You can’t always get what you want, especially if it’s a massive inheritance.
In an interview with the Wall Street Journal this week, Mick Jagger said that the Rolling Stones have no plans to sell their formidable music catalog, despite artists like Justin Bieber and Katy Perry recently doing the very same thing to the tune of roughly $200 million each.
Jagger said the reason is simple: he doesn’t need the money, and his eight children don’t either.
“The children don’t need $500 million to live well. Come on,” he told the Journal, conceding that if he did sell he would likely give his share of the proceeds to charity. “You maybe do some good in the world.”
The 80-year-old rock star’s offspring range in age from 52-years-old to six.
Jagger’s approach towards leaving massive sums of money to his children is similar to that of other wealthy stars.
In 2021, “James Bond” actor Daniel Craig said he doesn’t plan on having a fortune to leave to his children by the time he dies, calling the practice “distasteful.”
“Isn’t there an old adage that if you die a rich person, you’ve failed?” Craig said at the time. “I think Andrew Carnegie gave away what in today’s money would be about $11 billion, which shows how rich he was because I’ll bet he kept some of it, too.”
Similarly, billionaire investor Warren Buffett has a long-held belief that his “incomprehensible” net worth would be better spent going toward philanthropic causes than into his kids’ investment portfolios.
“After much observation of super-wealthy families, here’s my recommendation: Leave the children enough so that they can do anything, but not enough that they can do nothing,” he said in a 2021 note to shareholders, adding that his own adult children “pursue philanthropic efforts that involve both money and time.”
In the interview, the “Sympathy for the Devil” singer noted that unorthodox moves he and the Stones made early in their career, such as embracing merchandise and branding and sponsorships, were smart business decisions in the long term.
“”One of the things I’m really proud of with the Stones is that we pioneered arena tours with their own stage, with their own sound and everything, and we also did the same with stadiums,” Jagger said. “I mean, nobody did a tour of stadiums.”
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