Dynastic Billionaire Wealth Under Siege!

May 30, 2015 1:00pm by

This has to be the strangest headline relative to the content I have seen in a very long time:

 


Source: Wealth Management

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  1. Whammer commented on May 30

    Wow, I guess so! But then again — “There’s no doubt that taxes loom large in the mind of billionaires,” says Michael Spellacy, Global Wealth Leader at PwC.”

    Those darn taxes looming large again!!! Who will think of the great-great-grandchildren of today’s hedge fund managers?????

    The other remark about the “gilded age ending in tears” somehow didn’t exactly tug at my heartstrings too much….

  2. VennData commented on May 30

    “…there are many reasons why wealth does not survive multiple generations, perhaps the most fundamental one is that wealth dilutes over time…”

    A siege from within. A Fifth Column. Brats.

  3. bear_in_mind commented on May 30

    That has to be one of the worst pieces of writing I’ve encountered since Atlas Shrugged, and every bit as distorted. Is that a new publication being funded by John Mauldin?

    Look, when one’s argument is predicated on “self-made” success, you know you’ve entered the realm of fiction. Even more of a red flag is basing that self-made predicate on self-reported data! Wait, you mean people might INFLATE their own agency and importance? Impossible, my dear Watson.

    Equally lazy is the conclusion the author arrived at which asserts generational wealth necessarily dilutes, and does so at a formulaic assumption of approximately “=SUM(wealth/2)*generation”. I know this is an imprecise formula, but you get my drift.

  4. RW commented on May 30

    Perhaps the headline is the content; i.e., hoi palloi are trying to steal what plutocrats have rightfully earned?

    But, agreed, the chart appears to have nothing to do with much of anything including the headline. Can’t think of any argument it might support that wouldn’t be hopelessly vulgar — assuming wealth equivalent to virtue or an innate right for example — or largely spurious; e.g., turning a billion dollar inheritance into two billion dollars is less a matter of ‘entrepreneurship’ than it is avoiding stupid mistakes and compounding.

    To turn $100 into $110 is work. To turn $100 million into $110 million is inevitable. –Edgar Bronfman, Sr.

  5. willid3 commented on May 30

    so maybe we dont want to become England, where the wealthy have all the money?

    • constantnormal commented on May 30

      Are you sure it’s not too late for that?

  6. b_thunder commented on May 30

    Driven by “entrepreneurial wealth creation?” Really? Then look at the graph and explain what happened 1998-2001, and 2007-2010? Did the entrepreneurs stopped entrepreneuring? Or it’s just that “the market” repriced the values of “eyeballs”, “page clicks”, “likes” etc?
    The whole thing more than anything is driven by cheap money and the liquidity from central banks. Paraphrasing Buffett, eventually we will see how many of entrepreneurs have been swimming naked. I think the “entrepreneurs” will be affected a lot more severely than the conservatively invested and stashed away multi-generational wealth.

  7. constantnormal commented on May 30

    Very rarely is it the case that subsequent generations build fortunes the way that the first generation did.

    There is a decent argument that inherited wealth saps the will and creativity of the recipients, which may be one of the things that Buffett and Gates are pitching to their fellow billionaires to get them to sign up for giving away the farm when they dies, leaving relatively modest amounts for their heirs.

    When you get up in the morning to receive a check from a financial machine that some ancestor has built, there is not a lot that can motivate one to take risks and work hard to expand the family franchise … safer to just cash the checks and live VERY nice lives.

  8. catman commented on May 30

    Billionaires to the battlements?

    • rd commented on May 30

      They hire mercenaries for that. Usually lawyers, CPAs, and lobbyists but occasionally guys with actual guns.

  9. alexanderdelarge commented on May 31

    Bear_in_mind – Atlas Shrugged has sold 8 million plus copies since inception.
    How many copies has your book(s) sold ?
    AD

    • ADMIN commented on May 31

      Hitler’s Mein Kampf sold 10 million copies in Germany alone prior to 1946; Karl Marx Das Kapital sold even more.

      Whats your point?

    • intlacct commented on May 31

      Bandwagon logical fallacy proffered by alexanderdelarge. Tsk tsk.

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