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The young and rich: 'Give away our wealth'
Members of the organization Resource Generation hold up signs. The organization brings together young people with financial wealth to help them figure out how to give their money way to causes that matter to them.
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Sarah Abbott, left, and Jessie Spector, right, of Resource Generation pose for portraits in their offices on March 18, 2013, in New York City.
If you love something, the saying goes, set it free. Let it go. Give it away, even. Americans give away, on average, about 5 percent of our earnings. Some give more. Some less. A few give everything. Paul Sullivan is the Wealth Matters columnist for The New York Times. He writes in the Times' special section this week about young people who've inherited money -- big money -- and who've decided to give all of it away. Sullivan says it may sound crazy, but these so-called "trust fund progressives" have a different mindset.
"This particular group, they're motivated by social justice," says Sullivan. "They have all this privilege, they realize they have all this privelege, yet they feel a little guilty about it."
Sullivan says these types of inheritors are looking for ways to give money away -- and there's an organization called Resource Generation that brings together young people with financial wealth to help them figure out how to give their money way to causes that matter to them.
"They are writing checks to traditional nonprofits, to charities. They are also making low or no interest loans to organizations that they believe in. Lastly, they are helping their friends. They are perhaps buying a new car for somebody who needs to drive to work or helping somebody who needs to pay a big medical bill," says Sullivan.
Exactly how much money are we talking about here? There's a wide range -- everything from inheriting a house worth $500,000 to having access to a foundation worth $100 million. And the young wealthy are not just giving away dividend checks and extra income, they are dipping into principal and giving away vast sums.
If all of this sounds crazy, Sullivan says there is some young idealism involved here. Inheritors who are involved with Resource Generation are between the ages of 18-35. "They kick them out when they are 35 and become cynical," he jokes.
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This was an interesting story and corresponds with what I've seen from my more well-to-do friends. However, you left out one reason that people in my generation give their inherited wealth away: the recognition that it may have been acquired at the expense of exploited populations.
Kai, You and Paul Sullivan miss an opportunity to see that Resource Generation is much more than a group facilitating charitable giving. I would image Market Place's interest might be in the financial literacy and financial empowerment work that RG is doing and may not exist anywhere else in our society. Or a story to look at the demographic mindset shift that this organization embodies as the Baby Boomers (and earlier) is a generation whose American Dream was to do better financially than their parents and have their children do better. In contrast, this generation is questioning "better at what cost" - to the environment, to other classes of people, to our community and question the definition of better. This generation is re-examining America's conspicuous consumption as a path to happiness and instead asking what makes a meaningful life, a healthy community, a whole values-aligned person. It is within the RG community that you will find some individuals who are living off of a $22,000 nonprofit salary and have managed to save $20,000 from their salary and have not touched a trust fund for personal expenses. Resource Generation is a network/a nonprofit/a movement of young people invested in social change and organizing other young people with privilege and some with access to resources to leverage those resources toward social, racial and economic justice.
