The Downsides Of Being A Billionaire

Welcome back to Chuck for Free Radio. Uh in today's episode, we're going to be talking about billionaires. Now, they get a lot of attention in the media, a lot of discussion around their lavish lifestyles, the private jets, uh, the yachts down in St. Bart's. Uh it looks like a lot of fun, looks like it's a glamorous existence. Uh, but in this episode, we're gonna discuss whether uh the reality lives up to the glamour, and whether there's maybe more of a of a kind of creation in our mind than what what the truth of the situation is. Uh now, it is an interesting time right now as regards to wealth, extreme wealth. Uh, we know we see a lot of people uh upset with the you know disparities in in both this country and around the world. Um so it's it's uh I think it's it's a it's a topic that's that's out there in a lot of people's minds, and we want to maybe bring some some different perspectives on on this topic. Uh so so first off, uh I will say I've had a lot of experience with billionaires during my time in finance. I met a lot of them, had a lot of personal experience with them, perhaps not super deep experiences, but yeah, you you get to be around them. I have a lot of opinions on this topic. So I want to start. Ray, man, what's what's your thought on the billionaire class?

I think uh, I mean, obviously I don't have like lots of money, right? So like it's easy for me to be like, you know, I I think they should give back some of their wealth. I mean, that's probably like the only thing that I would say. Like, I think when do you say enough is enough? Yeah. In terms of wealth. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, and I I guess like if you like disperse some of that money, that money off to like other US citizens, then I guess everybody's on the same playing field. And I don't think they don't want that. Yeah.

Well, yeah, you know, and it's also um what what what happens is that that you say, you know what, I have X amount of money now. Yeah, and if I make another investment, I'll have like three X more money.

Yeah.

And then I can do even more, right? And then you get to the 3X, and then you say, you know what? If I try a little harder, I'll get to 30X. And then I can do even more.

You can already do a lot with 1 billion. Yes, I agree. You can do anything you want in the world with 1 billion. You can do anything in the world you want for with probably with 500 million.

Yeah, well, not everything in the world, but you could do a lot.

What do you mean?

You can buy islands with with 500 million. Yeah, but maybe it's not a glamorous island, you know. I I'm just saying, listen, I I've I've been around. It's like it just it just keeps going. Like it, you know, like I think I I understand your perspective. I'm just saying that once you're in that seat, you say, you know, I'm worth a billion. That's not that special. I want to be worth 10. And I want to own a sports team. Yeah, you know, like it does tend to keep going.

Clear, like if I had 10 billion, I would want to own a sports team too. You would? Yes. I really would. I really would. I really would want to own a sports team.

Yeah, we're we're gonna come back to that topic in a little bit. So so first, uh just just some stats here. Uh so uh we have um multiple sources, including uh Forbes magazine and uh the investment bank UBS. Uh so they estimate uh Ray, how many billionaires on a global basis do you think there are?

150?

No, there's 3,000 on a global basis. And I and I actually I'm I'm I'm Did it tell you how many in the United States? Uh I don't know the number off the top of my head. I think it's uh probably maybe like a third of it. Okay. Um and and I will say I think that number is way too low. I think the real number is more like three or four times that. Because I think there's a lot of people globally. Yeah, I think there's a lot of people with a lot of money that we don't know about, and it's kind of kept off the books. Okay, I can see that.

Um so you think there's one in every country?

Probably not every country, but I think there's you know, just think about like how many billionaires in the criminal underworld are there, right? Who are not gonna be reporting their number in Forbes, right?

People be thinking that the underworld is like not real.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

The black market. Yeah. So I think I think there's a lot more ultra-wealthy people out there than than the numbers would suggest on a stated basis.

I mean, but like underworld is not it the reason why they probably haven't came to light because their stuff is probably not legit.

Yeah, yeah. You can't you can't run it through the banking system. Yeah. You know, not easily. But um, yeah. Anyways, the the the point I I want to make is whatever the stated numbers are out there, I think the real number is a lot, lot higher than that. Okay. You know, we talk about this glamorization of the billionaire lifestyle, but um what we want to talk about now is how the life of a billionaire, while it may look radically different than yours, it's really just a matter of degrees. You know, like a lot of the basic functions of a human being are not that different, whether you're worth zero or whether you're worth a billion dollars.

I mean, yeah, but no, no, yeah, I yeah, I want I want your thoughts on that statement. I mean, they probably just I don't know, worked harder. Maybe I don't know. Yeah, yeah.

I'm I'm not saying yeah, I think you you know, in a lot of cases, sometimes it's inherited, but most people have to work with sometimes those daddies or mommy's money. Yeah, but most people have to work really hard to get their money.

Okay, but but let's let's like Mark Cuban, didn't he sell a company like a couple times?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He started, it was back in the in the late 90s. He started broadcast.com and then sold it to Yahoo. And then turned that money into the Mavericks and but he's like a he's like a regular billionaire to me.

Like, like he's not like an like a super asshole. Like he might have asshole tendencies, but like he doesn't display them that much on camera. Yeah, yeah. I he has pretty good like points of views on life and stuff, like he's not like totally like out the wazoo, you know what I mean? Like, yeah, I don't know. I think he said some off the off the reservation. I feel like when you're eventually you're gonna slip up, like you know what I mean, like eventually, but in terms of like I I think he's a pretty decent human being, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like if we're doing like a 100 scale, I think he has like a good 30% decency inside of him. Yeah, yeah, I think that's fair. Yeah, a lot of people don't even have five. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, like Elon, non explaining.

Yeah, you said it, man. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um okay, but but let's look at this, right? Okay, seven to eight hours a day. Every human being, what are they doing? Sleeping. Sleeping. Right. Now, maybe the billionaire's got a better bed, but I mean, you're talking about a third of the day where basically a billionaire and a pauper are essentially equalized.

Okay. Right.

So already like a third of the day, it's like basically you know, agree or disagree.

I mean, yeah, but I feel like when you when you're that rich, you don't really like they don't sleep that well. Yes, yeah. No, this is actually an interesting point. They they usually say that though. Yeah, yeah. They usually say like they maybe three, four hours.

Right, right, because they're so worried about the business empires and making more, right? So this this is an interesting point where being a billionaire, that eight hours of sleep might actually be worse than somebody who's worthless. Yeah. Monetarily worthless, you know. So so that's it's a it's an interesting point. You know, heavy, heavy lies the crown, right? So you you got all these mental burdens that you got to deal with. So now you're eight hours a day, which is supposed to be rest. Maybe as a billionaire, it's actually harder to get rest in that eight hours than it is for somebody who's just leading a normal life. Yeah. Interesting questions. Right. So it's possible that that a third of their day is actually significantly worse than a regular person's.

I can see that.

No, we don't know, it's an individual basis, right? Okay. So next up, two to three hours a day spent. Working out? No, eating meals.

Okay.

Yeah. So so let's talk about that, right? Two to three hours. What are you talking about? You you what you eat faster than that?

Or you take two hours eating?

Total? Three meals?

I mean, I only eat like two meals. I know I'm fat, but I only eat two meals.

Okay. Let's say at least an hour and a half then. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Now, there's obviously there's a big industry industry out there around, you know, gourmet foods, luxury foods.

With them, they probably have a private chef.

Private chef, yeah.

So like they're not there for the whole cooking process.

Right.

They're there, they just pull up and they eat. You know what I mean? They're probably like maybe 30 minutes. Yeah. Yeah. If they're eating at home.

So listen, you know, maybe they're having a great experience. Um, you know, when I when I was working in finance, I ate at a lot of nice restaurants.

Yeah.

Again, this is this is personal opinion. For me, I the vast majority of those meals, if you gave me that meal against a really, really good slice of pizza, I would take the pizza.

Yeah.

You know, like it's just a more satisfying experience. Now, you you have this mental image in your head. Oh, I've I'm I'm, you know, this is a$300, you know, sushi meal, or it's like a thousand dollar meal, whatever it is. Is the experience actually that great, or is it just because you've built it up in your head? You know what I mean?

Like from fine, like the fine dining aspect?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Oh, I think I mean I I think that's trash, but that's just me. Like those micro plates, yeah. Like, nah, you're not gonna give me that buddy. Like, right. I'd rather if I'm gonna eat that, I'd rather just stay at home and eat a salad. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I mean, like, it's just basically the same thing. Yeah, but like if I had the money, would I spend 500 to a thousand on a steak? Maybe. Yeah, maybe, yeah, yeah. But it gotta make me like it gotta like wow me or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I never got the whole stigma with those little tiny small, like, you know, they look amazing, but like, dude, they're like that big. What are we doing with that?

You you're you're supposed to savor every bite, right? So when you when you know each bite's costing you 50 bucks or 100 bucks, maybe you take it more seriously. How'd you feel while while doing those? That's not worth it. Yeah, you know. I I I would rather have the slice of pizza save the money and just give it to some random person on the street, or they'll they'll do something useful with it. For me, but there's other people out there where you know they'd have a very different opinion, and that's that's fine. But yeah, I just don't need it, you know.

Like when you were did you ever have to do like work, work, uh like taking a client out and fancy them or whatever?

Not not that often, but yeah, there were other interactions where it wasn't necessarily that relationship.

But yeah, there's entertainment and did you ever get any like substance from any of them? From the meal itself? No, from the actual like oh the interactions or yeah, from the person.

Yeah, yeah. I think if you know if you're in a relaxed setting and you have a nice conversation, I think it's it can be productive.

I'll be like, all right, bro. Strip down your whole like, you know what I mean? Like take the match in this out, like let's get let's get to the to the real you. Yeah.

That that doesn't happen. No, it doesn't? No, no. You're you're focused on you know business topics. Yeah, it's not we're not talking about the nature of reality at a business. That's not fun. I want to know people's hearts and intentions. That's that's that's generally low on the list of priorities in those those settings.

They just care about who, like, what are you gonna do with this amount of money to make and go with this, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

That sucks. Yeah. Um, you know, and then then we look at the other aspects of of life that are common, you know, whether you're a billionaire or whether you're just working a normal job, you know, you've got family issues, you know, you got to worry about your kids. You know, well, are they developing? And in some ways, I think it's harder as a billionaire to to let your kids develop because there's a lot of opportunity for them to grow up and have a sense of entitlement or be spoiled. A lot easier to develop a drug problem when your parents are billionaires.

You get the um I'm not worthy complex, maybe.

Yes. Yeah, yeah.

I'm not worthy of their time. Yeah. You know?

Yeah. And so um, you know, listen, that I mean, maybe the upshot is if you're really rich, you can go, you know, cut a check to a university and make sure your kid gets into the school that you want them to get into. But you know, it's it it may not on average, you know. Like a lot of these problems that that we face as regular people become magnified if you're ultra wealthy.

Yeah. You know. Like that's fire to think about, right? If I had the money, like I could just cut a check, right? To my kid always wanted to go to like UCLA. Right. Right. But like, what's the fun in that? You know what I mean? Like the whole the whole fun, though I mean, not not fun, right? But like the whole sense of accomplishment. Yeah, is to you get on to you getting there on your own and you going the whole full five years or whatever, yeah, and you graduating with a degree and you doing it on your own or whatever. Right. I don't know.

Yeah. Yeah. And and I think you know, there's there's an interesting question around, you know, does does a lot of wealth give you freedom? Yeah. You you think it does. Yeah.

Yeah.

I think it can in theory. In practice, I think it a lot of times it doesn't. Because because what happens is you start building up an empire.

Yeah. Right.

It's not one house, it's six houses. Okay, it's not uh you know, a little boat, it's yachts, okay, it's private jets. Okay, now to manage all that, you need tax tax advisors, accountants, business advisors, probably mental health advisor. You know. So now all of a sudden, you know your existence is kind of the opposite of freedom. Right now, now you're tied down by all this stuff, and you have a whole army of people you you need in order to maintain the empire, right? So is that person free? Now maybe they they think they are. I I would argue that they're not.

I mean, in that aspect, then no, but like how I view freedom and be like, and this is so like again, I'm a very morbid person, right? You ever watch Paradise? It's a show. No, no, no, no. The show is a premise about like if the world ended, only 60,000 people and they built a whole society underneath like a mountain or something. Yeah. It was like only the rich and wealthy can afford that, right? Right. So, like, all the regular people just gonna die up here, right? Right? But I mean when I think about that, I'd be like, all those people that have that money can probably go down there. Or whatever, they can go in space or whatever. Yeah. All us regular people are probably gonna die. Yeah. That's how that's how I look at freedom. In terms of like, you know, the money aspect, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. They could pay to do whatever they want, basically. Right. You know what I mean? They could pay an officer off, you know, pay a uh a lawsuit off. Yeah. That's gonna like detriment, like really like mess up their character or business or something like that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, so so yeah, so I'm so I'm so you you your net views, you you think a billionaire does have more freedom. Yeah. Yeah. I'm I'm not so sure. I think I think they could have more freedom. I think in practice they don't. No. Because you can just, I mean, you you know, you want to go on vacation, what what do you need, right? You just go.

I mean, yeah. Right? They don't really gotta save, they can just go, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah. But they're always gonna be worrying about the business.

Yes, yeah, yeah. I think that's that, and that'll be the point. You know, it's like are you?

We're talking about two different freedoms here.

Yeah.

I think yours is more like uh day-to-day aspect, and mine's is like worldly aspect if something ever happened catastrophically to the world.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I hear you, but you know, for those for those people to live in their in their paradise underground, they need, you know, regular folk to do the jobs that they don't know how to do. True.

I think there was only the I think there was only like 500 that made it down there. A couple bartenders down there.

Yeah, yeah. Uh-huh. So now we we want to come back to this this question around uh the sports, the sports team, you know, which seems to be like the number one prize for somebody who's a billionaire these days is to buy a major sports franchise. So this is my question to you. Is it more enjoyable to be the owner of a sports team or to be a fan?

I'd probably want to be the owner. Right. That's just me. Right? So I think most owners probably never played sports. Yeah. Right? So they're probably looking at things like they're not looking at the player like looking to see if he has the tools to help their organization. They're just trying to throw money, right? Yeah. We've I mean, I've played sports. I feel like I have a good eye. I'm like, oh, that person is like pretty decent. Like, I think they'd be a good fit for this team, right? But that's just me. But uh, I mean, yeah. Yeah. I I mean, I I'd want, I'd want to be an owner. I'd be I'd be a crooked owner too. Well, what do you mean? Steve Ballmer, I know what you're doing. I'd be paying Kawhi off the books too. I would have paid LeBron, though. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But that's just me. Yeah.

Yeah, and see, I I'm gonna take the opposite side. I would rather be a fan. Yeah. And I'll tell you why. It's because, first of all, statistically, okay, you're the owner of the team.

Okay.

Out outside of very rare circumstances, you know, you may be the owner and you may die before your team ever wins the championship.

Yeah, I mean, 100%. So at least the team's in my name, though. That passes down. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's hopefully hopefully my uncle, somebody, somebody, my cousins, somebody take it over and win.

No, I I I understand. Uh, you know, but I guess my point would be that if if if I'm a fan and this the the team is having a crummy season, I just gotta turn off the TV.

Right?

If I'm the owner, I gotta deal with that. Every single day I gotta wake up and have people hating me, you know, because I'm a I'm a crummy owner and the team stinks. You know, like you you don't get to just exit. Like you gotta sit there and deal with the problem, you know? Yeah, like it's it becomes like it's a job. Yeah, you know, now it's a glamorous job in theory, but all right.

I'll take I'll I'll I'll I'll I'll broaden it, right? I'd rather be an owner of a baseball team because I feel like I would have my hands on more with baseball, right? Right. I feel like I would I would be in it more, yeah. With football and basketball, yeah, I played those, but like I feel like I'll be delegating more in those two sports. Yeah, you know what I mean? I feel like baseball, like I love it down to the T, so like I would be in triple A and A, and I'd probably get rid of the general manager too. I probably I'd I'd I'd fuck a team up. I wouldn't, I would uh yeah, I mean I I don't know, that would just be me. At first I'd try to see if I could fix it on my own. Right. And then if I can't, then I'd bring other people in. Right. But that's that's just me. Yeah, yeah.

So yeah, I I just want to talk about one particular owner. Um, you know, the owner of the Carolina Panthers, David Tepper, yeah, who's uh you know an amazing stock investor, has made a ton of, I mean, he's worth, you know, whatever, 20, 20, 30 billion dollars. Brilliant guy. I I I just think it's an interesting case where he has the kind of money where he could do anything he wanted, okay, and he bought the Carolina Panthers, and he's in his 60s. Okay, now the team's gotten a little bit better, but there's a realistic chance that he is going to pass away before they ever win a Super Bowl, a Super Bowl, right? Now it's what I find in such a strange circumstance where you know the guy's worth you know 20 or 30 billion dollars, he owns an NFL team. Like you'd think that he'd be enjoying life, right? Yeah, you you think so?

Or I would hope so.

I would hope so too, right? But last season for the Panthers, which was a bad season, they got better this year, but they were they were terrible in 2024. Okay, at the end of the season, uh there was an incident at in the Panther Stadium where David Tepper got into an argument with the fan and threw a beer at a fan in the stands, right?

I would too. Fans be disrespectful, bro.

Yeah, yeah, it's true, right? Yeah, but but it's an interesting question, right? You're worth you know ungodly amounts of money. You have this professional team which is supposed to be bringing you happiness, and yet here you are in the stands throwing. A beer at some random person.

But you gotta look at it from this aspect, right? You come into my building and you saying crazy things to me. Right. Come on, man. That's like that's like that's like me going into your house and like throwing water at you every single day.

Okay, I agreed. Okay, but but my question is, is is the money and owning the sports team making him happy?

Oh, but I mean, losing doesn't make anybody happy, though. I mean, he's he's always gonna have the money though, but like I'm I'm pretty sure they don't want to lose. Right, right. And I'm just saying I think that just I think all that the losing people there probably wasn't just only that one fan. Yeah, probably thousands of fans telling you you suck as a as a as a as a owner, you should sell the team. Right. And you know, he just slipped up. Right, right.

But I'm just saying, okay, that this guy, he's worth so much money, you think that he could actually just enjoy himself in his later years. Uh right. And now he's like, he's gotta like field a winning team before he dies. And this is like there's no leisure now. He's just gonna like obsess over this team until the day he dies.

Yeah, I mean, I feel like if if I get to that point where I'm throwing stuff at fans, I'm probably I'm probably gonna sell the team.

Right.

Yeah. It's time for me to go. It's time for me to go and enjoy retirement, enjoy the money. Yeah. I don't know. Go to St. Bart's. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

So, anyways, it's it's an interesting question because it feels like now every billionaire, this is like the new status symbol. It's not enough to be a billionaire, you gotta own a major sports team, you know. And it is it, is it as I don't know. I I wouldn't want the hassle personally. You wouldn't want to fix the Pittsburgh Steelers? No, let somebody else do it, and I'll have them. Yeah, there's no shortage of other people interested, so they they can have at it, man.

You don't want to fix the the black and gold.

No, no, no, no. There's yeah, there's there's plenty of people out there with opinions on how to fix it. I I don't have an opinion, so no.

Yeah. I know one team I'd fix the Red Sox. Get everybody out of here.

So we're we're gonna turn to uh w one more of the uh the kind of the assumed status symbols of being a billionaire, which is the private jet. Now, listen, if we've if people are out there flying commercial, you know it's a hassle to go through the airport to go through security and all that stuff, right? And it looks really awesome to be on a private jet, have the place to yourself and bring your friends and you know, do whatever, right? But there's there's an interesting aspect to owning a private jet, which is that flying on a private jet is significantly more dangerous than flying commercial. Um, and depending on which which source you're using for the analysis and how you cut the numbers, the the chance of an accident on a private jet is anywhere from three to five times higher than it is on commercial. Is it because they're smaller? Um, smaller, less training for the pilots, less maintenance routines, you know. So again, this is something where it looks super glamorous, like, oh, they've got their own private jet. Now, there's a lot of people out there who were scared getting on a plane. And what if you tell them, hey, this private jet, your your odds of having an accident are three to five times higher than flying on a commercial airline.

I already get nervous on a plane. I could never do a Friday. Right. Unless it's Drake's now, he has like a real plane. Right, right. So like I'd I'd trust his over them small jets.

I I don't know if this the statistics are all that different, but but but at least then you'd have the experience of being on the plane with Drake, which maybe is enough to offset the the accident.

I'm just saying he has like a real plane, you know. I mean like a real Boeing, whatever that plane is. Like it's not like a jet jet. Yeah, yeah.

But like, yeah, I'd I'd I'd so anyways, anyone out there who you know wishes they had a private jet, it's just something to think about. Three to five times higher likelihood of an accident in that private jet. So you're better out driving. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So I didn't know that though. That was a good that was a good one. Yeah.

Again, these are things people don't think about.

You're paying like 35, 40k to probably get on a jet too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a lot of money. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

So something to think about. Now, maybe may I think maybe the most difficult aspect of being a billionaire, I think it's something that is not discussed very often. Okay, but to me, it'd be the one of the most horrific aspects of it, which is that when you're ultra wealthy and people know that you're ultra wealthy, okay, the problem is that you can't really trust people anymore, you know, because you don't know whether they're interested in you because of you or because of the money.

They don't know their intentions, yeah, exactly.

Yeah. So, you know, your friends, relatives, you know, even the person you, you know, you date or you marry, you know, it's like now you need a prenup agreement, right? Yeah. Well, not a lot of them will, right? I mean, really, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, apparent apparently uh uh uh Brooklyn Beckham had to sign a prenup.

Isn't a prenup saying that like you leave with what you brung?

They'll they'll predefine all like what happens after if the marriage ends, right? But but again, think about this, right? It's like you say, you know, in in most marriage ceremonies, there's something about you know have and hold, you know, through through life, right? Even before you say all that, you have an agreement in place just in case it doesn't work out.

I mean, I'd want that, yeah. Right, right. I'd want that too. You're not taking half of what I built.

Right, right, right. Yeah. So now now it's like, okay, the the sacred thing, you want to find a life partner.

Yeah.

The the fear and paranoia bleeds into it.

I I wouldn't be able to do that. Right. Honestly, if I was a billionaire, I'd probably be single. Unless the person knew you from before. Yeah. You know what I mean? Then you you seen the you seen the glow up. Yeah. But like all those people, they're not in it for like actual well, who knows actually, but like I would I would have constant paranoia.

Yeah, and I think there's uh I think maybe to me, one of the more disturbing aspects of all this is that I think there's a point at which if you're really wealthy, the people around you want you dead. I can see that. You know, because they they want you dead and out of the way so that they can do smarter things with the money than you are.

They inherit. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So and they got a bunch of yes men.

Yeah.

They don't really have people that say no to them. Right. So right.

And so now, okay, we we you know, it's like let's say you know you you want to start moving towards the truth with the capital T, right? And you and you're surrounded by people who just tell you what you want to hear. So again, it looks really glamorous from another perspective. It's actually a pretty hellish existence, right? Like you have to be worried all the time unless you're a very, very balanced person, which most people generally you don't become a billionaire by being a balanced person. Yeah, you know, like it's it's not a joke. Yeah, you know, it can really, really mess you up, you know. And I think this is the aspect that people don't really talk about.

Well, in sports, though, right? Say if I was a billionaire in sports, like LeBron. No, no, no, no, no. I'll say I was an owner, right? Okay, you're to get rid of those yes men, right? Yeah, you know what I would do? Like, say I owned the Cleveland Cavaliers in 20 and 2005. To get rid of all the yes men, I'd be like, all right, guys, my first point of business, I'm trading LeBron James. And anybody in here that said yes, I'm removing them as my removing them as my friend. Because there's no way in hell you think I should trade LeBron James. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a great idea. All right, get out. Yeah, there you go. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, but now you gotta worry about are you surrounded by a bunch of yes men? Is that a pleasant experience?

Oh no, yeah, no, see how it worked out for Kanye. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Nobody ever tells him. No, yeah, yeah. I mean, that's life for them.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

So I feel like if you had a billion, you you would have given that away already. If I did, or yeah, I don't know.

You know, I I think I mean I would like to think so, but I think it's I've again I've seen it. It's so easy to talk yourself into it.

Yeah.

Oh, I could give a billion dollars away, or I can make some investments, and if I'm patient in 10 years' time, I'll have$10 billion to give away. And then I can give a lot more.

I mean, but yeah, I feel like you do it for the greater good.

Maybe. Yeah, I would like to think so. But you know, you know, it's it's a very, very tough thing, man. Yeah, it really is. Because you start you start talking yourself into things which sound very, very noble, but in reality are very ego-based. It's a tough thing.

You worked in finance, but like when you see those numbers go up, is it like does it get like your blood, like your like your blood flowing? Like, oh yeah, I gotta get more. Like whenever like whenever you dipped into it.

I think I think I think everyone's different, but I think for a lot of people it's uh oh, if I'd if I'd only done X or Y, I would have even more.

Yeah.

I think it's very, very I think you know, this is what I think I want to I want to convey is that you know, to get lasting satisfaction out of money is a very, very hard, hard thing. Yeah, you know, there's a bunch of things that go wrong when he got a lot of it. You know, and and I I was, you know, just to be clear, never anywhere close to billionaire status at all, but I've I've seen it. Yeah, you know, and and and it causes a lot of problems. Yeah. And this is now maybe worth, you know, just turning to the spiritual aspects of this, which is essentially every major spiritual tradition carries extreme warnings about wealth and the and the you know constant effort to acquire it. I think it's just worth maybe thinking about. Is it possible, you know, again, nearly every spiritual tradition is telling us that we need to look within for the real answers to life, right? Is it possible for somebody who's obsessed with external wealth to really look within?

Oh no.

Yeah, I think it's I think it's 99.9% of the time.

I'm trying to think about people that that like have a lot of money.

Yeah, and it's not that they're bad people, right?

I mean, LeBron, not bad.

Yeah, and he gives and he gives a lot in charitable causes and support.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah, but but is is he sitting down and and and looking at his inner consciousness, or is it constant focus on the next career step, the next investment, the next even you know, I mean, there's benefit to it, but even the next charitable project. These are all external things.

Yeah, I mean, I don't know. I think I think LeBron, a different case.

Yeah.

He grew up poor. Yes. I think most of those guys grew up poor, but like he, you know what I mean? Like he knows.

Yeah, and there's an appreciation for the need to give back.

Yeah. I don't know. I think it's based, it's it's it's based on base casic. I think the people who inherit the money, yeah, I mean, I think they're long gone sometimes. You know what I mean? There's like rare cases. Obviously, we don't know everybody in the world, we don't know everybody's circumstances, so yeah, can't really speak on them, but like the ones we do know, I don't know. I think it's hard. Yeah, it's a hard thing to judge. Again, I it's hard for me to judge because I don't know, guys. I don't got I don't got money like that. So like who am I to judge them for for doing, you know what I mean, for attaining all that wealth?

Right. Yeah, right. You know, and and again, you know, uh oft-repeated theme on this show, but you know, when when the end comes, yeah, you're not a billionaire anymore. It's almost in like every episode. Yeah, yeah.

No, I mean, but it's for real, though. It's like you gotta think about those things, like yeah, yeah.

And and I would say in some ways, that's the last thing a billionaire wants to think about, is because Deaf? Yeah, because they they're like, Oh, I I have an amazing life. And now I at some point I'm gonna lose all of this.

Like Fiddy said, death gotta be easy because life is hard. But uh yeah, I mean, it's just it's just one of those things where it's like in the end, whatever you have in your bank account, that 401k, the the Roth IRA, like nothing, you can't take none of it with you. Yeah, it goes to someone else. This is not Egyptian, like what they used to do back in Egypt, bro, when they buried with everything, yeah. Yeah, they buried your gold with you, you know what I mean? Like you're gonna take it in the afterlife with you. Like, no, that's literally not happening with us. So, I mean, it goes off to your offspring, or it goes off to your family, or in some cases, if it doesn't do that, where does it go?

Charities, charities, no, which maybe there's some good that comes out of it, but it's it ain't coming with you, that's for sure.

Oh, this is a good thing, right? You know, uh what's her name? What's that couple? Oh, the Amazon guy. Oh, his ex-wife, yeah, Kenzie, Kenzie Scott, yeah. She, whatever she got from that settlement from their divorce, she's giving it back to HBCUs.

Yeah, she's giving away a lot of money.

That's fire. Yeah, you know what I mean? That like it's like, why wouldn't you like want to like help? Yeah, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

I think some of those guys, when you get, I don't really know how their numbers, but I the Amazon guy, isn't he like over a hundred billion?

Yeah, I yeah, I don't know the number.

I mean it's like, bro, just give some of it away. Yeah, and I think they are, yeah.

Some of them are, well, a lot of them are, you know, but yeah, make Amazon like 12-hour shipping. Yeah, yeah. Nah, I'm joking. So, so I just want to, you know, there this is a little bit of a different angle on it, but I just want to, yeah, I think it's an interesting question. To you, when you were growing up with your peers, other kids, who did you regard as like the luckiest kids or the wealthiest kids? And I I'll answer for myself. When I was young, I was like, it was the kid with the best baseball card collection.

I mean, the kid that had the house with the you know, like those houses, like you know, the home alone houses.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, or like the Dizzy Channel, like those movies, and they had a two-parent household.

Right.

That's what I thought was rich back then. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know what I mean? Like, because I've always lived in apartments. Right. So, you know what I mean? Yeah. That's just me. That's just me and my family. Yeah. And I have one mom and no dad, so that's what I looked at as a yeah.

Yeah. You said what was yours? I I I was most jealous of the kids with like the nice baseball card collection. Baseball card. Or the parents bought them whatever toy they wanted, right? Now, it's like now as an adult, I'm like, that means nothing to me. Like, I just don't care. See, and and I guess my like more I'm going with this is okay, now a lot of us out there, and myself included at some points in my life, thought there was like nothing better than being a billionaire, right? Yeah, is it possible that there's a phase of existence where after we're done with this life, you look back and you say, you know what, that was about as stupid as thinking that like a kid's baseball card collection was super important, you know? Is it possible for them to think that? Is it is it possible for us at some point in our our conscious development to have that moment where it's like, you know what? Maybe maybe the billions of dollars was actually like a totally meaningless thing that only had value because I believed it had value. Like, are they thinking that? I'm I'm saying, is it possible for that that for us? Like me and you, yeah, thinking that or or anybody out there. I I I guess we're different, though. Yeah, well, I guess what I'm trying to say is there's points in our lives where we think something is super valuable and super important, and then 20, 30 years later, it's like that was a really stupid thought.

Yeah, right. Like winning the Super Bowl, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like winning the NBA Finals.

Yeah, well, you're you're you're spoiled as a Pats fan.

No, but I'm just saying, though, like in reality, like who cares?

Right. You know, right. But at the time, you know, so so I I guess I'm asking.

You know what's crazy? Like, not to cut you off, sorry. Whenever I was watching, I know this is totally off script, right? But like whenever, whenever we were done winning a championship, right? 10 minutes later, you're like, okay, well, uh, you know, it's over. I'm going to sleep now.

Was it that fast?

Yeah. Or like, I mean, I will, I'm pretty sure in my younger years, like I was out or whatever, but it's like like in 2018, right? When we came back against um the Falcons, right? I was amp all game. Well, I was pretty depressed for the first half. Yeah. But the second half, I was, I was amp, amp, amp, right? Like, oh my God, watched over for like 10 minutes when when James White finally crossed, you know, in overtime. And then that was really it.

Right, right, right, right.

Oh my damn, all that screaming. Yeah. For 10 minutes.

Right, right, right. Now, this is this is this is my question, okay. Now, what there's a lot of us out there sitting there obsessed over uh I I should I should I would like to be a billionaire. Yeah. Is it possible that all of us at some point will reach a point in our consciousness consciousness where we're just like that was pointless?

Yeah. I would hope so.

Yeah, yeah, me too. I hope so.

Yeah.

You know, I think it'd be a better world, more interesting world.

I think a lot of people have these thoughts, they just don't, they don't keep feeding the the they don't keep feeding the thoughts, right? Yeah. Until like, you know, something catastrophic happens, or yeah. Or maybe until you're dead and your conscious starts actually realizing like, oh, that was actually pointless.

Uh all right. Well, so for our donation today, uh, it's gonna be a donation to the World Central Kitchen, um, which is an organization that was started by by uh world famous chef Jose Andre. Um they do a lot of work delivering meals to uh vulnerable populations across the across the world. Um so hopefully you know there's there's some good that comes out of that. So yeah, I don't know, Ray, anything else on this topic or are you you ready for our minute of silence?

I think we're ready for the minute, man. I think I think we gave we can't we gave all our billionaire talk.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I agreed. All right.

You got our quotable.

No. This one basically said earlier. So uh you're entitled to the work, not the results.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So this is this is a key, key philosophical argument within uh the bug with the Gita. Yeah. So it's an important thing, you know. I think we you know, we all have the right to a work, but you know, it doesn't mean that there's always gonna be the outcome you want from it.

And then if you don't get the right outcome, are you gonna stop working hard for it? Yeah, you know what I mean?

So yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

You know, yeah. Take that tea with you.

Yeah.

You know?

Yeah.

That's it, right? Yeah, yeah. Well, yeah, hopefully, you know, for our audience out there, hopefully you got something useful. You know, maybe being a billionaire is not as great as it, you know, looks. So I don't know.

Go Pats. Yeah. Yeah.

Until next time, this is Chucker Free Radio signing off.