Easy Come, Easy Go for Idealistic Heirs

ANNE GLICKMAN, 34, inherited several million dollars in stock on her 18th birthday. She preferred not to think or talk about the money into her 20s because, she said, as a political activist, her wealth was a bit inconvenient.

“I felt like I was in hiding,” she said.

A dozen years later, the trust fund had grown to eight figures. “Here I was, an activist thinking about class and race, but I wasn’t really factoring in my own personal wealth,” she said. “I decided to give away a large number. It was scary, but I just had to do it.”

So far, Ms. Glickman said, she has given away $1.2 million, and she plans to give away more.

Her mother was not thrilled. “I was shocked,” Francie Glickman said. “I had never heard of such a thing. My response was, ‘That’s a lot of money!’ ”

Anne Glickman is part of a movement of relatively young heirs who practice what they call social justice philanthropy, an outgrowth of ’60s activism that emphasizes giving to small, local groups. Karen Pittelman, 32, a singer in a punk band, said she inherited $3.5 million seven years ago and gave away all but $15,000. Jamie Schweser, 35, an author of the novel “Tales of a Punk Rock Nothing,” said he inherited $1 million eight years ago and gave away three quarters of it.

While most of these philanthropists do not give away their entire fortune, they do give away enough to violate a cardinal rule of wealth management: don’t touch the principal. Heirs are often advised to give away only a percentage of any investment income, and to leave the rest alone.

What motivates people to give away so much of their money? Short of donating a kidney to a stranger, it is hard to imagine acting more altruistically. Is it simply a sense of justice? Guilt? Rebellion? In interviews with almost two dozen of these philanthropists, the reasons given were complex, often having as much to do with family dynamics as politics.

For Anne Glickman, the decision was not about trying to live an ascetic life. “I’m not an antimaterialist,” she said. “I don’t believe you shouldn’t have a nice TV. But people said, ‘What about your unborn children?’ And at the time I think I was sitting on $12 million. I mean, how much do you need to raise children?”

Tyrone Boucher, 25, said he told his father he wanted to donate his six-figure trust fund to groups that work for racial equality. As part of his argument, he pointed to the growing gap between the rich and the poor.

His father, he said, responded: “ ‘Tyrone, we’re not really rich. There are people who have multiple homes and private jets.’

“And I’d say, ‘But the thing is, you’re talking about your friends who are in the top 1 percent, and we’re in the top 5 percent.’

“The point isn’t to dis my dad,” he added. “The point is, what’s enough?”

Many donors said these conversations were the first they had with their parents about what it means to have money. A reluctance to discuss wealth, therapists and psychologists said, happens in every generation.

“It’s the most taboo of subjects,” said Judith Stern Peck, director of the Money, Values and Family Life Project at the Ackerman Institute for the Family in New York. “Parents don’t talk about it for a myriad of reasons — because they don’t want to spoil their children, because it might touch on a host of other things that are also difficult to talk about. Or perhaps because there might be contradictions between what they say their values are and what they do with their money.”

And the taboo, said Dr. Jim Grubman, a psychologist and frequent consultant to wealthy families, leaves a vacuum. Then these heirs receive millions of dollars, “at which point,” he said, “they’re often struggling to establish an identity, struggling to understand and handle the money, struggling to cope with economic differences in the world that have begun to generate guilt or entitlement, or both.”

Groups like the nonprofit Resource Generation offer programs and seminars for wealthy adults under 35. Participants describe the meetings as something like a support group.

“But the point is not to be like, O.K., now I can feel good about myself,” Mr. Boucher said. “The point is to be like, O.K., now that I can stop hating myself I’m going to do something.”

In that way, these philanthropists can seem motivated as much by guilt as by altruism. “When the money was suddenly in my name and I really came to grips with my privilege and class background, the denial came apart,” Mr. Schweser remembered. “I realized: I am literally the Man.”

Mr. Schweser gave the bulk of his trust fund to small nonprofit groups like Critical Resistance, which tries to prevent the construction of new prisons. He also helped start the Gulf South Allied Funders, which helps areas devastated by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Ms. Pittelman started a foundation to support a variety of grass-roots groups in Boston.

Some philanthropy experts argue that this kind of giving is important because it does not demand guaranteed success.

“Social change takes a long time,” said Joe Voeller, a spokesman for the Ford Foundation, which has given Resource Generation three $100,000 grants since 2002. “Social justice philanthropy needs young donors who are not treating it as a passing fad but are committed to walking the walk.”

But others question whether philanthropy can fix entrenched social problems.

“Some change can occur through philanthropy, but at a certain point you need the political process and good policy,” said Patrick Rooney, director of research at the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University.

And financial planners wonder if political views and personal wealth should be so entwined.

“You have these young people gazing upon an event like Katrina, on the tide of human suffering, and they say, ‘I have a million dollars, how can I watch this?’ ” said Ron Gallen, a financial adviser on the Upper East Side whose clients include young heirs. “And the answer is, because you have to. You have to be able to watch these things and go on with your life, otherwise you’ll be broke.”

As generous as they are, most of the young philanthropists interviewed do not need to work; many depend on income from their investments or on help from their parents. And most are likely to inherit more money.

Yet they were quick to wave off suggestions that this cushion made parting with millions any easier. And they all said they intended to continue giving away the same percentage of their wealth. Still, one wonders if they will regret their generosity later.

“There’s not really a danger that they’re going to be cast into poverty,” said Lisa Leff, a financial consultant who works with philanthropists like Ms. Glickman. “The greater risk is that you make decisions not realizing that you will grow older and your interests will change. And I do know a couple people for whom youthful giving had unforeseen consequences.”

One example might be David Crocker, 59, a self-described child of the ’60s, who gave away much of his money to a Boston foundation he helped launch, the Haymarket People’s Fund.

“I don’t know if it’s because I’m older, having come a long way from where I was, but I see that it’s important for people to be kind to themselves and prudent with their financial resources,” said Mr. Crocker, reached by phone at his home in Santa Fe, N.M.

“That said, I don’t think I would do anything really differently. There have been financial repercussions for me, but it’s been O.K., because I really believe in the things I did.”

Mr. Crocker is a financial adviser.