Robert L Frank: Richistan

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Rich-i-stan n. 1. a new country located in the heart of America. 2. populated entirely by millionaires, most of whom acquired their wealth during the new Gilded Age of the past 20 years. 3. a country with a population larger than Belgium and Denmark. 4. typical citizens include “spud king” J. R. Simplot; hair stylist Sydell Miller, the new star of Palm Beach; and assorted oddball entrepreneurs. 5. a country that, with a little luck and pluck, you, too, could be a citizen of.

What inspired you to write this book at this time?

After I had been covering this beat for a while, I was at a yacht convention in Florida at the end of 2004. I was looking over the dock, and there were dozens and dozens of giant yachts all parked in this marina, and a yacht owner came over and he said to me, “You know you look at all these boats, and you think everyone in America is making loads of money. It’s like these people live in a different country.” And so that phrase, “it’s like these people live in a different county,” really stuck with me, and that’s kind of where I came up with the concept of Richistan.

What is the difference between lower Richistan and upper Richistan?

What I wanted to do is show that even if you have $10 million today, you may not feel rich. Certainly if you have $1 million today you may not feel rich. The reason for that is, No. 1, there are so many people richer than $1 million, that when you do have $1 million, you just don’t feel that special. The second reason is that the cost of things that wealthy people buy, whether it’s private school, the butler or the mansion in the Hamptons or Cabo or a new Ferrari, all these things have gone up vastly in price.

How does living in Richistan tend to shape someone’s views?

As far as what that world is like, the biggest surprise to me is how complicated your life gets when you become rich. There’s a story in the first chapter about a guy who needed five people to remove a mouse from his house. That to me just kind of summed up what life is like when you’re really rich.

Are there regional differences in Richistan, particularly in Northern California?

I think that in California wealth is more open, more accepted, more out there than it is in the rest of the country. In the Northeast, wealth is a little quieter. They don’t like quite so much to display their wealth, although they do, but not quite so much as California. So California is like the land of bling. New York is a close No. 2. Then, as you get to the middle of the country, wealth is a lot more quiet, it’s a lot more populist, and there’s a lot more concern about appearing to be bragging about your wealth.

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