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Bloomberg should retitle this article "The Ugly Side of Greed". But then we never would have read it. ;) The people portrayed here are on the extreme end of gr
by MR4D 10y ago
Bloomberg should retitle this article "The Ugly Side of Greed". But then we never would have read it. ;)
The people portrayed here are on the extreme end of greed & materialism.
I once worked with an almost-billionaire family. If you ran into them in a restaurant, you would never know. They were out of the mold of Sam Walton. Ok, they drove Cadillacs, but Cadillacs with well over 100,000 miles on them. The rest of their vehicles were Chevy Tahoes or Ford pickups.
Further, there are tons of millionaires who saved their money over their life. They don't act like this, and they probably live right near you, but you wouldn't notice because they don't go overboard on their materialism.
On the poorer end of the spectrum, there are tons of "credit-card millionaires" - as I call people who make $100-300,000 per year but have no real savings and spend all their money on "glamorous" crap that fills up their homes. To me, the article is about people just like this, but who have secured more money - their behavior is identical.
- SyneRyder 10y ago> I once worked with an almost-billionaire family. If you ran into them in a restaurant, you would never know. One of my favorite books is The Billionaire Who Wasn't, about Chuck Feeney of DFS (Duty-Free Shoppers), and it keeps referencing his cheap Casio watch: “Since my earliest days I have been frugal, but I am a frugal person in that I hate waste, at any level,” says Feeney, who always wears off-the-peg clothes, a cheap plastic watch, and reading glasses of the type sold in book-stores. “If I can get a watch for $15 that keeps perfect time, what am I doing messing around with a Rolex?” https://www.amazon.com/Billionaire-Who-Wasnt-Secretly-Fortune/dp/1610393341/ https://www.amazon.com/Billionaire-Who-Wasnt-Secretly-Fortun... [Incidentally, it means the $200 Pebble watch I wear & love is 13x more expensive/extravagant than that of a billionaire. Gives an interesting perspective.]
- jjeaff 10y agoIt actually makes more sense for the already successful and wealthy to not be interested in outward appearance. They have no one to impress and nothing to gain by showing off. Your up and coming business man, however, may have some logical reasons to signal wealth. Either for networking purposes or convincing potential customers or partners that you are the type of successful person they might want to work with, conspicuous consumption can have its merits.