Wealthy but still unhappy
LIKE many people I spent a few minutes contemplating Johnny Depp’s lifestyle this week. He has 45 classic cars and a luxury yacht. He won’t fly anywhere except by private plane and rents a Gulfstream GV at a cost of $200,000 a month. He owns over 70 valuable guitars. He buys jewellery, Andy Warhols and Hollywood memorabilia. He spends over $30,000 a month on “fine” wines. He blew $3million blasting his friend Hunter S Thompson’s ashes into space. He has 14 homes including a French chateau, a chain of islands in the Bahamas and several homes in California. He has an army of staff and 24-hour security. This all costs him $2million a month and he still has a substantial amount notched up on his Visa card. He also looks perpetually miserable.
The details came out because he is in a legal battle with his management. Depp’s lawsuit, filed last month, accuses his former advisers of defrauding him.
The week before, we heard about the misery of Adrian Bayford who won the Euromillions jackpot in 2012 – £148million – and blames the subsequent stress on his marriage falling apart. He has now parted company with the woman he took up with who has returned to her former boyfriend, abandoning Bayford’s millionaire pad for a humble semi.
Some very rich people – such as Sir Mick Jagger – are famously thrifty (some would say tight). But for others, wealth becomes the means with which they try to buy approval and status. Those of us (most of us) who spend our lives worrying about paying the mortgage find it mystifying.
I know for a fact – and I’m sure you do too – that if I came into a huge amount of money I’d spend it carefully and tastefully. We accept that though money does not make you happy there is no reason why it should make you unhappy either. Money doesn’t buy you health but it can buy the means to help you stay healthy. It doesn’t buy you peace of mind but it can alleviate a few of the problems that keep you awake.
We look at Johnny Depp’s outgoings and wonder why anyone needs multiple homes – how many Los Angeles penthouse lofts can a man live in? Depp has several.
ADRIAN Bayford says that his huge fortune actually caused the split-ups with the women in his life. Bitterly, the majority of us would reflect that most arguments with our own partners/ spouses are caused by lack of money, not too much of it.
But somehow extreme wealth destroys so many people that maybe we aren’t as immune to its poison as we imagine. Think of all the mental juggling we do as we balance one expenditure against another, justifying some extravagant splurge (“because I’m worth it”) while putting a foot down about something else. It’s often utterly irrational.
Would we all end up as wretchedly unhappy as Johnny Depp appears to be or would we be serene and sensible? Hmm… I’d still like the chance to find out.