Diary. I had to run about an hour after I posted it and, well it seems to kind of gotten "popular." I went back and read a lot of the comments today and folks had a lot of questions. I will try and address some of those.
1. Why would I post something like that here? Tell people these things?
Well one I trust people here. Two I really, really want to highlight what I see as the most important problem in this country. A massive, massive divide between those that have so much and those that don't have hardly anything. And of course we've all seen the charts that this divide is growing at a rapid rate.
While all this is happening those in power, those elected are proposing "solutions" to our nation's problems that require the single mother working two jobs or the recent college grad with tens of thousands in student loans (and can't find a job) to sacrifice.
I find this unacceptable in every way possible! A lot of us with financial means are NOT creating jobs (we're sitting on our money) and we wouldn't even notice it if you raised our taxes. These two things are just facts. There is no way around it.
So that is the main reason I wrote what I did. I see so many heartbreaking Diaries here about those in the 99%. I rarely if ever see somebody that is in my situation say what it is like over here. I wanted to do that.
Now I will try to address a number of the other questions that were asked below the fold.
2. How rich are you?
I am not really rich in the "traditional" sense of the word. My parents are so kind of via the trickle down effect I am. But I do have a ton of benefits most don't have. I have a job. I made a good yearly salary. But things like insurance and other items that most people pay themselves, well those things are taken care of for me. My house is paid for. My car is paid for. So outside of basic monthly expenses, I don't have much hanging over my head. I also have access to a wonderful CPA, lawyer, and investment guy (that does matter BTW). None of these things alone are "huge" but added all together they make a big difference.
3. What do you do for a living?
More than anything, and a lot of people asked this in the comments, I can do what I want for a living. I no longer troll away at a job I dislike working 60, 70, even 80 hours a week. I can take on projects that will be "fun" where I can charge less than I would because my expenses to live or lower than most. If a client is a pain I can fire them. In the grand scheme of things this is what I love the most about my situation.
In advertising speak I was a "suit" for about 20 years. The phrase "suit" isn't a positive phrase. I was the project manager. The guy that dealt with the clients. I didn't write a headline or copy. I didn't design anything. I was "Debbie Downer." I was the person that said we can't do that. We don't have the budget for that. That design is "cool" but to "hip" for our client. Most days it seemed I only brought bad news.
For those that know something about this industry, I was the guy that said "the client wants their logo bigger" :)!
I never got a chance to be "creative" cause that wasn't my job. I now do web sites. I get to be creative. It is a nice change.
4. Why don't I start giving away your money now?
Well it isn't mine to give away. Although my trust pays a lot of bills, I don't have tens of thousands of dollars just lying around. But I do tend to give away my time and professional skills. More than a few people here know what I mean by this. I've done work for them, for free, that I normally would have charged tens of thousands of dollars for. At some level I think this is better than just giving away money, because it has helped those individuals sell their products (i.e., make a living) and spread their cause(s) to a wider audience. Or at least that is what I tell myself :).
5. How can your parents, which seem like "cool" people be Republicans?
I really don't know to be honest. I just don't and believe me I ask. My parents are also not "low info" voters, which makes it even more strange. They read two local papers daily. They get Time and Newsweek. They watch CNN for a few hours a day. You ask them a question about current affairs and I am willing to bet they know more than about 95% of the population.
On social issues they are moderate, if not almost liberal.
My gut is they are trapped in a time warp where they view their party as it was in the 60s and 70s. Where Republicans were sane. They had ideas. Maybe ideas I wouldn't agree with, but honestly real ideas that were not bat shit crazy. I think as people like Bob Dole retire and a new crop of Republicans come into power, they are having a much harder time being Republicans.
But I honestly don't know.
6. Would you really give most of this money away? We all think we would, but would we really do it?
I'd keep some, just so I could have income based off of it. But yes I would give most of it away. I have ZERO doubt about that. Before I had access to this money I made a ton of money working at ad agencies. I bought fast cars. Expensive toys. I thought they would bring me joy. They didn't. I look at all the things I own and wonder how much is enough?
I said in my initial Diary that when asked by my parents and investment team what I'd do. I really did say I'd sell everything I own, head to REI and the Apple store, buy a few things and travel the world. I still plan to do that.
Now I will end with this. I started my first Diary on this topic thinking I would only talk about what I think is the myth that the rich create jobs, therefore you can't tax them. Clearly that was something I touched on, but I also went in another direction.
We only know what we know and I've worked 20+ years in the advertising industry (tech companies as my focus). Sure there are a lot of rich folks that work in technology that do create a lot of jobs. I mean I think most folks here don't know that the founder of Twitter, was also the founder of Blogger, which he sold to Google and used that money to found a company that failed than Twitter.
Folks in that space often start a lot of companies and create a lot of jobs.
But taxing that guy, on the tens or hundreds of millions he has made won't stop him from creating more jobs.
And then you have people like myself or my dad. We're more "doers." Not big idea people. We might be smart. We might be successful. But me at 42 and him at 67, if we would have had that billion dollar idea ..... well I think we would have already had it.
So when I have access to all this money am I going to start a business that will most likely fail or will I give it to somebody to invest where I have almost no chance, cause of how much I have, not to make money.
I think I would take the second option and I bet most people would do the same thing.