Winning The Lottery Is A Blessing And A Curse

Ric Edelman, the personal finance expert, on his Sunday morning show in October 2018 on New York's WCBS News Radio Eight-Eighty spoke about the headaches that come with winning the lottery: greedy relatives, relatives you didn't know you had, resentful co-workers, criminals who will know your identity and location, the need to hire security personnel, etc. And if you decide to give the money to friends and relatives, there is a hefty gift tax you have to pay. So winning the lottery can be both a blessing and a curse.

Humphrey Bogart's F.Y. Fund

In 1934, Humphrey Bogart starred on Broadway as a gangster in Robert Sherwood's The Petrified Forest. The play (later to become a movie also starring Bogart) was so successful, it allowed Bogart to put aside some money in what he called the F.Y. fund. (The F.Y. no doubt stood for Fuck You.) The F.Y. fund, writes Stefan Kanfer in Tough Without a Gun: The Life and Afterlife of Humphrey Bogart (Vintage Books/Random House, 2011), was "money that would give him the freedom to spurn trivial roles from now on."

We should all follow Bogart's example and establish a F.Y. fund. It would be the perfect safety net.