Rich Kids Who Want to Give Away Their Money

I'll believe it when they give away enough that they have to get real jobs and work for a living. Maybe that's overly snarky, but to me something rings hollow about people sitting in a multi-million dollar loft in Manhattan pontificating about pronouns and privilege. Like, the privilege isn't all that bad, is it? I mean it's not like you're trying to give it up. You aren't renting a run-down office in Toledo so you can maximize the amount you're giving away. You aren't really looking to inconvenience yourself in any way, just trying to assuage some guilt.

I guess it's better than spending it all on cocaine and hookers. Would it be worse to invest the money in a way that employs people fairly even if makes a profit for yourself? I don't think so.

I feel like Bill Gates's idea of giving away all your money so children won't die is the only rational and sane thing to do.

I cannot imagine having billions of dollars and being like, "Nah, forget the children. I need three more yachts." I genuinely don't get it.

At first I think "oh yeah, really noble...give away your birthright money you didn't earn".

But really if it's that instead of becoming a social media influencer, starting a ridiculous furniture or clothing line...I think I'm in favor of this.

The only way you’d be willing to get rid of all your money is if you’d never experienced being poor.

This is really great. It would be even better if the money was distributed earlier to the workers that made their parents and grandparents excessively wealthy

I have plenty of solid ideas if anyone wishes to direct their excess resources my way. :)

“Zacchaeus, come down from that tree immediately. I must stay at your house today.”

"I wish it wasn’t something that I had to do voluntarily."

I think this is the crux of a major philosophical difference. Someone made a bunch of money, and decided to put trust in you to do what you thought best with it (give it away, invest it, whatever). The sentiment expressed by this individual in the article is a delegation of that trust - they would rather have someone else (presumably, the government) decide for them the best way to use that money.

At the same time, it's not like anyone in this article is really giving it all away. Last week, Catholics celebrated the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi. He would be a useful role model for anyone who feels like they have too much privilege of how to actually give away all that you have (and still not have birthday vacations and lunch at Le Pain Quotidien).

I'm not holding my breath. I would rather they spend it excessively, living a life of complete hedonism. This is perhaps the most efficient way of distributing their wealth throughout society.

These are trust fund kids.

Stuff like this always makes me laugh, mostly out of the insanity of it. Most of these types have never had to file bankruptcy, or worry about paying the month past due bill(s), or how they're going to eat or feed their children. They have no idea what people need. When they want to play philanthropist to 'save the world' I just can't help but laugh.

You want to make a real difference? Find some people, give them a monthly stipend, tell them it'll last x years and they should use it to improve their situation.

Say you have 1 million dollars you want to do something with:

- Find 15 people

- Give each one $500 a month for a decade as a stipend/annuity.

- Take the other 100k and give four $5,000 scholarships a year for 5 years.

You'll radically change 20~ lives profoundly. For me $500 a month would be another week and change of take home pay every month, over the course of a decade it would be 35-45% of a house here around Indy.

Hell, I only need 700k to retire with a 3% safe withdrawal rate if I do not have kids (34 and not married so doubt that's happening). You could take that 1 million and give 10 people 100k and say "congrats, I just put you a decade closer to retirement!" and the impact it would have would be drastic for those individuals, and if you're worried about them blowing it on stupid stuff, just spread it out, 1k a month for 8 years and change.

Have a financial planner create a document that gives them suggestions on how to invest it into retirement vehicles or educational programs, or just point them at the /r/personalfinance sidebar and ask them to write you an update each month on what's going on in their life. Feel good for the better part of a decade.

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I don't have a college degree, EVERYONE wants a college degree. I had a multi-millionaire, that at the time was running not one but TWO companies tell me he was sorry that I was running into a wall for not having a degree and that he was sorry it has become a "de facto union card". I begged, and begged, and even suggested things I could do for either company or some other endeavor of his and "I'm real busy right now" was all I got.

Last summer this individual that flew me clear across the country and put me up in a hotel for 2 days, to talk to me face to face for less than 1 hour - while they worked on their laptop the entire time. I spent all of my Sunday, Monday and Tuesday finally getting home at 8pm, having arrived at the airport here 8am Sunday, so they could talk to me for maybe 40 minutes face to face... the money they wasted on that was about 2 weeks of my take home pay.

I imagine they didn't think anything of it. "Hey I'm busy, I'd like to meet this person, I'll have them journey across the country so we can have a meeting since they aren't local" probably didn't think anything of it. but to me I thought they were finally going to give me a 'trial' job and wanted to do it face to face. Nope. Just wanted to meet me. I was devastated. For a week or so leading up to getting there I was like "This is it, this is it!!!" and then just "hi, nice to finally meet you"...

People with this sort of wealth, simply have no concept of reality for 'normal' people.

At last, an article that fully explores the aspirations of trust fund kids! I had no idea they are so virtuous!

They can give away their money, as long as they don’t force others to do the same, which is typical of socialists.

I am excited for the era of millineal politicians. I think we'll possibly get more non-greedy than greedy ones.

That's great. Rich people often give their money away, I'm sure it helps them feel good about themselves.

If these kids are so inclined, more power to them. I hope they pick great causes.