I can’t speak for actual Western billionaires but I had the chance to speak to a few Arab billionaires (member of the ruling families) and a few Western multi-millionaires (as in hundreds of millions).
In terms of the western ones: They don’t have a fear for their money,they have enough hidden accounts and real estate around the world that they will never run dry… They fear for the same thing: Their lifes. Basically in two ways: Partly they fear that some random leftist or a terrorist group like the Italian Brigate Rose or the German RAF will simply shoot them in the head or kidnap them so they can make a point. (Which is quite strange as none of the people I spoke with was even out of elementary school when these groups operated - but they were really afraid of them,not of some common criminal)
The other thing is that they all were really really afraid of ending like the Romanovs - that there would be some kind of political turn and all of a sudden the “masses” stand in front of their estate with pitchforks and torches and hang them. (That’s literally a quote from one of them) Funny enough: None of them were afraid of the right wing - even though their families sometimes literally once lost almost everything to the fascists, etc.
Personally that explains a lot of the current state of the world. Money will always gravitate towards right wing politics as the right wing is always fixed on a strong leadership structure - which makes it easy to identify who you need to “befriend” or bribe if you want to keep your money. And people who have seen political turmoil in a role where they felt unable to control their own social standing anymore also have a tendency to gravitate towards these structures. Et voilà you have a armchairs psychologists explanation for Elmo. Well,if you add in a LOT of ketamine.
Not worded like that. A lot of billionaires, probably all of them, are evil narcissistic fuckheads. The narcissism does the heavy lifting. They can’t imagine themselves being poor, and they certainly can’t imagine themselves being the kind of poor person that they despise.
I don’t think they even know what being poor means or feels or whatever
Well how could they, no one’s done them the privilege of opressing them and extracting value.
Billionnaires are hoarders. They don’t need the shit they hoard but they can’t help themselves trying to get more shit.
The problem is, billionnaires hoard money at everybody else’s expense.
No. Every single one of them could pull $100,000,000 out of their personal money circulation and just store it in various stupidly safe places that barely return the rate of inflation. For all I know, maybe they all do that.
They have so much money that it’d be almost impossible to lose it all, but if they managed to do it somehow, then they could pull out that safe nest egg and still have more money than they could ever need in a lifetime. There’s almost zero chance that they’ll ever be poor.
I suspect it’s related to insurance in the case of loss by the bank. I think most have upper limits to how much they’ll reimburse if they’re robbed or something so they’ll store it in multiple accounts.
I don’t think anyone would just have an exorbitant amount of money in one spot.
Correct, I wasn’t saying that they’d put it in one spot.
Billionaires are almost always created by starting with substantial familial wealth, taking large financial risks, and getting lucky. They then generally misattribute this luck to personal excellence, causing them to underestimate future risks.
On the other hand, they also induce institutions to change in ways that really do insulate them as a class from the consequences of risk. Both of these factors would tend to reduce their fear of losing their wealth and status.
Im not sure. I could see it but its sorta stupid at that level.
I’m guessing most do not, because it takes a lot of work to spend a billion dollars. I speculate they are competitive with each other and want to be the richest of the rich. And/or they have dreams about colonizing Mars or whatever.
I think one blind spot many of them have is: you do NOT want to be a wealthy person living in a poor country.
Oh no I disagree, I would rather be the richest person in a poor country than be the poorest person in a rich country. But I grew up in a low-ish, not nearly the lowest, income country so maybe I am just used to it.
Their definition of poor is likely not ours. We might see someone rich beyond words while they see themselves as ruined. A great example of this is the ending of Succession.
But no. They will never reach our definition of poor.
Look at Rudy Giuliani. He’s still rich, he’s just a whiny little bitch.
If you sold your soul to the Devil to obtain something, wouldn’t you be afraid of losing that thing?
I hope so. I hope it is a waking nightmare for them and haunts them mercilessly.
Only in the sense that they worry about the working class rising up and making their wealth worthless. That is, if they get to stick around to see.
I just saw a post on LinkedIn from a low-rent c-suite that lost their cars and home. Other c-suites were reaching out to help them like I’ve never seen.
Billionaires won’t ever be poor because their peers will help them.
Is it possible for someone to identify the bubble they live in so practically?
IMO, Money equates to power and authority. They aren’t wrong in thinking that, but have you ever heard the saying “absolute power corrupts absolutely” or “Evil checked grows. Evil tolerated poisons the whole system”?
