As a trust fund beneficiary who knows lots of other TF kids, this has not been my experience.

Most TF people I know either are high earners or are not working to focus on raising their kids. I make $350,000 and the only thing I will do differently than any other earner is retire sooner. I will be done at 53.

I agree with this. Most I know with significant family money spend a lot of time and energy trying to prove that they are just as good at their jobs/life as someone with no money.

+1. In fact, for some it is quite a sensitive topic. I don’t think you can generalize. I know hardworking, successful trust fund kids, and I know some that are a total waste. However, I know about an equal number of people from poor or modest backgrounds in each category.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Raising humble, hard working and appreciative kids

yup...have this problem. Oftentimes I question if we did something wrong raising our kids, who BTY are doing well...hard working, etc. However, I find their
selfish and entitled attitudes highly disturbing.

What would you change?

ZERO luxuries....move into a less affluent area, smaller, older home, share more, basic cars, make then work PT during HS, have them chip in with chrores, etc. etc.
As a parent you want to put your kids in the best environment to succeed with resources, but that's not always a good thing IMO.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:*shrug*. As a trust fund beneficiary who knows lots of other TF kids, this has not been my experience.

Most TF people I know either are high earners or are not working to focus on raising their kids. I make $350,000 and the only thing I will do differently than any other earner is retire sooner. I will be done at 53.

I agree with this. Most I know with significant family money spend a lot of time and energy trying to prove that they are just as good at their jobs/life as someone with no money.

+1. In fact, for some it is quite a sensitive topic. I don’t think you can generalize. I know hardworking, successful trust fund kids, and I know some that are a total waste. However, I know about an equal number of people from poor or modest backgrounds in each category.

+2. All the trust funders I know are pretty much like everyone else I know: went to prestigious private schools, Ivy or similar and hold jobs in medicine, law or finance. They work hard too. The only difference is that most retire at 55 or so and have no problem switching from private to public sector.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sting (of the band The Police) said he plans to give most of his money away and not saddle his children with "an albatross around the neck" which is what a huge sum of money can be.

You have failed as a parent, if you've raised children that cannot deal with the level of wealth you've managed to accumulate in your life. Human progress is precisely preparing our children to be able to take what we've accomplished and build on top of that. We would all be wearing loincloths and living in straw hats if we didn't want to saddle our children with the albatross of woven clothes and brick houses. Just shows you that many very successful people are terrible parents and have failed at one of the most important things that give their life meaning.

Well then, a lot of wealthy people fail as parents. And I think it's because getting too much, too soon can hurt a kid. It's not normal or natural, and plenty of trust-fund kids end up messed up because they don't really have to work at anything. There's giving your kids a good start, and then giving them something that's too much for most people to handle.

PP here. Well, sure, a person doesn't have to be a good parent in order to be a successful money maker. Think about it. Being successful/wealthy means surrounding yourself with other capable people, and you don't do that by training people to gain new strengths - you look for and hire people who already have those strengths and further develop them. You get rid of the people who don't have the strengths you are looking for. You don't have those same choices when it comes to your kids: they are who they are and being a good parent means identifying those strengths and developing them to maximizing their value in society. This is also why a middle class parent may be able to raise high-earning kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:*shrug*. As a trust fund beneficiary who knows lots of other TF kids, this has not been my experience.

Most TF people I know either are high earners or are not working to focus on raising their kids. I make $350,000 and the only thing I will do differently than any other earner is retire sooner. I will be done at 53.

I agree with this. Most I know with significant family money spend a lot of time and energy trying to prove that they are just as good at their jobs/life as someone with no money.

+1. In fact, for some it is quite a sensitive topic. I don’t think you can generalize. I know hardworking, successful trust fund kids, and I know some that are a total waste. However, I know about an equal number of people from poor or modest backgrounds in each category.

+2. All the trust funders I know are pretty much like everyone else I know: went to prestigious private schools, Ivy or similar and hold jobs in medicine, law or finance. They work hard too. The only difference is that most retire at 55 or so and have no problem switching from private to public sector.

^ reread that post, and think about it for a while, would you?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sting (of the band The Police) said he plans to give most of his money away and not saddle his children with "an albatross around the neck" which is what a huge sum of money can be.

You have failed as a parent, if you've raised children that cannot deal with the level of wealth you've managed to accumulate in your life. Human progress is precisely preparing our children to be able to take what we've accomplished and build on top of that. We would all be wearing loincloths and living in straw hats if we didn't want to saddle our children with the albatross of woven clothes and brick houses. Just shows you that many very successful people are terrible parents and have failed at one of the most important things that give their life meaning.

Well then, a lot of wealthy people fail as parents. And I think it's because getting too much, too soon can hurt a kid. It's not normal or natural, and plenty of trust-fund kids end up messed up because they don't really have to work at anything. There's giving your kids a good start, and then giving them something that's too much for most people to handle.

I hope I don't out myself here.
I know a LOT of people who have inherited massive amounts of familial wealth. Usually, at age 40 or 45, the real money comes in through the trusts. Each and every one of them is now in the 45-50 age range - and lost/purposeless, flight, meandering. No job. Men golf all day, women shop and redecorate the house. They always knew the money was coming. And while they had jobs in their 30s, they never really worked that hard. Never needed to have real grit or ambition. Why? Because they knew they had 30, 60 or 100+ million coming their way. Yes, they are very philanthropic people. But their lives are just so boring. And they are boring. They don't really have a purpose.

While a career shouldn't be your purpose, it does help guide/focus/help you define your identity in those important 30-40 age ranges. The jobs these folks had - it was just a holding pattern....

While depressing, this resonates with me. I fit this mold and others I know do, too (maybe just delete a 0, but still). If I could go back in time, I'd tell my parents to keep their cards closer until I was older! I certainly plan to do so with my offspring.

What a completely irrational, unproductive, and immature way of approaching a problem. Do you also hide the family car from your kids and force them to walk/bike everywhere? Do they camp out in a tent lest you corrupt them with the luxuries of modern homes? Everything you find to be commonplace in your life was considered wild and fanciful things at one time in the history of human civilization. To the extent that your child has no issue handling them is because they are exposed to them since birth. People become prepared for something by being repeatedly interacting with it, not by being kept away from it. It does take a special type of person to build on top of the achievements of their parents. In fact, the progress of human civilization proves that it is only a minority of parents who fail to adequately prepare their kids. Don't be one of those parents by thinking that your kids are somehow inferior to your capabilities and should be shielded from the pressures of having abundant resources.

[Anonymous]

^^^ TYPO: It does *NOT* take a special type of person to build on top of the achievement of their parents.

[Anonymous]

We think too highly of ourselves, that "how we raise them" matters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We think too highly of ourselves, that "how we raise them" matters.

Speak for yourself.

[Anonymous]

This forum is full of striver phonies who post the same corny 80s stereotypes over and over. Everyone rich is unmotivated, all the rich kids in private school are drug addicts, blah blah blah.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This forum is full of striver phonies who post the same corny 80s stereotypes over and over. Everyone rich is unmotivated, all the rich kids in private school are drug addicts, blah blah blah.

Yup.
Stupid false dichotomies.
It makes people feel better to think these things, but that’s all, they aren’t true.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This forum is full of striver phonies who post the same corny 80s stereotypes over and over. Everyone rich is unmotivated, all the rich kids in private school are drug addicts, blah blah blah.

Yup.
Stupid false dichotomies.
It makes people feel better to think these things, but that’s all, they aren’t true.

Reading these always makes me wonder if these posters have ever met a rich person before

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This forum is full of striver phonies who post the same corny 80s stereotypes over and over. Everyone rich is unmotivated, all the rich kids in private school are drug addicts, blah blah blah.

Yup.
Stupid false dichotomies.
It makes people feel better to think these things, but that’s all, they aren’t true.

Reading these always makes me wonder if these posters have ever met a rich person before

No. They assume rich people look like the monopoly guy. Or the bad guy from Caddyshack.