Money might not buy you happiness but it gives you a wealth of choices
IT WAS quite the declaration – the billionaire owner of a mega-successful outdoor clothing company has given it all away. Yvon Chouinard is an 83-yearold American rock climber who founded Patagonia in 1973, this year alone they sold over €1.5billion worth of waterproof jackets, fleeces and hiking boots.
But Chouinard, always known as something of an eccentric in the business world, has put the company in the hands of a specially set up charitable trust, which will ensure that from now on all the profits will be used to ‘combat climate change and protect undeveloped land around the globe’.
It’s the kind of story that stops you in your tracks to check if you’ve read the headline correctly, and then wonder if you’d do the same, if you were in his position.
The short answer is I’d never be in that position, so it’s not worth the effort of thinking too long and hard about it.
There are 2,668 billionaires in the world at present, according to the latest figures from financial magazine Forbes. More than a quarter of them live in America, while Ireland can boast between nine and 17, depending on where you get your information from.
Truth is, many billionaires often don’t like telling everyone how much they’re worth. With so much poverty and famine in the world, it can seem a little, well, unseemly. And they’d be right.
Indeed, it was being outed as a billionaire that set Chouinard on his path to giving away his fortune. In 2017, Forbes added him to their annual billionaire list, which he told the New York Times ‘really, really p **** d me off. I don’t have $1billion in the bank. I don’t drive Lexuses.’
He’s been described as a ‘reluctant billionaire,’ but I’m not sure how that works. Did he accidentally end up with a company that sells ludicrous amounts of active wear? Where a man’s ‘Storm 10 Jacket’ will set you back a hefty €340 or a woman’s ‘Reclaimed Fleece Pullover’ costs €150.
Regardless of how much it costs to buy into the Patagonia ethos (and I’m sure their gear is of the best possible quality), it was an impressively altruistic decision by Chouinard and his family. He has two kids in their 40s who he claims didn’t want to take over his company, although they will both continue to work for it. Putting aside thoughts of what it must feel like to have ever had access to that kind of fortune, how amazing it is to have that kind of choice about where your money will go.
In fairness to the Chouinards, they have paid almost €18million in tax on the gift they’ve given to this new charitable trust – unlike other billionaires who’ve given money away but managed to reap generous tax benefits, often getting enormous personal windfalls for donating their company’s money.
There are a few of them, of course, billionaires who’ve figured out there’s no possible way of spending that amount of cash on themselves or their loved ones in just one lifetime. That once you have the mega-mansions in every corner of the globe, the luxury super yachts and private jets, there’s usually still a massive wedge left over.
So some of them give it away. Mackenzie Scott, ex-wife of Amazon tycoon Jeff Bezos, seems to be having a blast shedding her divorce settlement. Currently worth more than €38billion, thanks to her 4% stake in the company she helped her husband set up, so far she’s donated almost €13billion to various groups, organisations and charities that she felt deserved her help.
This week she gave two mansions in Beverly Hills collectively worth over €55million, which she once owned with Bezos but were handed over to her after the marriage break-up, to a California charity who have pledged to sell them and use the money to help those finding it hard to buy their own home and immigrants.
She must feel totally in control of her life right now. As do all those billionaires who’ve promised to give their money away before they die, like Warren Buffet who’s currently worth €97billion, but is planning to shed 99% of his fortune and has already donated almost €50billion, most of it to his pal, and fellow billionaire, Bill Gates’ foundation.
We don’t get to make those kinds of decisions about how our money will be spent.
Instead, we hope for the best when each annual budget comes up, that there’ll be some sort of relief or benefits to help cope with the escalating costs of living. Now more than ever.
And we watch helplessly as millions of euro of public money is squandered on inquiries and investigations into alleged financial corruption by people, some of them billionaires, who will never have to worry about filling their oil heating tanks. And nothing ever seems to change; there are no consequences.
It feels like so much of what is coming down the line is completely beyond our control.
Yeah, you can change energy suppliers, or choose to turn the lights off or put an extra jumper on. But it won’t really matter in the end, the bills are still going to be huge.
Money can’t buy you love, or it might not make you happy, or any of those other rubbish cliches, but it sure does give you choice.
The Patagonia guy didn’t have to make the choice he did, and it was a pretty decent move.
But not only does he get the satisfaction of passing on his fortune to a cause close to his heart, he doesn’t have to watch others decide how to spend all that money he accidentally made.
That kind of choice is the kind of extraordinary privilege only the very, very few ever get to enjoy.