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> the thing is, most middle or above folks with an once of sophistication can sense the trust fund kid a mile away

My experience has been the same as the author's. My college classmates (at Swarthmore) and I were repeatedly surprised when we learned that our friends were trust fund kids. I remember junior year we found out that one kid was super wealthy because he bought a last-minute cross-country plane ticket, first class. Even his roommates, who had lived with him for years, had no clue he was wealthy.

Another time, I learned that a girl was wealthy because she bought an iPod ($400 in 2004!) on a whim. I'd previously thought she was upper-middle class because she drove a Honda CR-V and didn't have any other trappings of wealth.

Both of those examples are put-it-on-a-card-and-worry-about-it-later territory for even normal, middle-class people. Super-wealthy is buying a yacht on a whim.

First class round-trip tickets across the US? Thats a thousand bucks. And $400 for a music player? Those are not normal expenditures for middle-class 20-year-olds (in 2007, before MP3 players were ubiquitous and inexpensive).

Regardless, I’m not saying these are only ever purchased by the ultra-wealthy. I’m saying this was the first sign anyone had that these kids had any money whatsoever. It turned out both have trust funds and are extraordinarily wealthy.

That particular example resonated with me. I'm not super-rich, far from it, I certainly wasn't even earning much in that time-frame. And I did a similar thing because it was the last ticket left and I had to get to a funeral. There must have been other clues that lead to the conclusion that they were trust fund kids!

The last ticket left was a first class ticket?

Yes. It was about $2000. But what was I going to do, just not be there? Took me a bit of work to pay it off but I would have regretted not going so much more.

I think this is a very common perception issue. I am at a university with enormous wealth concentration, but wealth is opaque and everyone orientates upwards.

For students without means or parents buying them toys, someone buying an iPhone on a whim because their old broke is rich. Having any money to spend on non-essentials is rich.

Students who can buy an iPhone on a whim because it's just a random expense for their parents would never think of themselves as wealthy - that's the people who go on first class trips and wear designer clothes without thinking twice.

The people who wear overpriced clothes and go on expensive trips don't feel rich either, they don't even have a building at the university in their family name, and no multi-generational wealth.

I briefly went out with the daughter of an Asian billionaire tycoon, the kind with lots of buildings named after. She never mentioned it or brought it up and I wouldn't even have known until it suddenly clicked about her name and the name of some buildings. I never asked her who she orientated upwards to, though. Some richer tycoon's family?

I'm always reminded of my college friend who went to an international private school in Asia.

Her classmates were the children of billionaires and sultans. Everyone in the school would know because you could just Google them and find paparazzi pictures of them with the parents.

She said for the most part, they did act like normal teens. Just more aloof because the second they left the school, they had a contingent of people, like bodyguards and chauffeurs. Perhaps people like that change more when they are in college.

> the situation makes your point about "they have to conceal it to be treated as human" ring totally false

They can smell it sure, but their reaction is proportional to some product of distance between their socioeconomic positions and how much shame the other party signals. Pretending to be poor is demonstrating shame of one's higher position. In your case, this seems to have been enough to placate their less privileged peers.

But it really occurs to me, the rich aren't acting poor to fool the poor. The rich don't care about the poor and don't encounter them that much. The rich act "poor" to fool themselves or just flatter themselves, to tell themselves they face challenges or just because their idea of the poor is romantic. Back in college X, lots of folks dressed vaguely dock workers, with lots of plaid and such, but no one trying to actually seem a dock worker. It was just a starting off point for a pose.

No, the rich are ashamed but aren't ashamed to you, they're ashamed to themselves.

Calloquially this is known as humility.

A thing being known secretly and a thing being known openly are two very different scenarios. That they can't completely conceal their wealth and that they know that, is not a reason to believe they're trying to conceal their wealth.