From "The Book of Questions" by Gregory Stock, PH.D.
Q #20
If you knew of a way to use your estate, following your death, to greatly benefit humanity, would you do it and leave only a minimal amount to your family?
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6 comments:
Sure would.
But, how 2 packs of Dentyne and some 3XL clothes will greatly benefit humanity is beyond me.
Yeap - I don't as yet ahve any direct family, i.e. no wife, kids, etc.
Yes ....
Just look at Paris Hilton to see the dangers of inheritance without earning ....
However .... if my heirs have proven themselves and shown real love and interest and skill in whatever it was that built my estate, then they deserve to continue with it.
Okay, so my HUGE estate will benefit all of humanity...I would hope that my family is part of that humanity and would also benefit, so HECK YES!!! It's a WIN WIN situation.
The dangers of inheritance without earning it... hmmmmm. Well there are literally hundreds of thousands of wealthy families who pass wealth down to their heirs and they do not even begin to have the issues that the Hilton sisters do. So are the Hiltons the norm or the aberration. I think the later. The key in inheritance is to teach your children or heirs the value both monetarily and from a personal responsibility standpoint of what they are inheriting because its more than the dollar value. There is an intrinsic value of the family, the history of the family and its legacy long after the originators of the wealth are gone.
It is interesting to me that we assume inherited wealth is unearned or is bad for you. That somehow it should belong to "society".
Ponder this. What if more families took care of their own and handed down wealth, would we need more charity or less charity in this world?
I would do the reverse and would hope my family would use the money to benefit humanity (hoping that I raised them well).
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