Anderson Cooper Says He Won’t Leave His Son An Inheritance

September 27, 2021 / Posted by:

Anderson Cooper is from money. Old, old money. His great-great-great maternal grandfather was Cornelius “The Commodore” Vanderbilt, who built a railroad and shipping empire, has a university named after him, and was worth $105 million at the time of his 1877 death. Experts determined that Cornelius’ fortune would be worth about $143 billion in modern times, making the Vanderbilt patriarch the second richest person in U.S. history (some old Rockefeller was #1).

Anderson has written a new book about his family’s history, entitled, Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty, and over the weekend he went on the Morning Meeting podcast to talk about the book, money, and his 1-year-old son, Wyatt. Unfortunately for Wyatt, Anderson shared that he will not be leaving him an inheritance, because it’s not something he believes in. Well, at least he gave the kid a head’s up. There will be no threats of, “Wyatt, clean the east wing of your bedroom or you’ll be written out of my will, posthaste!”

Here’s what Anderson said, via Page Six: 

“I don’t believe in passing on huge amounts of money,” the CNN anchor, 54, told Air Mail’s Ashley Baker and Michael Hainey on Saturday’s episode of their “Morning Meeting” podcast.

“I don’t know what I’ll have,” Cooper added of his fortune, which is estimated to be $200 million. “I’m not that interested in money, but I don’t intend to have some sort of pot of gold for my son. I’ll go with what my parents said … ‘College will be paid for, and then you gotta get on it.’”

In a 2014 interview, Anderson told Howard Stern that his mother, Gloria Vanderbilt, made it clear to him that there was no trust fund coming his way. He added that he didn’t believe in inheriting money because “it’s a curse.” When his mother died in 2019, Anderson inherited less than $1.5 million from her estate. Well, that’s not nothing. But I guess when you’re already worth $200 million it’s chump change.

On the podcast, Anderson said that, as a kid, he realized his family was different when his father took him to Grand Central Station to show him the statue of Cornelius Vanderbilt. He joked:

“I just remember coming away [from] it believing for quite some time that all grandparents turned into statues when they die.”

Naw, just the richies and the racists.

As for Wyatt, that kid better squeeze all the nepotism he can outta his silver fox daddy if he’s gonna follow in his family’s financial footsteps. I’m sure it won’t be very difficult. “Daddy dearest, may I please have a top executive position in television with a starting salary of six… nay, seven figures?” “Sure kid, but you won’t get a penny from me!”

Pic: Instagram

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