[CaptHayfever]

Money Can't Buy Happiness, So Man Gives Away Every Penny of His £3 Million Fortune - Neatorama

Money Can't Buy Happiness, So Man Gives Away Every Penny of His £3 Million Fortune
By Alex in Money & Finance on Feb 10, 2010 at 2:05 am

Karl Rabeder grew up poor and thought that life would be wonderful if he had money. But when he got rich, Karl discovered that he was unhappy … so he decided to give away every penny of his £3 million fortune:

"My idea is to have nothing left. Absolutely nothing," he told The Daily Telegraph. "Money is counterproductive – it prevents happiness to come."

Instead, he will move out of his luxury Alpine retreat into a small wooden hut in the mountains or a simple bedsit in Innsbruck.

His entire proceeds are going to charities he set up in Central and Latin America, but he will not even take a salary from these.

"For a long time I believed that more wealth and luxury automatically meant more happiness," he said. "I come from a very poor family where the rules were to work more to achieve more material things, and I applied this for many years," said Mr Rabeder.

But over time, he had another, conflicting feeling.

"More and more I heard the words: ‘Stop what you are doing now – all this luxury and consumerism – and start your real life’," he said. "I had the feeling I was working as a slave for things that I did not wish for or need. I have the feeling that there are lot of people doing the same thing."

What do you think? Is he doing the right thing or is this just a crazy idea of a rich man?

One of the commenters thinks he might be doing it to dodge a tax bill, though I can't imagine how that plan works unless the UK has a tax bracket over 100%.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"