Looking through my Venmo transactions, it’s obvious that requests for comically small amounts of money are almost always made by friends who were born with or make more money than me.
The experience is curious and seemingly universal.
“Rich people love Venmo asking you $4.72 for half a bagel because they have no concept of money and don’t understand that working class people operate in a buy-a-beer economy to someone”, muses an X user.
“Friend who makes $450,000 as a software engineer: ‘Can you Venmo me $3.62 for your share of the Uber ride?’” another wrote.
Susan Bradley, founder of the Sudden Money Institute, coaches clients who have quickly or unexpectedly received large sums of money on how to get out of destitute status.
The phenomenon of the rich friend being the stingiest seems true, she says: “People who have more money than their peers have a hard time being generous.”
“They are without equal”
If a person knows they’re in a higher income bracket than their friends, they’ll likely feel isolated or “othered,” Bradley says.
“People who have a lot more (money) have a smaller population to have as peers,” she says. “So in some ways they are second to none.”
Because their money is what sets them apart from their friends, they begin to believe that their money is Why they have friends.
“They don’t want to be taken advantage of or think, ‘I have money and that’s why people hang out with me,'” Bradley says. “It seems very debilitating.”
These insecurities manifest themselves in a Venmo request for $4.
“If someone is using Venmo cheaply, that means they’re not feeling well,” Bradley says.
If someone uses the low-dollar Venmo, it means they’re not feeling well.
Susan Bradley
Founder of the Sudden Money Institute
“With more wealth comes a greater focus on transactional relationships”
Being economically unrivaled also means you might struggle to feel a sense of community, says Hal Hershfield, a professor at the Anderson School of Management at the University of California, Los Angeles. Hershfield studies the psychology of long-term decision-making.
“With more wealth comes a greater focus on transactional relationships, which could then develop into relationships that should be community-based,” Hershfield says.
Let’s say you move. If you are trying to save money, you can ask for help from a few friends. This favor signals a communal relationship.
If you make enough money to pay the movers, then this experience becomes transactional.
Soon, you might start seeing the world in a more transactional way, he says, and that will spill over into your friendships.
If a friend Venmoes you for a small amount of money, Bradley suggests doing two things: paying it, then asking if anything else is going on with them.
“If they do this, it’s a way of not being exploited,” she says. “It could be something in the past with longer legs that hasn’t been addressed. They don’t care about the $4.”
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