Many of personal finance bloggers do not have formal financial education, and I am no exception. Therefore, I can never imagine what will be taught in a $5,000-entrance-fee retreat aming at boosting the financial skills of kids from super-rich families. WSJ Robert Frank reported the dismal outcome: only a few of the silver spoons "could explain the difference between a stock and a mutual fund."
Here is Robert's conclusion of the growing niche of financial education for the rich kids:
"When I got to the Skills Retreat, I thought it would confirm my worst fears about growing inequality. Here was a camp designed specifically to help rich kids get richer (or at least, keep them from getting poorer). It was yet another way for the children of wealth to get a leg up on members of the middle class, who can't afford financial education camps and won't have big inheritances to carry them through life.
Yet after two days, I realized I was wrong. Today's rich kids may be cash-rich, but many are skills-poor, with little chance of growing their wealth or landing top jobs. Raised in a bubble of privilege and insulated from the competitive pressures of the everyday world, many tend to have low self-confidence, little drive and few of the necessary tools to succeed in today's global economy. Only a few of the kids, for instance, could explain the difference between a stock and a mutual fund.
In the end, I concluded that these kids wouldn't be tomorrow's chief executives and billionaire entrepreneurs. Most would probably drift through life spending their parents' money and hoping it would last. Tomorrow's economic superstars will more likely come from the striving middle class, just as they have for much of American history.
And all that inherited wealth will wind up going to people who actually earned it -- an encouraging sign for those of us worried about the wealth gap."
Should I feel blessed? At least, my 6-year-old can do three-figure additions and substractions in his little head now.
