Ever felt like the poor relation?

Tropez

Person_one wrote: »

In my opinion, if less people were 'driven' to acquire huge amounts of money and were happy with enough to be comfortable with occasional small luxuries, then the world would be a much nicer place.

Having a huge desire to be wealthy is not really a good thing, is it? Better to try and encourage your children to want to do something useful with their lives and that money is not the be all and end all.

But what if you don't have or want children?

Person_one

aliasojo wrote: »

Is that what millionaires do?

I always thought people set out to become successful in whatever field they chose to be in and the fact they became millionaires on the way was testament to them achieving their goals. Not that the million itself was the goal. IYSWIM?

If the money wasn't the goal, maybe more of them would give it away or refuse it in the first place once they had enough to live a nice lifestyle. Who really needs a million? Or £150K plus a year? Nobody.

Success in career terms is nearly always defined in terms of money, what if you deem success to be finding a job you never mind getting out of bed for, that makes a positive difference in the world and that allows you to spend time with your loved ones? On those terms far more of us would be considered 'successful'!

Person_one

Tropez wrote: »

But what if you don't have or want children?

The OP does, and its more of a general point about what we as a society should be teaching and passing on to the children of that society, regardless of who actually gives birth to them!

(Just spotted the smiley, sorry, thought you were being seriously dense!)

Any

I agree with Tropez - I know a lot of people who went to private shools and never did anything special. I also know people who went to private schools while their parents didn't have shed loads of money (stationed abroad). I also have a person in extended family who is very rich, due to his family.

And I tell you what. The richest one of them is an ****. Even his own family doesn't think he will amount to something. The guys who don't come from rich backgrounds have better jobs then him, in their lifetime they probably won't have as much money as his family does, but when he is finished with the money his kids won't be rich in the slightest. They will find it extremely hard because they will not be ready for the world of having to make their own way. Private school taught him nothing, the so called "oportunities" didn't bring him anything because people around are not stupid.

We live in the age of rise of working man. I believe that who thinks that you need money and parental afluence to be able to achieve something will never achieve anything only for the one reason that they have great excuse for failing. Most of the bosses up there are normal hard working people nowadays, and they don't give a damn if you went to private school (though some might put it as negative).

It is a mind set of a parent what makes difference, not private school or having money.

Tropez

Person_one wrote: »

If the money wasn't the goal, maybe more of them would give it away or refuse it in the first place once they had enough to live a nice lifestyle. Who really needs a million? Or £150K plus a year? Nobody.

Success in career terms is nearly always defined in terms of money, what if you deem success to be finding a job you never mind getting out of bed for, that makes a positive difference in the world and that allows you to spend time with your loved ones? On those terms far more of us would be considered 'successful'!

Success, in my mind, is defined by oneself and while people may judge whether an individual is successful or not, their opinions don't really matter on the scale of things.

If people are happy and content with themselves then that is all that matters.

And depending how you view it, £1m isn't a huge amount of money if you consider the long-term implications of inflation. Certainly, if I were to reach the minimum life expectancy for a man in this country, I wouldn't have been able to live off £1m, even if I was trying to live solely from the interest off that £1m.

(I should point out, this is bearing in mind that 10% of my annual gross salary is given to charity)

aliasojo

Person_one wrote: »

If the money wasn't the goal, maybe more of them would give it away or refuse it in the first place once they had enough to live a nice lifestyle. Who really needs a million? Or £150K plus a year? Nobody.

Sorry, just don't agree with you at all. Very few people in life would give away money or refuse it. Doesn't matter if you are a millionaire or just comfortably off.

aliasojo

Any wrote: »

It is a mind set of a parent what makes difference, not private school or having money.

I agree that plays a large part but I don't believe it's anywhere near as simple as that alone.

Any

aliasojo wrote: »

I agree that plays a large part but I don't believe it's anywhere near as simple as that alone.

We will have to disagree then. I cannot see how family money or affluence can bring you inteligence. And that is where it all starts - inteligence and attitude.

Badger_Lady

I do think that environment has a major impact on what a child believes they're capable of achieving... but that doesn't start and end with school.

I went to a girls' Grammar school, so there was a serious mixture of backgrounds: many had been to private prep schools, some were from nearby council estates, and I was from an average family and had to travel 50 miles to school each day. The one thing we all had in common was that we were bright and capable, and were fortunate to be taught at a very, very good (free) school.

My best friend there was from the council estate, where she'd grown up in a two-bed flat with her mum and sister. She was very proud of her roots and would stretch the rules at school, but never to any serious level. She had the intelligence and confidence to do everything if not more than anyone else there.

So ten years later, where did we all end up? Well I've ended up travelling all over the place doing work I enjoy, with a mortgaged house and a campervan, and enough savings to be comfortable; most other girls have got their degrees, settled into decent careers and relationships... my old best friend is living in the council flat below her mum's with her 9-yr-old son.

Now don't get me wrong, she's a very happy girl, but what saddens me about the story is that she's 100% convinced that the rest of us had more privileged backgrounds and that we are lucky to end up in our current situations. And that she never had the same opportunity. But it's not true! We've all just worked, saved, invested... used our brains, the exact same standard of brains that she had. There's absolutely no reason for that girl not to have broken away from her family and blazed a new trail doing anything she wanted.

Any

Badger_Lady wrote: »

Now don't get me wrong, she's a very happy girl, but what saddens me about the story is that she's 100% convinced that the rest of us had more privileged backgrounds and that we are lucky to end up in our current situations. And that she never had the same opportunity. But it's not true! We've all just worked, saved, invested... used our brains, the exact same standard of brains that she had. There's absolutely no reason for that girl not to have broken away from her family and blazed a new trail doing anything she wanted.

So she did use the greatest excuse in the book...
She had the inteligence (you think), but not the attitude... Probably thanks to her mother.
If you are told enough times that you cannot do something you will believe it.

That is why even caresing this suggestion that private school/better family/inheritance/daddy worked harder would have helped you is wrong on all levels. It gives your children all the wrong attitude.