Althouse: "It's gonna sound horrible for me to say money is meaningless..."

February 11, 2012

"It's gonna sound horrible for me to say money is meaningless..."

"... but everyone's like: 'What are you gonna do now, now that you have all this money and freedom?'... I did everything I wanted to when I had nothing. Everyone's like: 'Well, what are you gonna do now?' and I'm like, I'm still gonna do whatever I want except more people are just gonna bother me now."

32 comments:

Sorun said...: ...wishes he could buy his privacy back.

Obvious advice: Don't do media interviews and stay off of TV.; 2/11/12, 5:57 PM
Saint Croix said...: Give it away, clueless. Cripes, what a whiner.; 2/11/12, 5:58 PM
Synova said...: I don't think he was bad off before. The article is trying to make him sound like he was living in cardboard boxes, but he wasn't. He was well off enough to have teh freedom to chose stock as payment over $60K, and at no point since then did he need to sell the stock in order to live. That's not poor.; 2/11/12, 6:00 PM
edutcher said...: He made it the old-fashioned way - earned it, but an unappreciated part of the old-fashioned way is not all at once.

A lot of people aren't prepared to handle that kind of success.

Look at the big lottery winners; 2/11/12, 6:04 PM
Wince said...: Either he's a phony or this will not end well for him.

wv - "ablog"; 2/11/12, 6:06 PM
Ann Althouse said...: I think it's funny and he meant to be funny. And his style of funniness is bullshitting.; 2/11/12, 6:13 PM
traditionalguy said...: He's right.

Having more money than you need to live on, which is about $300,000 a year, is actually a responsibility that causes stress trying to do the right thing with it.

Actually having a faith in scripture that points out giving to help widows and orphans is the best thing.

Check out Truett Cathy's way of handling his Chik-fil-A wealth as a good answer.; 2/11/12, 6:17 PM
Petunia said...: He should just STFU. Talking to the media ain't gonna help and it's just going to tick people off that he's whining about getting $190 million.

And the murals are ugly.; 2/11/12, 6:21 PM
Malesch Morocco said...: Damn 1%er!; 2/11/12, 6:23 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: He may still sound horrible..

But now he can look very
good.. if he wants to.

btw.. has the Sartorialist been missing here lately.. or did fail to cath him?; 2/11/12, 6:40 PM
Lem Vibe Bandit said...: Wait a minute.. did I just say something racist?

I'll tell on myself.; 2/11/12, 6:44 PM
robinintn said...: The first words in the article:

"The 35-year-old, who considers himself homeless because he lives in casinos in hotels..."

As far as I know, casinos and hotels don't let people just stay for nothing. I have to think he's putting one (or more) over on the interviewer. Who doesn't seem to realize it.; 2/11/12, 6:45 PM
Ron said...: I'll help him...and suffer, Camille-like, in cash-swaddled silence.....cry, cry for the suffering commenters!!!; 2/11/12, 6:46 PM
Anonymous said...: So, $60,000 for those murals? The original article said he was offered "a few thousand dollars." Seems like quite a discrepancy.

It also changes the economic calculus of the original transaction. There are a lot of things I'd do in lieu of $2000 cash that I wouldn't necessarily do in lieu of $60,000 cash.; 2/11/12, 6:55 PM
Alex said...: I thought I was going to be a bigger man and not be envious. But.... fuck him and his $190 million PAPER money.; 2/11/12, 7:09 PM
rhhardin said...: Whether money is meaningless depends on your lifestyle.

You can easily have everything you want already, in which case all more money does for you is eliminate worry.

In the meantime the money is at work for somebody else - the key being that you're not consuming and so not a load on anybody else.

Presumably the money is buying heavy equipment for ditch diggers, raising their wages and their employers' earnings, by way of loans or investments. All those middlemen find the most productive use for it.

Giving the money away is very likely to be the worst thing to do with it. It goes to a less productive purpose.; 2/11/12, 7:17 PM
Anonymous said...: OT: Whitney Houston's death has just been announced on CNN.; 2/11/12, 7:19 PM
ricpic said...: You need 300K a year, tradguy? I mean gas and groceries are going through the roof but still...; 2/11/12, 8:01 PM
Patrick said...: I've heard it said that once you reach a level of financial security somewhat above subsistence (i.e. not worrying about keeping a roof of some sort over your head, worrying about missing meals, and having access to basic transportation), additional money doesn't really add too much to a person's level of happiness. Depending upon how you define "happiness," I can see that being true.

I've also heard about studies of people who win big lotteries, and they find that a large majority are quite unhappy and disappointed. I think that may also be true.

I'd like to take my chances, however.; 2/11/12, 8:32 PM
Alex said...: $300K/year is minimum? Tradguy has expensive NEEDS.; 2/11/12, 9:26 PM
bagoh20 said...: Anyone who thinks money is worthless is only thinking of themselves.

I have all the money I need and I still play the lottery in hope of being able to help a lot more people.

Guys like this just piss me off.; 2/11/12, 10:58 PM
jeff said...: "I did everything I wanted to when I had nothing. Everyone's like: 'Well, what are you gonna do now?' and I'm like, I'm still gonna do whatever I want except more people are just gonna bother me now."

fine. Send me a freaking check for the balance. Problem solved.; 2/11/12, 11:18 PM
bagoh20 said...: There are millions of people around the world who for lack of a few thousand dollars suffer incredible hardship with all kinds of medical, legal or financial misfortune. From kids with cleft palates or other reparable deformities or ailments, to villages who need a well dug. If you can't think of something to do with $190 million, you need a freaking smack upside your head and your wallet lifted simultaneously. Jesus Christ on a skateboard!; 2/11/12, 11:55 PM
traditionalguy said...: That is too high at the $300k example today. But it was every bit needed during the child raising days days of private school tuition, cars and insurance.

And eating out at expensive restaurants where client/friends like to go several, times a week, is 10% of that.

Also, when you make that much income, then your kids qualify for NO free aid at colleges, much less the basic 1-12 tuition at Woodward Academy, which was higher than college tuition.

The tax rates were not 15% on that earned income either...more like38% State and Federal.; 2/12/12, 12:04 AM
Palladian said...: When, like me, you struggle to barely stay afloat every month, money isn't meaningless, it means everything.

I've never understood this "money can't buy happiness" nonsense. I grew up in a financially struggling family. I have struggled to survive most of my life. During the relatively brief period of my life that I had abundant financial reserves, I was very happy, because I didn't worry about surviving. When the money was gone, that security was gone, and happiness does not come as easily now that I'm one paycheck away from homelessness.

This man received a tremendous gift and should be eternally thankful for it. Me, I feel lucky and grateful if I can get $50 dollars for a print.; 2/12/12, 1:09 AM
Rosalyn C. said...: Artists are different. To be any good as an artist you have to devote yourself body and soul to learning your craft and working at producing something which offers absolutely no hope, let alone guarantee, of financial reward. What matters ultimately is whether you feel good about your work and your level of creativity. Money is a tool for survival, not a measure of self worth. The fact that he was successful enough to be able to travel to different locations, presumably to do his large scale murals, and stay at hotels and casinos means he had money. And he had money he could afford to gamble away.

Francis Bacon, a great and highly successful artist, used to paint in the AM and take off in the afternoon and spend the rest of the day drinking in his favorite pub and hanging out with friends. If money was his objective he would have worked more hours -- making as much money as possible clearly was not his main goal.; 2/12/12, 2:09 AM
Jim in St Louis said...: R. Chatt said...
....Money is a tool for survival, not a measure of self worth...

I'm not arguing since I agree with everything you wrote, but to the libertarians here, (and the conservatives who lean libertarian)
Money is the measure of value for everything. All that Adam Smith stuff. Why not apply that standard to the human being in question as well?; 2/12/12, 3:15 AM
Sydney said...: What he really seems upset about is the attention, not the money. I wouldn't like it if the media were trumpeting my personal financial situation all over the world either. After the publicity comes the begging.; 2/12/12, 7:33 AM
Brian Brown said...: The 35-year-old, who considers himself homeless because he lives in casinos in hotels

Does this mean he washes up in the bathroom and sleeps in the corner or something?

Weird.; 2/12/12, 8:24 AM
Firehand said...: When you've spent time wondering how you're going to pay a doctor bill on top of the regular bills, or get something for the kids because there's nothing left, money damn well DOES mean something.

Now, if you hit the point that you think having piles of cash, of itself, will make you happy, you're either deluded or one of those few people who really will be happy with that. But having enough that, as noted, you don't have to worry about making it through the month, having enough set aside that a car problem or something won't break you... yeah, that means something.; 2/12/12, 9:19 AM
NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...: Palladian said...

I've never understood this "money can't buy happiness" nonsense. I grew up in a financially struggling family. I have struggled to survive most of my life. During the relatively brief period of my life that I had abundant financial reserves, I was very happy, because I didn't worry about surviving. When the money was gone, that security was gone, and happiness does not come as easily now that I'm one paycheck away from homelessness.

You had no choice, I'm betting Choe did/does and his disdain of money is a little more than poverty tourism.; 2/12/12, 10:01 AM
glenn said...: Actually stories like this should be a cautionary tale for the taxandspendit crowd. My wife and I bot retired a few years back, our income declined by two thirds but guess what? She's still a great cook, we still live in the same (small) house. We still travel, we still eat in the same resturants. The only thing that changed is we no longer pay a pile of taxes. Enough people figure this out and winning elections won't mean a thing.; 2/12/12, 11:22 AM