Archive for the ‘rich’ Tag
These days when I talk about “rich” people it is considerably different than when I was in my twenties. Back then it was unbelievable that someone could become a millionaire. It was difficult to believe that amount of money could be earned by anyone except for the mega-rich. Today it’s almost unbelievable. If you own a large home in a nice neighborhood, have two cars, and good paying job, your net worth is probably more than a million. I couldn’t even imagine trying to guess how many millionaires are playing pro sports. It boggles the mind. As outrageous as that is, the uber rich remain in a separate class all their own. To them a millionaire is seen as a low rent bum. Let me show you what I mean.
- William Randolph Hearst once purchased a pair of Cellini saltshakers for the low, low price of $500,000.
- Henry Ford once stated to Hearst after he had been complaining about never seeming to have any money: “That’s a mistake,” replied Ford. “A man ought to have $500 million or so in cash for a rainy day.”
- Once when a reporter asked John Paul Getty if he was really worth over $1 billion, “Yes, I suppose it’s true, but $1 billion doesn’t go as far as it used to.”
- A young Nelson Rockefeller was sailing his toy boat in a pond when another boy asked, “Where’s your yacht? “Whaddaya think I am, “he replied,” a Vanderbilt?”
- When an elderly John D Rockefeller, Sr, learned that members of his family intended to give him an electric cart to ride around his estate, he told them in no uncertain terms, “I rather have the money.”
- Howard Hughs started out as a very presentable young playboy with the world at his feet. He ended up as a starving, paranoid recluse trapped in a room watching old movies.
- The oil billionaire H. L. Hunt wrote and published a book in which he proposed that citizens voting power be proportionate to the amount of taxes they paid.
- H. Ross Perot had a coral reef dynamited at his oceanfront home in Bermuda because it interfered with his boat slip.
- Armand Hammer once bought an important manuscript written by Leonardo da Vinci and renamed it the Codex Hammer.
- William K Vanderbilt once stated, “I am the richest man in the world. I am worth $194 million. I would not walk across the street to make $1 million.”
They live in a different world in a galaxy far, far away. They barely have the ability or the desire to stoop so low as to talk to someone considered a “blue collar” worker.
MONEY BREEDS ARROGANCE
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Unfortunately, the word “Greed” is used to describe our country by many foreigners and also from many of our own citizens. I can’t say that I disagree because in too many cases it’s absolutely true. “Money is the root of all evil” immediately comes to mind when I hear that word. It’s not something we should be proud of but “It is what it is.” I thought today I would examine the statements made by an assortment of well-off persons who are well enough known to be quoted in publications. For those of you out there who are not rich let me inform you.
- “People will swim through shit if you put a few bob in it.” Peter Sellers
- “Time is money.” Ben Franklin
- “Money isn’t everything as long as you have enough.” Malcolm Forbes
- “It isn’t enough for you to love money – it’s also necessary that money should love you”. Baron James D Rothschild
- “If I had my life to live over again, I’d be a $30 a week librarian.” Andrew Carnegie
🤑🤑🤑
- “In some ways, a millionaire just can’t win. If he spends too freely, he is criticized for being extravagant and ostentatious. If, on the other hand, he lives quietly and thriftily, the same people who would have criticized him for being profligate will call him a miser.” J. Paul Getty
- “There is always the question. You wonder if people like you for you or the inevitable disturbing question: Are they after something?” Mary Leah Johnson (heir to the Johnson & Johnson fortune)
- “The best reason to read about the very rich, of course, is to be reassured that money cannot buy happiness and indeed, often seems to buy trouble.” Maureen Dowd
- “As a cousin of mine once said about money, money is always there but the pockets change; it is not in the same pockets after a change, and that is all there is to say about money.” Gertrude Stein
- “Money talks. The more money, the louder it talks.” Arnold Rothstein
One final thought, a quote from my late down-to-earth father concerning money. It’s as true today as it was fifty years ago when I first heard him say it:
“MONEY TALKS AND BULLSHIT WALKS!”
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Today I’d like to discuss a topic that politicians have used against us for years. The old saying “the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer” has been used by the liberal left for decades to influence the vote at every election. The strategy of “Divide and Conquer” remains valid after centuries of misuse around the world. Since I’m neither rich nor poor, I will offer a few tidbits to keep some of those arguments alive.
It’s also true that the “rich” are constantly criticized by almost everyone. Their every move is watched and analyzed, and every problem of the society is blamed on them. Is it unfair? To a certain extent it is. I also believe that there’s plenty of blame to spread around that encompasses every special interest group you can think of. Of course, the rich are their own worst enemy at times and these statements will provide proof of that . . .
- Martha Stewart had this to say during an interview. “I have a beautiful weekend house in the Hamptons, but it is not, as it turns out, my summer dream house. It doesn’t have the view of the ocean that I absolutely want. It doesn’t have the rustic wood floors that I absolutely crave. It doesn’t have a little dock to which I can tie my little rowboat. And it doesn’t have the shallow water of a quiet lagoon where I can pick my plants.”
- When a reporter asked him to confirm the speculation that he was worth over $1 billion, J. Paul Getty thought for a moment and replied, “Yes, I suppose it’s true, but one billion dollars doesn’t go as far as it used to.”
- When an elderly John D. Rockefeller, Sr., learned that members of his family intended to give him an electric cart to aid him in getting around his estate, he told them, ” If you don’t mind, I’d rather have the money.”
- Newport spinster Edith Wetmore, who died in 1966, never entered a grocery store until she was over eighty years old, when a friend took her to an A & P. After shopping the aisles, she wheeled her cart to a checkout counter. But Miss Wetmore, whose income was $6000 a day, did not have a cent in her purse so her friend was forced to pay the bill.
What these samples have shown is that when you’ve reached a certain level of wealth your entire outlook on everything changes. I’m not making excuses for the rich, but they see things from quite a different perspective when it comes to living their life. I know if someone dropped a couple of million dollars into my bank account, I’d take a whole different approach to money and how to use it.
Will this ridiculous bickering continue, probably? Apparently, no one has the solution or if they do, they’re not sharing it with anyone. This battle will continue to the end of time when only two people are left. One will have a penny and the other will not. You can be sure that the guy with the penny will almost certainly lord it over the other.
SOMETIMES THE HUMAN RACE JUST SUCKS
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I rolled out of bed today at about 3:45 AM and the house was dead silent. I poured myself a cup of coffee, crawled back into bed, and watched one of my favorite movies. The movie is “Shooter” and stars Donnie Wahlberg. It’s been one of my favorite movies for quite a long time but today something struck me, and I thought I’d talk about it a bit. In one of the nastier scenes in the movie Wahlberg is trapped on a mountain top and chatting with a corrupt United States Senator. The senator was eloquent in his smartass remarks and stated, “There are no Republicans or Democrats, just the “Have’s” and the “Have Not’s”. And that’s a pretty profound statement, like it or not, and it’s true to a certain point. Certain political entities in this country love nothing better than separating those two groups whenever possible to garner votes.
I’ve been known to take shots at the wealthier class of people in this country only because I felt it was necessary. I recently discovered a book titled The Rich Are Different. I’m a firm believer that statement is true but I’m not sure if it’s a good ‘different’ or a ‘bad different’. Here are a few pearls of wisdom from that book and a few of our richer, upper-class citizens.
- When the Duke of Marlborough could no longer afford his valet, who had, among other things, always put the paste on the Duke’s toothbrush, the nobleman’s shock was palpable. “What’s the matter with my tooth brush?” He exclaimed. “The damn thing won’t foam anymore!”
- “Until the age of twelve I sincerely believed that everybody had a house on Fifth Avenue, a villa in Newport and a steam driven, oceangoing yacht.” Cornelius Vanderbilt Junior
- “I have had no real gratification or enjoyment of any sort more than my neighbor on the next block who is worth only a half million.” William K. Vanderbilt
- “Prior to the Reagan era, the newly rich aped the old rich. But that isn’t true any longer. Donald Trump is making no effort to behave like Eleanor Roosevelt as far as I can see.” Fran Leibowitz
- “With money in your pocket you are wise, you are handsome, and you sing well, too.” Yiddish Proverb
- “No rich man is ugly.” Zsa Zsa Gabor
- During the 1887 Saratoga racing season, William Collins Whitney lost $385,000 at the gambling tables while waiting for his wife to finish dressing.
- “We don’t pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes.” Leona Helmsley
- “What’s the use of money if you have to earn it?” George Bernard Shaw
HOW COULD ANYONE THINK THE RICH AREN’T JUST LIKE US
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