Is the American Dream alive in Europe? I have learned that the answer is yes. I recently spoke about that topic at a conference comprised almost exclusively of Europeans. My talk focused on the challenges today’s wealth inheritor faces in chasing the American Dream. The talk was based on the well-received white paper, titled Can the Wealth Inheritor Chase the American Dream?, that Washington University scholar Mark Rank and I wrote last year.
The European audience did not aspire to live in the US, but appreciated the fundamental proposition: The human soul wants the freedom passionately to pursue self-actualisation. To do that requires optimism, financial security and the recognition that the dream is a journey and not a destination.
Wealth and children
Freedom passionately to pursue self-actualisation brings us to the question that has no national borders: How do we help children of the wealthy, engaged individuals who want to be all they can be? How do we give them the foundation to self-actualise?
The studies answer these questions directly and unequivocally. Children of wealth need optimism and financial security to self actualise. Self-actualisation is a journey, but the way must be paved with the belief in the future and knowing that one’s financial needs will be met. Parents must recognise that these are fundamental to raising children of wealth.
Chasing the American Dream requires optimism. An Irish cop can be optimistic that his child can be a lawyer. A Jewish tailor knows his son can be a doctor. Worldwide, optimism gets more and more. How can one become optimistic and purposeful in a world full of ISIS and the economic challenges Europeans seem to be facing? Twenty-four hour news has little to be happy about. So how does the parent impart optimism?
Here I could draw on the impressive work and thinking of Eric Greitens, an American again, of whom the Europeans had heard little.
Greitens, author of several books, most recently Resilience, is a former Navy Seal who has helped US veterans recover their sense of purpose. Using mythology, the ancients and modern writing, Greitens concludes that warriors returning home succeed when they feel they are serving a community. He helps veterans by encouraging them to engage in social services to those less fortunate than they. He has founded and runs a charity, The Mission Continues, based on that concept.
How to find purpose
Just as the mission can continue for the veteran through redirection to social services, so it can for the wealth inheritor. Engaging in community can give the European wealth inheritor, as the American wealth inheritor or American veteran, a sense of purpose and optimism. Whether through volunteerism or philanthropy, recognition of a relationship with the world creates a sense of optimism and purpose. There is no place on earth where you will not find people engaged in helping community. The wealthy that do it are as self-fulfilled as those without wealth.
Passionate self-actualisation can also be encouraged and reinforced in another important way. By building a legacy of the family rooted in becoming all one can become - not in further wealth accumulation. In fact, whenever life’s purpose is exclusively creating more wealth, the life is rarely a happy one.
To perpetuate the family legacy, wealth creators and inheritors need to highlight the stories of those who lived their dreams and accomplished their intentional goals. Whether those are stories of the American frontier, of colonial expansion, or of post-world war vision, they are the models for those inheriting wealth.
Financial security
Financial security is fundamental to self-actualisation. Rank’s studies and data prove unequivocally that without a feeling of financial security it is most difficult to chase the American Dream. Those who have good jobs and lose them also quit the chase.
Nothing seems more controversial among private wealth holders than the proposition that withholding wealth from children to “motivate” them is likely to keep them from pursuing the passion to self-actualise. “I don’t want to spoil my children and give them so much that they don’t want to be anything” is a common theme. In fact, providing financial security enhances the likelihood that your child will become all he or she can become.
Determining what your child needs for security requires work and relates to the environment in which you raised the child. But there can be no doubt that your child with financial security is more likely to chase the dream.
Besides the data, real life stories can prove the proposition. I was talking to group of wealth holders about the American Dream and how to chase it. An older man raised his hand and asked, “Do you mean to tell me that if my son wants $10 million to start a publishing house and my daughter wants $10 million to buy a farm, I should do that just because it is their passion?” “Yes,” I replied. There was a hush in the room because everyone assumed I had just insulted this gentleman, whom they all knew and respected. “If your children have passion for those endeavours and you have the spare $10 million or $20 million, by all means, do it,” I said.
After the Q&A session, the gentleman was first in line to talk to me. I prepared for loud criticism of my answer. Instead, the gentleman shook my hand and said, “You are absolutely right! I gave my son $10 million for the publishing house and my daughter $10 million for the farm. It was the best thing I ever did in my life! They are happy, fulfilled and prosperous.”
A universal desire
In talking to Europeans in the tiny town of Montreux in Switzerland, I saw that the American Dream resonates in the hearts of European wealth holders. They are inspired by passionate self-actualisation regardless of their nationality. What we must all recognise is that the human soul and human wisdom are universal. There is nothing exclusively American about the craving for self-actualisation; there is nothing exclusively American about the restorative effect of community engagement. There are no differences culture to culture in these respects.
I have heard the same questions and responses in the past year from audiences in Phoenix, New York, Hong Kong, Sydney and Brisbane. The world of wealth is global. The challenges of wealth are global. The desire to be all you can be is in every soul. n
Charles Lowenhaupt is founder and chairman of Lowenhaupt Global Advisors, a family office with a 100-year legacy of working with wealthy individuals and families, and also co-author of ‘Freedom From Wealth’ by McGraw-Hill.
