The Worst Cases Of 'Rich Kid Syndrome' People Have Ever Seen

Growing up with unlimited money can warp a person's perspective of the world.

Having everything handed to them, the concept of earning rewards or working hard becomes unfathomable. The ability to relate to the majority of the population is difficult.

Confronted with the word "no" for the first time is baffling when the answer has always been "yes."

Entitlement, tantrums and bullying often become the reactions for someone who has never had to develop coping skills due to a lack of adversity.

The term "rich kid syndrome" has become commonplace to describe young people struggling with the effects of their family's wealth after numerous high profile wealthy children had very public meltdowns including criminal activity.

Reddit user ThrowRAmagicia asked:

"What was the worst case of rich kid syndrome you've ever seen?"

Servants

"When I was at university I was friendly with a guy who lived on my floor who was from a rich family, like his family had villas in Spain and Italy as well as a big house in the countryside in the UK."

"He was actually quite a nice bloke, but he regularly came out with things that only a rich kid could say."

"He once tried to be relatable by mentioning how annoying it was when you didn't realize your cleaner or gardener were in the house and how awkward it was."

"Like, brother, most people just clean their own homes."

"As I said, he was quite a nice bloke, he wasn't being malicious but he was just so sheltered from what the average person has to go through."

~ killerkebab1499

Oblivious To Others

"Worked at a mine in Northern Canada. Owners delayed the cargo boat for 5 days, at millions of dollars in penalties, so that they and their friends could come and watch it come in."

"Disrupted everyone's leave because of it. When they finally got there, they decided to get drunk and missed the boat coming in."

"So millions of dollars down the drain, disrupting everyone's family life, just to act like morons and miss it."

~ Desalvo23

Pick Up After Yourself

"I used to live with a rich girl and you’d know whenever she’d been back to her country for holidays."

"She’d forget she didn’t have people picking up after her anymore and would leave a trail of mugs."

"And then get pissed that we weren’t cleaning up after ourselves. Like 'girl, they’re all yours!'."

~ idonteatcakes

Rich People Problems

"Ex friend of my wife, daughter of fairly wealthy business owner."

"This girl threw a hissy fit at a friendly gathering, complaining about how her father (CEO) had given her (VP of operations—honorary title) a $200K yearly bonus after she had already prepared her taxes."

"She was now going to have to go back to her accountant."

~ Sea_Ganache620

No Concept Of Prices

"The most recent one that sticks out was from a friend who's a drum teacher at a fancy private school."

"He's not technically employed by the school, so he bills the parents directly."

"Went to check his account and found a few more 0s than there should be in his teaching account.

"Turned out he'd accidentally billed one set of parents 40,000 instead of 400 and they just paid it anyway."

~ Seruvius

Tantrums

"I worked at an upmarket boarding school for a while, living in the girls dormitory as a dorm matron. One of the girls was (we suspected) the daughter of a Russian oligarch and was obscenely wealthy and badly behaved."

"One of the biggest social events of the school year was a winter ball, and the girls had their dresses planned months in advance. The oligarch's daughter had a designer gold dress that she told everyone who would listen about how it cost 6k. Bear in mind she was just barely 14."

"Anyway, a couple weeks before the ball she did something truly heinous, and I ended up grounding her from attending the ball. Oh boy, the tantrums and attempted manipulations the next two weeks were absolutely bonkers, but I'm not budging."

"She ended up cutting the dress into ribbons and throwing it in the dumpster in order to 'punish me'. Unfortunately for her I'm not her real mum and didn't pay for it, so I didn't care."

~ lil_poundcake

Rich People Solutions

"It happened recently with another adult at the charity organisation I work at. It's a charity organisation so the money is sh*t."

"That means either you're in poverty or you have a rich partner/parents usually."

"I was talking to a colleague who is also from another country and told her I wasn't going home for Christmas. A flight to my home country for Christmas would've been like $1,500 USD."

"Just too much for me to spend right now. First Christmas without my family."

"My colleague was confused and asked why my family didn't all just fly out here then."

~ bigdreams_littled

Drive

"I knew someone in college who is the heir to a company most Americans and Canadians would recognize. He drove a Mercedes as his 'school' car because at home he simply had a driver."

"Every semester when it came time to return to class, his butler would drive his school car to campus, and his driver would drive him to campus."

"The driver and butler stuck around for a day or two to unpack him and get him 'settled', then the driver and butler drove back to his house."

~ Radiant_Maize2315

Wreck

"Kid was angry because his parents bought him a new high end BMW instead of a Mercedes."

"He intentionally wrecked the BMW."

~ Coyote3855

"I knew a girl in high school who got a brand new BMW for her 16th."

"She promptly wrecked it and was rewarded with another brand new BMW."

~ Radiant_Maize2315

Rebellion Without Consequences

"I knew a guy in law school whose dad wanted him to continue the family tradition and go to Harvard law. He even offered him a Mercedes if he would go to Harvard."

"But this guy decided to rebel and go to a different Ivy League law school. So he turned down the car and told his father off at a work function honoring him."

"And he expected from me (1) pity and (2) admiration for being his own man.

"Instead I just thought he was stupid for turning down a car and Harvard and dissing his dad at a function. Silly me!"

~ Plain_Chacalaca

Small Change

"I had a roommate in Uni who threw her change away. Anything under £5 would go straight to the bin."

"I put a 'change drawer' in the hallway outside her room, and we threw an end-of-year party with the funds."

"One can hope it taught her that even coins have value, too, but I doubt she changed her ways entirely."

~ listenspace

Story Time

"My old job did this event in Minnesota, where all accountants had to attend to learn about the company’s culture and stuff."

"So we were all sitting down at tables and they decided to do a workshop exercise where they scattered all the accountants into random groups and gave us these cards with questions we had to answer; as a fun exercise."

"Everything was fine up until one girl pulled out the question, 'What was the worst thing you have experienced, and how did you handle it?' So accountants at the table were going in turns to talk about different things, passings of parents/spouses, addiction, sickness, divorces…..etc.."

"I kid you not, this 21-year-old Kyle said this when it was his turn, 'Yeah my dad is a pilot and my mom is a surgeon and I’m a lonely child. So on my birthday, I usually travel the world, and one time, when I was in Japan, I tried Kobe Beef for the first time, and it was amazing'."

"'When I went back to the US, I had an argument with a restaurant owner because they were also serving kobe beef but I knew he was scamming the customers because actual Kobe Beef is not legitimate unless they are prepared in Japan'."

"'They kicked me out of the restaurant and I was never kicked out from anywhere'."

"Everyone was quite stunned and speechless, then one lady said she is not in the mood to continue the game after he was done."

~ Itward_

No Pizza!

"I went to high school in a working class neighborhood. Most of the students were middle class, and most of my friends were on the lower end of that scale."

"One girl I hung out with was smoking hot. She started dating a guy from a nearby private school."

"One night a bunch of us went to Pizza Hut and she brought him along, first time most of us had met him. He had no idea what Pizza Hut was or what they served."

"We had to explain the place to him and he actually said, 'I've heard of pizza, never tried it'."

"Dude was in high-school and never had pizza. Apparently, the only restaurants he had ever been to were high end fine dining places."

~ Deitaphobia

Fines Are Fees You Pay To Break The Law

"Me: 'You can't park here, it's a handicapped space!'."

"Them: 'That just means it costs $250 to park here'."

"And that's when I realized fines should scale to income."

~ BlindOnARocketcycle

"At my college, each on-campus parking ticket was double the amount of the prior ticket, e.g. $20, $40, $80, etc..."

"This policy was adopted because a former student, who was the daughter of a rich movie star, parked wherever she wanted, whenever she wanted: handicap spaces, fire lanes, reserved."

"She did not care. Dad would just pay."

"When she got fines for over $5,000, it finally got her attention."

~ Early_Worm_Gets_Bird

Disposable Income

"I knew a kid who threw out his clothes after he wore them. He legit didn’t understand the concept of washing clothes."

"When he came to college he had a copy of his parents Amex platinum card. He would literally stop by a store after school and buy clothes for the next few days."

~ johnnyglass

"Reminds me of I girl I knew; Saudi on a foreign student exchange."

"She did the same thing, but with cars."

"True, she did not drive all too often, but once the fuel was out it was a time for a new car."

~ PovBy899

Affluenza is another term that has cropped up in the last few decades after it was famously used as a defense in several criminal cases.

Lawyers claimed their client's social status caused them to not understand the full ramifications of their actions.

The Affluenza Defense states a wealthy person isn't criminally liable for their actions because they’re rich.

What examples of rich kid syndrome have you seen?