A larger question:

Reader comment on: Nantucket Project

Submitted by Lyle (United States), Oct 10, 2011 18:36

Often history reflects that leaving a large inheritance to one's children is an excellent way to ruin their lives. One has to judge if one's children are capable of handling this without turning into the typical useless heiress or heir. There are many examples of this happening, although not in all cases. Assume one either has no offspring, or decides (as John D. Rockefeller did with his daughters) to leave them a trust fund of a size just to keep them comfortable. Then what does one do with the bulk of their wealth? Basically you have to give it away as one can't take it with one. I think that Bill Gates and Warren Buffet both feel that huge inheritances spoil offspring, so they decided to give the bulk of their wealth away, and rather than create a foundation that in 3 generations would do the opposite of their wishes set it up so that most of the wealth will be given away before 15 years after their death.

So it is a fundamental question of how much one thinks one's offspring could be spoiled by a huge inheritance that drives the decision of what to do about it.

Note: Comments are moderated by the editor and are subject to editing.

Comment on this item