Nuanced Selfishness
With an upcoming lake cabin purchase and investments in Montana, it’s time to start reading about what’s happening in the modern west. Teton County WY is where *the billionaires price the millionaires out of the market. * Farrell’s book is a long winded expose on the rich acting selfishly. Even charitable activities, especially environmental conservation, are either directly linked to tax benefits, or indirectly only a select few with the resources to benefit. This creates a charitable industrial complex where issues around social services for those in need are considered buzzkill causes and ignored.
Most interesting was when Farrell described the mindset of the wealthy, and specifically how they view society’s views of themselves. One respondant tells of three misconceptions of the ultrawealthy:
- The ultraweathy aren’t deserving people
- The ultrawealthy aren’t integrated into the community like normal people
- The ultrawealthy deserve to be taken advantage of The allure of rural Wyoming is the appeal of normalcy, where the ultrarich can convince themselves they are normal. After finding success, many wonder *“Oh my god, what have I sacrificed in life to get to where I am?” * and the remedy is to buy (or better yet build) a mansion in the wilderness and pretend to be a member of the idealized rural working class where money doesn’t matter.
Yet Farrel seems too caught up pointing out the inconsistencies in the ultrawealthy’s world view to completely understand it. He states that the ultrawealthy are mostly numb to the criticism that surrounds them but there’s a difference between numbness and willful ignorance, something Ta-Nehisi Coates explains much more effectively.
Billionaire wilderness isn’t a great way to understand Teton county, or a great way to understand the ultrawealthy, even if it does find occasional insight from the interviews.
89th book of 2021 2.5 Stars