# Characteristics of "Old Money"
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [April 20, 2016, 1:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721 "2016-04-20T13:56:15Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@GrumpyBunny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GrumpyBunny)
#### Post date: [April 25, 2016, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/21 "2016-04-25T19:58:42Z")
> [@Baron\_Greenback](#):
>
> New money has to buy its own furniture _sniffs_
And silver. Some of which might be silver-_plate_.
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### Author:  [@john\_b\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/john_b_2)
#### Post date: [April 25, 2016, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/22 "2016-04-25T20:23:53Z")
I wonder how much of the distinctions between what constitutes “old” and “new” money in America is regional. If anyone has thoughts I’d love to hear them. As an east coaster I’m somewhat confused by it all.
In the old cities of the northeast “old” was indeed the money of the (so-called) founders, those descended from the first settlers, the ones who got rich first. But even in New England one could in time effectively “buy” one’s way into old money. It took a while but the textile “magnates” did it.
In New York, the Roosevelts epitomized old money but they weren’t all that rich even as far back as the Gilded Age. Cornelius Vanderbilt was considered an upstart during that period, as were all in his family, but in time they became, as the saying goes, “respectable”.
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### Author:  [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)
#### Post date: [April 25, 2016, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/23 "2016-04-25T20:38:07Z")
> [@seal\_cleaner](#):
>
> I inherited a fair amount of money. The life insurance was minimal.
Estate taxes only kick in if the estate is worth more than $5 million.
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### Author:  [@Happy\_Scrappy\_Hero\_Pup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Scrappy_Hero_Pup)
#### Post date: [April 25, 2016, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/24 "2016-04-25T21:03:11Z")
> [@john\_b\_2](#):
>
> I wonder how much of the distinctions between what constitutes “old” and “new” money in America is regional. If anyone has thoughts I’d love to hear them. As an east coaster I’m somewhat confused by it all.
Someone above made some mention among the same lines, but it’s like this:
1. “He’s an Astor.” Old money. Even a second cousin once removed is getting a table before you.
2. “His family is in shipping.” Still old money, not as much.
3. “His grandfather was in shipping.” Old money thinks he’s new money, new money thinks he’s old money.
4. “He’s Steve Jobs’s son.” New money, but enough respect to not be tainted by the label (because Jobs “made” things).
5. “That’s Bill Gates.” New money, slight curiosity/"other"ness at the nontraditional way the money was made, but “made” things. Is not opulent.
6. “That’s Mark Zuckerberg.” New money, slight curiosity/"other"ness at the nontraditional way the money was made, didn’t “make” things, so lower ranked than Gates. Is not opulent.
7. “That’s Kim Kardashian.” New money. Tainted. Triply so because she leveraged porn to do so, because her family money to that point, while new, was made in law, because she seeks attention. Opulent. Does not “make” things.
8. “That guy just won Powerball.” Even if you consider 300 million “money,” which real money does not, this guy isn’t getting into any party.
Also, there is no “old money” west of the Mississippi, and any money in Los Angeles or Las Vegas is tainted (there being some few exceptions, such as the Spielbergs and Lucases of the world).
…mind you, I didn’t make these rules. I’ve just been on the wrong end of them for 40 years.
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### Author:  [@Saintly\_Loser](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saintly_Loser)
#### Post date: [April 25, 2016, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/25 "2016-04-25T22:54:21Z")
Conservation of capital is key.
There’s an old joke:
Muffy and Buffy, two young(ish) woman who’ve known each other forever, meet for lunch one day. Muffy is dripping with jewelry. Pearl necklace, diamond earrings, everything.
Buffy says “Muffy – what’s going on? You must be wearing $50,000 worth of jewelry!”
Muffy says, “I’ll tell you what’s going on, but you have to promise not to be shocked.” And Buffy agrees.
Muffy says “I’ve turned to prostitution. I’ve become a very expensive escort, and it’s working out really well for me.”
Buffy says “Oh, thank God. I thought you’d dipped into capital.”
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### Author:  [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)
#### Post date: [April 26, 2016, 7:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/26 "2016-04-26T07:14:00Z")
Gates was already old money before Microsoft.
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### Author:  [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)
#### Post date: [April 26, 2016, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/27 "2016-04-26T08:08:18Z")
> [@msmith537](#):
>
> Without money, then they are just “old”.
Shrug, a lot of the people I know who have the contacts and the name recognition but not as much money as others think, I’ve known since they were in diapers. I’m one of those myself; the money I have I made, but the instant connections (both good and bad) which I often get when I mention my last name come from a long line of people who shared it.
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### Author:  [@john\_b\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/john_b_2)
#### Post date: [April 26, 2016, 8:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/28 "2016-04-26T08:25:42Z")
> [@Happy\_Scrappy\_Hero\_Pup](#):
>
> Someone above made some mention among the same lines, but it’s like this:
>
> 1. “He’s an Astor.” Old money. Even a second cousin once removed is getting a table before you.
> 2. “His family is in shipping.” Still old money, not as much.
> 3. “His grandfather was in shipping.” Old money thinks he’s new money, new money thinks he’s old money.
> 4. “He’s Steve Jobs’s son.” New money, but enough respect to not be tainted by the label (because Jobs “made” things).
> 5. “That’s Bill Gates.” New money, slight curiosity/"other"ness at the nontraditional way the money was made, but “made” things. Is not opulent.
> 6. “That’s Mark Zuckerberg.” New money, slight curiosity/"other"ness at the nontraditional way the money was made, didn’t “make” things, so lower ranked than Gates. Is not opulent.
> 7. “That’s Kim Kardashian.” New money. Tainted. Triply so because she leveraged porn to do so, because her family money to that point, while new, was made in law, because she seeks attention. Opulent. Does not “make” things.
> 8. “That guy just won Powerball.” Even if you consider 300 million “money,” which real money does not, this guy isn’t getting into any party.
> Also, there is no “old money” west of the Mississippi, and any money in Los Angeles or Las Vegas is tainted (there being some few exceptions, such as the Spielbergs and Lucases of the world).
> …mind you, I didn’t make these rules. I’ve just been on the wrong end of them for 40 years.
Thanks, Scrappy Hero :),
I sorta guessed as much, remember reading Vance Packard’s **The Status Seekers** as a teen, and various Stephen Birmingham books when I was in high school. Later on, there was literature,–American, British, European–and what broadened my horizons considerably. _They_ of course regard us all as uncouth _nouveau_ barbarian upstarts, and I really can’t blame then.
Envy plays a huge part in this, as does America’s (for the most part) absence of much in the way of high culture (that hasn’t been bought, that is); and our indifference to our “inferiority” in matters where the arts are concerned generally, but then the times seem to be changing this, and I suspect that _that_ Europe (England included) will be a thing or the past before this century is over.
The old versus the new where _American_ money is concerned is central to the fiction of Henry James and Edith Wharton; and it’s a factor in Scott Fitzgerald’s work as well, best of all in **The Great Gatsby**. As to west of the Mississippi, I know that there is, all things being relative, old money on the west coast as well as in cities like Denver. As a fan of classic Hollywood I know of many stories of wealthy stars and producers who were rejected by the best country clubs in metropolitan L.A. due to the taint of not just their new money but their association with show business, _infra dig_ to blue bloods or whatever they call old money types on the coast.
What surprised me is that the old money crowd’s aversion to the new Hollywood elite of the “golden age” of the studios _wasn’t_ based, or not wholly, on anti-Semitism. There was some of that, but even good white Anglo-Saxon Protestants, if associated with show business, had a difficult time maneuvering, socially, outside of it, with a strong resistance from the “old L.A. “society”” crowd.
John B.
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### Author:  [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)
#### Post date: [April 26, 2016, 8:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/29 "2016-04-26T08:30:20Z")
> [@john\_b\_2](#):
>
> What surprised me is that the old money crowd’s aversion to the new Hollywood elite of the “golden age” of the studios _wasn’t_ based, or not wholly, on anti-Semitism. There was some of that, but even good white Anglo-Saxon Protestants, if associated with show business, had a difficult time maneuvering, socially, outside of it, with a strong resistance from the “old L.A. “society”” crowd.
Why would it have been? The association of the performing arts with the “performing arts” is about as old as the performing arts :dubious:
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### Author:  [@john\_b\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/john_b_2)
#### Post date: [April 26, 2016, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/30 "2016-04-26T21:04:10Z")
> [@Nava](#):
>
> Why would it have been? The association of the performing arts with the “performing arts” is about as old as the performing arts :dubious:
Years ago, before movies, radio and television came among, what one might broadly call “show people” were looked down upon by even the genteel middle classes. Whether it was the stage or the circus, drama or comedy, vaudeville or the “legitimate” theater, all were regarded as low class. Popular as entertainers were, those involved in show business, especially the performers, were not welcome in mainstream society. They lived in a world of their own.
Don’t take my word for this, look it up. If a young woman from a respectable (not even wealthy) family went “on stage”, pursued the life of an actress this was regarded as maybe a notch or two above becoming a streetwalker, and they were often not spoken of, or referred to in the past tense, as if they were dead. The theater was glamorous, and going to the theater was a treat, but pursuing a career on stage was a no-no in what was once called “polite society”.
John B.
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### Author:  [@Briny\_Deep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Briny_Deep)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2016, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/31 "2016-04-27T03:24:01Z")
> [@Nava](#):
>
> I think there is going to be a big difference between how this is seen in America and the UK. The UK, and paraphrasing very badly from memory, you know who is the lady who owns the big manor because she’s the only one who’ll walk into City Hall in muddy galoshes and knits older than herself.
I think for a similar reason, and also echoing what **bump** said, when you drive down the tree-lined streets of (say) Wilmette and Winnetka, you’ll see 20-year old Volvos parked in front of the mansions with nary a Benz or BMW. Heck, you used to see nothing but 20-year-old _Fords_ there, _good-solid-dependable-Republican-station-wagons_ – back when 20-year-old Fords weren’t as crappy as they are now. Gotta have some minimum standards of quality, but you’re certainly not worried about what anyone else thinks of your car – it would never even occur to you.
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### Author:  [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2016, 8:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/32 "2016-04-27T08:17:56Z")
> [@john\_b\_2](#):
>
> Years ago, before movies, radio and television came among, what one might broadly call “show people” were looked down upon by even the genteel middle classes. Whether it was the stage or the circus, drama or comedy, vaudeville or the “legitimate” theater, all were regarded as low class. Popular as entertainers were, those involved in show business, especially the performers, were not welcome in mainstream society. They lived in a world of their own.
>
> Don’t take my word for this, look it up. If a young woman from a respectable (not even wealthy) family went “on stage”, pursued the life of an actress this was regarded as maybe a notch or two above becoming a streetwalker, and they were often not spoken of, or referred to in the past tense, as if they were dead. The theater was glamorous, and going to the theater was a treat, but pursuing a career on stage was a no-no in what was once called “polite society”.
> John B.
No? Really? Gosh. That’s exactly what I’m saying, that what I don’t understand is why would you expect antisemitism for something that Theodora of Bizantium already had problems with (to name someone who’s quite old, quite famous and quite not Jewish; there are plenty of other examples).
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### Author:  [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2016, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/33 "2016-04-27T13:34:26Z")
> [@Happy\_Scrappy\_Hero\_Pup](#):
>
> 1. “That guy just won Powerball.” Even if you consider 300 million “money,” which real money does not, this guy isn’t getting into any party.
I don’t tell people I won Powerball. I just show up, buy the biggest house in the neighborhood and pretend to be a mysterious foreigner. Like Jay Gatsby or the Count of Monte Cristo style.
I’m pretty sure 300 million is a lot of money regardless of who you are. There are only about 1600 billionaires on the entire planet. According to Forbes, about 1000 of them are self made.
> [@Nava](#):
>
> Shrug, a lot of the people I know who have the contacts and the name recognition but not as much money as others think, I’ve known since they were in diapers. I’m one of those myself; the money I have I made, but the instant connections (both good and bad) which I often get when I mention my last name come from a long line of people who shared it.
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### Author:  [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2016, 1:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/34 "2016-04-27T13:55:53Z")
> [@john\_b\_2](#):
>
> Envy plays a huge part in this, as does America’s (for the most part) absence of much in the way of high culture (that hasn’t been bought, that is); and our indifference to our “inferiority” in matters where the arts are concerned generally, but then the times seem to be changing this, and I suspect that _that_ Europe (England included) will be a thing or the past before this century is over.
I think a bigger factor is America’s spirit of entrepreneurship and exploration. We like to pride ourselves on being a country where anyone with the right talent and ambition can make a success of themselves. A significant number of wealthy people become so through working at Silicon Valley tech companies, Wall Street firms, law firms, entertainment, professional sports and starting small businesses. As I pointed out earlier, a large portion of billionaires are self made. So it kind of makes me wonder what advantage, indeed what relevancy Old Money provides? I mean contacts are great and it’s kind of cool to have a long, prestigious family history. But millions of dollars spent wisely tends to buy you a lot of contacts and party invitations as well.
> [@AK84](#):
>
> Gates was already old money before Microsoft.
The millions of dollars of Old Money Gates would have made at his father’s law form, Preston Gates & Ellis, LLP. have long since been diluted by the billions of New Money he made from Microsoft.
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### Author:  [@AK84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AK84)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2016, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/35 "2016-04-27T14:23:32Z")
> [@msmith537](#):
>
> The millions of dollars of Old Money Gates would have made at his father’s law form, Preston Gates & Ellis, LLP. have long since been diluted by the billions of New Money he made from Microsoft.
Irrelevant. He was already old money and that’s what opened doors for him. His mother sat on several corporate boards. His father represented large cooperations. Do you think if his parents had been Bill and Mary Gates, store clerk and Seattle housewife, IBM would have taken the chance on him that it did, or would have even heard of him?
This is BTW, not a hypothetical,[its pretty much what happened](http://www.nytimes.com/1994/06/11/obituaries/mary-gates-64-helped-her-son-start-microsoft.html).
> [@](#):
>
> In 1980, she discussed with John R. Opel, a fellow committee member who was the chairman of the International Business Machines Corporation, the business that I.B.M. was doing with Microsoft.
>
> Mr. Opel, by some accounts, mentioned Mrs. Gates to other I.B.M. executives. A few weeks later, I.B.M. took a chance by hiring **Microsoft, then a small software firm, to develop an operating system for its first personal computer**.
They saw their chance and took it, but without such connections, there would have been no chance in the first place.
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### Author:  [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2016, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/36 "2016-04-27T19:42:05Z")
> [@AK84](#):
>
> Irrelevant. He was already old money and that’s what opened doors for him. His mother sat on several corporate boards. His father represented large cooperations. Do you think if his parents had been Bill and Mary Gates, store clerk and Seattle housewife, IBM would have taken the chance on him that it did, or would have even heard of him?
Gate’s father started a law firm. That’s “new money”. Old money just lives off of generations of inherited wealth.
Is the term “Old Money” even really used nowadays? I kind of feel like it’s a throwback to the pre-Depression early 1900s. Or maybe as a way of “not that wealthy anymore” people to thumb their nose at “upstart” billionaire hedge fund managers and tech startup billionaires.
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### Author:  [@usedtobe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/usedtobe)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2016, 10:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/37 "2016-04-27T22:37:17Z")
Buy things ONCE.
Real carpets last generations; Wal-Mart carpets last years.
The reason men’s fashions don’t change every year is because men won’t put up with that crap.
Your hand-tailored suit can be modified if you really need to, but: when you’re the boss, you don’t need to follow fashion, and your suits last a lifetime.
And no, I’m NOT talking about Armani or whoever.
In 1980, I was introduced to a semi- and full- tailored shop. There is a turnstile at the door. They do not welcome casual browsers.
The suit is gorgeous.
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### Author:  [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2016, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/38 "2016-04-27T22:38:20Z")
> [@john\_b\_2](#):
>
> Years ago, before movies, radio and television came among, what one might broadly call “show people” were looked down upon by even the genteel middle classes. Whether it was the stage or the circus, drama or comedy, vaudeville or the “legitimate” theater, all were regarded as low class. Popular as entertainers were, those involved in show business, especially the performers, were not welcome in mainstream society. They lived in a world of their own.
It’s not hard to see remnants of that idea in the mid-20th century. Two examples I ran across recently - an episode of “I Love Lucy” in which a club run by New York society matrons is reluctant to let Lucy in because of her association with “show people,” and an episode of the 1950s radio program “The Halls of Ivy” in which the college president’s wife is accused of encouraging the students to take up low pursuits such as show business (the wife had been a minor star in London musical comedy theatre).
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### Author:  [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2016, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/39 "2016-04-27T23:56:19Z")
IIRC that snooty society matron had to be reminded by the lesser matron that had to start letting show people join a few years previously because they were desperate for money. Then Lucy told her to shove it.
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### Author:  [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)
#### Post date: [April 28, 2016, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/characteristics-of-old-money/752721/40 "2016-04-28T01:11:59Z")
> [@alphaboi867](#):
>
> IIRC that snooty society matron had to be reminded by the lesser matron that had to start letting show people join a few years previously because they were desperate for money. Then Lucy told her to shove it.
Yes, that’s right.
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