Survey by law firm Withersworldwide sheds light on the worries of the world'f super-rich
Survey by law firm Withersworldwide sheds light on the worries of the world's super-rich Getty

"More money, more problems", goes the old saying and a new survey reveals there are a wealth of problems keeping the world's richest people awake at night.

For anybody who has ever wondered what it's like living in a "rich man's world" then the answer appears to be a life of worry - for instance about whether your children will grow up to be feckless, layabouts with an extravagant sense of entitlement.

Anyone who has seen the taste-free lives of youngsters on 'Rich kids of Instagram' or watched any videos by YouTube troll 'Lavish P,' will know this fear is well-founded.

Four and a half thousand rich people from around the world contributed to the survey titled: The meaning of wealth in the 21<sup>st century.

By the way, you were not invited to partake in the survey if you were not a multi-millionaire. To put that in some context, having $10m in the bank makes you merely "moderately wealthy".

For those with more than $10m, the second biggest worry was that all the cash would dull their children's desire to succeed because they would "lack the drive and ambition to get ahead".

This was more of a concern than marital breakdown, being suddenly left broke and investments failing unexpectedly. Those with less than $10m disposable ranked the indolence of off-spring as their fourth-biggest worry.

Withersworldwide partner Sarah Cormack said: "It is easy to see why the moderately wealthy don't worry about that as much. If they are worth around the $10 million mark realistically they are not well off enough to put their children in the position that they never have to work."

Both wealth groups were united in their uppermost concern: health, which of course money can't buy.

Meanwhile, for those whose wealth rests soley upon investments, the greatest source of tension in their lives is wealth itself.

So are the super-wealthy really living beneath a cloud of angst? According to Silicon Valley billionaire Tom Perkins, the wealthy are an "oppressed minority"; he likened the world's richest to Jews facing persecution under the Nazi regime.

"I would call attention to the parallels of fascist Nazi Germany to its war on its one percent, namely its Jews, to the progressive war on the American one percent, namely the rich."

Perkins later apologised for any offence caused but stood by his main point.