Ask Lemmy

If I were “influence the government” rich I’d probably start an organization designed to facilitate and encourage the spread of cooperatively owned businesses by providing loans to unions to purchase stock in their employers and by loaning money to start cooperatively owned businesses.

I’d also probably lobby the government for more protections of individual rights and environmental protections and more human focused urban development prioritizing shared mass transit and bicycles over cars.

Lifestyle, I’d stick to a middle class life. I don’t need things to be particularly nice to be happy, just more time with the people I love and the ability to partake in community

It depends how rich

If by rich you mean what a child would consider a lot of money, i dont think i could do much with 100€

If by rich you mean infinite money, i would try to buy all companies and politicians i can, make money worthless in as many countries as i can and attempt to achieve anarcho-posadism or something similar

If I was a rich man, the only thing that would really change is the anxiety of losing my job and not being able to pay rent would go away.

Move to a different country

if I was billionaire rich, I would buy companies that provide essential services and make them non profits.

buy useful tech services and convert them to non profits without advertising. e. g. YouTube etc.

lobby to ensure environment protection laws are made to protect the environment and not profits.

stop government subsidies on anything that's bad for the environment. meat. fossil fuels.

Buy secluded land and build a prep retreat/bunker just in case. Then take some time, hire a team, and map out a path to first taking over the Democratic party, maybe rebrand, then a path to taking over the government and updating the Constitution.

Have a child / children. Invest in my community. Help my parents retire. Get another dog. Buy the fancy chocolates. Probably join some sort of workout class for my own health.

If I were just a little rich, I would work less, and spend more time traveling.

If I were rich (but not rich-rich) I would retire, move further away from the city, and make my own saw mill. Also spend more time traveling.

If I were rich-rich, I would fund Vasalgel, lobby for that project to make mosquitoes extinct, and fund a few low budget films per year, outside of Hollywood. I don't know where I would move, but I would probably still travel more.

Hunt other rich men for sport, and have my very expensive team of lawyers keep me out of prison.

Grab that cash with both hands and make a stash

New car, caviar, four star, daydream

Think I'd buy me a football team

Obligatory.

All day long, I'd biddy biddy bum

If I were a wealthy man

I would buy up as many apartments as possible and lower the rent below market value, this driving other landlords to compete. Since they could not maintain a "sustainable" business model with their profit driven mindset, they would sell and I would buy. I would still seek a modest profit, which would be rolled into further acquisitions to further infect the market with sanity. It would be a McDonald's or Walmart approach to housing, positive effect by volume and low margins, but actually provide an undeniably good product.

I would also work with local businesses to offer discounts to residents of the apartments and employees of other businesses that also wish to partner, with the end goal of creating incentive to shop local and increase foot traffic, and therefore profits for those small businesses.

I would find residents who would be interested in starting a business, startup costs covered by my organization, and outcompetes with businesses who do not wish to be our partner. I would endeavor to provide free childcare and animal daycare/boarding. Ideally a pseudo private and free school system could be established to further promote the ideals of the community. Ideally provide free therapy. Ideally offer scholarships to traditional higher education or trade schools. Ideally create a system to help homeless people get back on their feet.

Overall the end goal would be to keep as much money within the local economy and maintain businesses that embody the values which create a healthy local economy, lower the costs of living, and restore the community to a healthy social state.

Or maybe I'll just start a sex cult in the woods.

I'd donate to cancer research. You never know when it's gonna hit you and I'd rather die knowing I did something to help cure it.

To me "rich" means someone whose passive income exceeds their spending.

So if I was rich I'd stop working and instead pursue my personal interests. Ideally I'd buy a property somewhere remote and close to water with a lot of land and start building a homestead of some sort.

disappear from radar

do random acts of charity

buy senators and media to support climate change and education

make a competing big cheapo pharma

redirect fame/blame to paid actors

Build a sweet ass house with a wizard's tower.

We have this really cool cafe in my city where you can buy buttons when you eat there, like 20 bucks worth, and people who can't afford to buy food can come take six buttons and use them to get a hot meal. I would subsidize the fuck out of it and hopefully open other locations so we could help as many as possible.

I'd tell ya what I'd do, man.

Honestly I would only want two things, to not have to worry about money and to live where I want. So much stress and thinking goes into money that I think I would be quite relaxed if I didn’t have to think about it except for investments. I also wouldn’t have to worry about home security or how my pets are taken care of. For living where I want, my job and family takes me around the a world. I wish I had a small place in each location :)

Oh darling, if I had real money, I would use it to sow chaos and undermine the world's financial markets.

But most of all, if I have to live in this bullsh!t cyberpunk reality, we might as well have shadowrunners/Edgerunners/mercs. So I'd recruit as many paramilitary mercenaries as I could find and set them on the task of sabotaging critical corporate infrastructure, kidnapping any oligarchs we could find vulnerabilities for, and doing brazen, overt terrorism kind of stuff.

The idea being if I can cause enough chaos perhaps the people of the world might finally have enough and force change for the ultra wealthy.

It depends, how rich? Millions? Billions?

I would fix the gym/auditorium at my old high school (the drama club has to share it with all of the sports teams and PE, and all of drama’s stuff gets broken or stolen) so that drama has their own space.

Buy a place in Montreal. Try to do random acts of kindness on randos where I can. You can't generally change the world, but you can make personal impact.

Not go to work and sleep for about a year before I figure out what I really want to do.

Edit: move to Finland first.

I'd fund online counter propaganda campaigns. Drown out the voices of the troll farms attacking our democracies.

• Get a house with a garden (backyard)
• Start my own laptop/desktop line
• Obtain and maintain a naturally aspirated manual V12 Aston Martin

Pay the debts of myself and all my close friends.

House with a yard is already a check for me but I have a neighbour on both sides. I want a standing house.

Then I'd invest a lot in art, my own and others. Work less, play more. See the sights. Meet people.

You didn't say how much, from lowest to highest income level:

Retire

Help every homeless person in my city, then my county, my province.

Order or build locally, tiny homes for all the homeless in my city. Expand outwards if I had money left.

Buy the local power corp and run it as a nonprofit.

2 chicks at the same time

If I were a rich man, Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba deedle deedle dum. All day long I'd biddy biddy bum. If I were a wealthy man. I wouldn't have to work hard. Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba deedle deedle dum. If I were a biddy biddy rich, Yidle-diddle-didle-didle man.

I'd build a big tall house with rooms by the dozen, Right in the middle of the town. A fine tin roof with real wooden floors below. There would be one long staircase just going up, And one even longer coming down, And one more leading nowhere, just for show.

I'd fill my yard with chicks and turkeys and geese and ducks For the town to see and hear. And each loud "cheep" and "swaqwk" and "honk" and "quack" Would land like a trumpet on the ear, As if to say "Here lives a wealthy man."

If I were a rich man, Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba deedle deedle dum. All day long I'd biddy biddy bum. If I were a wealthy man. I wouldn't have to work hard. Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba deedle deedle dum. If I were a biddy biddy rich, Yidle-diddle-didle-didle man.

I see my wife, my Golde, looking like a rich man's wife With a proper double-chin. Supervising meals to her heart's delight. I see her putting on airs and strutting like a peacock. Oy, what a happy mood she's in. Screaming at the servants, day and night.

The most important men in town would come to fawn on me! They would ask me to advise them, Like a Solomon the Wise. "If you please, Reb Tevye..." "Pardon me, Reb Tevye..." Posing problems that would cross a rabbi's eyes! And it won't make one bit of difference if i answer right or wrong. When you're rich, they think you really know!

If I were rich, I'd have the time that I lack To sit in the synagogue and pray. And maybe have a seat by the Eastern wall. And I'd discuss the holy books with the learned men, several hours every day. That would be the sweetest thing of all.

If I were a rich man, Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba deedle deedle dum. All day long I'd biddy biddy bum. If I were a wealthy man. I wouldn't have to work hard. Ya ha deedle deedle, bubba bubba deedle deedle dum. Lord who made the lion and the lamb, You decreed I should be what I am. Would it spoil some vast eternal plan? If I were a wealthy man...