The problem is most people (including 90% of the people here
) have no concept of how much money this is.
I used to work in a bank Trust department where you had to have 3 million in investable assets to even be one of our clients. We had our share of lottery winners but mostly they were people who inherited money from someone.
There are as many different types of people as there is money.
Some give it away, but you would be surprised how many people who are the beneficiaries of these gifts are ungrateful. Just as several TFP'ers said themselves 'he has plenty, he should give me some'. Why? Because he has it, somehow he should give it to you? Why? If you had it, would you give it to him? Really? Think about it now. If you gave the homelss guy $10K he would either drink himself dead or be right back on the street next week.
Next subject: How much money this really is. WOOHOO we won, let's start spending. New car - nice one without being too pretentious, say $50,000. Now one for your spouse, your parents, maybe another one just for fun. $200,000. $112,800,000 left.
Really nice house - this one could have a large variable. $500,000 could be the nicest house in town in 90% of the country. Big cities it would take a few million to really step up. Just for grins lets say 1 million, new house for parents - 500K, one more for vacations - 1 million. $110,300,000 left.
Don't have a boat yet?? Sure why not - $300,000. $110,000,000 left.
New plane? Don't bother, just buy a share of a Lear Jet so you can fly wherever, whenever, pilot included. $250K down, average usage $250K/year. Say 1 mil. $109,000,000 left.
OK, now, since you think I'm being cheap,,,, double everything. $ 105,000,000 left. Whew.
$105,000,000 at 5%. (I know not a great return, but let's just play it safe) = $5,250,000 per year in interest. Tell your accountant to just wire that into your checking account every Friday. How much? $100,961. a week. Every week. $14,400 every day. What would you spend it on? Food? Movies? Gas for your cars? My point here is most people have no concept of how much money this really is.
Now we haven't spent anything on investments, but if we do, it will just give more money every day. We can't spend what we have. How would you spend your day? Spending money? Even the clothes, cars, and shoehogs among us would get tired of it pretty soon. You have to have some time to enjoy the boat, cars, planes and vacations sometimes.
OK, next. Charitable foundations. You can give anonymously. Even hire someone to research lots of cool causes. Lets say you take half of the remaining money after buying everytrhing you can think of. $52,000,000. By law, a charitable foundation must give away 5% of its asset value each year to keep its status. $2,600,000. That is a lot of 10K scholarships, $100k buildings, etc. Every year. How many new buildings does the ASPCA need? Girl scouts, boy scouts, church, humane society, etc.
I know this used to happen to us when people wanted to give money to small local charities. Your local humane society has a budget of around say, $100,000 a year. What would they do with a million? I can tell you, they say no thanks, we'll just take $100,000. A lot of charities will lose their government support if they accept too large of gifts.
Of course, now you would have to live off, $50,000 a week.
And remember, we haven't touched the principle so you better figure out who you are going to leave it all to when you die. Damn. Maybe I'll just spend it instead.
Remember, buying 'stuff' is just trading one type of asset for another. The only way you can just get rid of the money is to spend it on food, travel, and/or recreational drugs, and 'personal services'.
Yes, I do know two guys who are billionaires. They cannot spend all their money. But damn, they try. Every Fourth of July they have everybody over to their houses on the beach and spend $25,000 on fireworks. It is better than the town sponsored show.
These guys are self-made and enjoy the hell out of it. Nobody seems to think they should just give their money away. ???
Why do you think most people just withdraw --- having that much money can really be a pain in the ass. You don't even think about somebody kidnapping you or your kids now, you would if you had $100Mil.
Anyway, just some food for thought.