A few weeks ago, I was chatting with some families at Martha’s Vineyard – the summer playground for America’s elite – when the issue of private jets cropped up. One mother winced. Like most of her ilk (glamorous multi-millionaires, who both inherited and created their wealth), her extended family has often used private jets to hop across America’s vast landscape. But now she is having second thoughts.
The reason? Earlier this year, she overheard one of her child’s friends pompously state that he “hated flying commercial, because he didn’t like sharing a plane with strangers”. That prompted her to wonder if her children might face a backlash if they uttered such sentiments too. So these days she urges her family to fly “commercial”, at least on holiday, “to teach my kids to blend in”.
Maybe this family is the exception among America’s elite. But I suspect not. These days, the issue of wealth and conspicuous consumption in particular is generating an unusual level of angst. In theory, America is a country that has long admired the pursuit of riches. After all, it is a core tenet of the American dream that anybody who is smart and hard-working will thrive. Thus, wealth has been seen as a badge of success to be admired, not a reason for rage.