Celebrity Parents Who Won’t Spoil Their Kids With Huge Inheritances

There are many benefits to having a famous parent. Just imagine getting to go on elaborate vacations and attend fancy parties, not to mention, having access to concerts, film sets, and other VIP spots (we’re just a little jealous, OK?). But for some celebrities, the perks stop there.

Recently, a slew of stars have claimed they aren’t including their children in their wills or otherwise leaving them fortunes when they die. After all, these stars worked hard for their money, and they expect their kids to make their own way in life — instead of just banking on mom or dad’s successes.

Many of these celebrities, such as Mila Kunis, Ashton Kutcher and Sting, don’t want to spoil their kids. Others, like Bill Gates, plan on leaving the vast majority of their fortune to charitable causes, while leaving only a small portion (relatively speaking, that is) to their offspring.

If this seems surprising to you, it is actually a pretty common move among high earners. A recent study by the financial website The Motley Fool of individuals worth at least $1 million found that 67 percent are worried about leaving too much money to their kids one day. The reason: Parents fear their children will not spend their money wisely or are concerned that inheritances would make their children lazy and unmotivated.

While it may seem harsh to cut children out of a will, these celebrity parents are doing so out of love. They want their children to grow up with a healthy view of money, a drive to work hard and achieve their own goals, and a heart for giving back to others less fortunate. It’s actually pretty noble if you think about it! Read more about these famous parents — and their reasons — for not leaving their kids a lifetime inheritance.

A version of this article was originally published in Nov 2021.

Guy Fieri

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Food Network star and restaurant owner Guy Fieri has an ultimatum for his sons and nephew who he helped raise after his sister passed. If they want a piece of the Flavortown fortune, they have to get two degrees.

“I’ve told them the same thing my dad told me. My dad says, ‘When I die, you can expect that I’m going to die broke, and you’re going to be paying for the funeral.’” Fieri said in 2023. “And I told my boys, ‘None of this that…I’ve been building are you going to get unless you come and take it from me.’”

At the time, his older son Hunter and his nephew Jules were following suit, pursuing an MBA and law degree respectively.

Meanwhile, his son Ryder — who was a senior in high school — was unpleased.

“Dad, this is so unfair,” the teen reportedly said. “I haven’t even gone to college yet, and you’re already pushing that I’ve got to get an MBA? Can I just get through college?”
Mick Jagger

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In Sept 2023, Mick Jagger revealed that he intends to donate his $500 million fortune to charity rather than his eight children. When asked about this during his interview with the Wall Street Journal, he joked, “The children don’t need $500 million to live well. Come on.”
Marie Osmond

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Former talk show host and singer Marie Osmond has made it very clear that her children won’t benefit from her fortune.

“Honestly, why would you enable your child to not try to be something? I don’t know anybody who becomes anything if they’re just handed money,” Osmond told Us Weekly on Jan. 10, 2023. “To me, the greatest gift you can give your child is a passion to search out who they are inside and to work.”

The Donnie and Marie star is mom to Stephen with Steve Craig. She shares and Jessica, Rachael, Brandon, Brianna, Matthew, Abigail, and Michael, who died by suicide in 2010, with ex Brian Blosil. She wants her kids to pursue their dreams like she did.

Osmond continued, “I mean, I’ve done so many things from designing dolls [and much more]. I love trying [and] I wanna try everything. I’m a finisher. That’s one of my rules with my kids. If you start it, you finish it, you don’t ever have to do it again, but you gotta finish. And, I just think all [an inheritance] does is breed laziness and entitlement. I worked hard and I’m gonna spend it all and have fun with my husband [Steve Craig, whom I remarried in 2011].”

This isn’t the first time she’s opened up about not leaving her kids money.

“Congratulations, kids,” she said while co-hosting The Talk in March 2020. “My husband and I decided that you do a great disservice to your children to just hand them a fortune because you take away the one most important gift you can give your children, and that’s the ability to work.”

She added, “You see it a lot in rich families, where the kids don’t know what to do so they get in trouble, so I just let them be proud of what they make.”
Anderson Cooper

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Anderson Cooper, who told “The Morning Meeting” podcast in September 2021, “I don’t believe in passing on huge amounts of money. 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, which is, ‘College will be paid for, and then you got to get on it.”

He shares sons Wyatt and Cooper with ex Benjamin Maisani.
Bill Gates

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He may be a billionaire — and one of the richest men in the world — but that doesn’t mean Bill Gates wants to leave his entire fortune to his kids, Jennifer, Rory, and Phoebe. In a 2017 Reddit AMA, Gates said, “I definitely think leaving kids massive amounts of money is not a favor to them. Warren Buffett was part of an article in Fortune talking about this in 1986 before I met him, and it made me think about it and decide he was right.”

A lot of his fortune will go to charitable causes. In a previous TED Talk, Gates explained that he wants to “strike a balance where they have the freedom to do anything but not a lot of money showered on them so they could go out and do nothing.”
Ashton Kutcher & Mila Kunis

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In an interview with Dax Shepherd for the “Armchair Expert” podcast in February 2018, Ashton Kutcher said that he and wife Mila Kunis, are not planning on leaving their kids Wyatt and Dimitri an inheritance.

“I’m not setting up a trust for them,” he said in the interview. “We’ll end up giving our money away to charity and to various things.”

Kutcher added, “My kids are living a really privileged life, and they don’t even know it. And they’ll never know it, because this is the only one that they’ll know.”

The actor said that he wants his kids to be resourceful and if they ever want to start a business, they have to have “a good business plan” for him to invest in it.

Likewise, in a 2017 interview with Entertainment Tonight, Kunis said the couple doesn’t want to “raise a**holes,” later adding that their Christmas tradition is “no presents for the kids.”
Gordon Ramsay

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Gordon Ramsey is famous for bringing the heat in the kitchen, but he also wants to light a fire under his kids to succeed. The British chef shares Megan, Holly Anna, Jack Scott, Tilly, and Oscar with wife Tana Ramsay.

In a 2017 interview with Telegraph Ramsay said of his fortune, “It’s definitely not going to them, and that’s not in a mean way; it’s to not spoil them. The only thing I’ve agreed with Tana is they get a 25 percent deposit on a flat, but not the whole flat.”

He added, “I’ve never been really turned on about the money. That’s not my number one objective, and that’s reflected in the way the kids are brought up.”

Additionally, if Ramsay’s kids ever want to follow his footsteps, they’ll have to find another kitchen. As he said in 2019, “You want to work in this business? You f**k off to another chef, learn something different and come back with something new to improve the business.”
Simon Cowell

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Before his son Eric was born in 2014, American Idol judge Simon Cowell said he planned on leaving his fortune to a charity. “I’m going to leave my money to somebody. A charity, probably — kids and dogs,” he told Mirror U.K. “I don’t believe in passing on from one generation to another.”
Daniel Craig

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James Bond star Daniel Craig has called inheritances “distasteful” throughout the years, most recently in an interview with Candis in August 2021.

“Isn’t there an old adage that if you die a rich person, you’ve failed?” Craig told the outlet. “I think Andrew Carnegie gave away what in today’s money would be about 11 billion dollars, which shows how rich he was because I’ll bet he kept some of it too. But I don’t want to leave great sums to the next generation. I think inheritance is quite distasteful. My philosophy is: get rid of it or give it away before you go.”

Craig has two daughters: Ella with ex Fiona Loudon and Grace with wife Rachel Weisz.
Laurene Powell Jobs

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Philanthropist Laurene Powell Jobs, the widow of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs, won’t leave their children Reed, Erin, and Eve any money when she dies. “I inherited my wealth from my husband, who didn’t care about the accumulation of wealth,” she told the New York Times in 2020. “I am doing this in honor of his work, and I’ve dedicated my life to doing the very best I can to distribute it effectively, in ways that lift up individuals and communities in a sustainable way.”

She added, “I’m not interested in legacy wealth buildings, and my children know that. Steve wasn’t interested in that. If I live long enough, it ends with me.”
Elton John

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Elton John and husband David Furnish, who share kids Zachary and Elijah have stated they won’t leave a massive inheritance for their children. “Having children changed everything about my life,” John told the Mirror U.K. in 2016. “I’ve learned that the simplest things in life — like having a minute with them — are worth more than any painting, any photograph, any house or any hit record.”

He added, “Before we had the children, we just had our lives, and would spend money because we didn’t have anything else to focus on. We have really toned things down because we have enough stuff. There is nothing else we need.”

This attitude affects his parenting as well. “Of course I want to leave my boys in a very sound financial state,” he said. “But it’s terrible to give kids a silver spoon. It ruins their life.”
Mark Zuckerberg & Priscilla Chan

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When Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan’s daughter Max was born in 2015, the couple announced on Facebook that they would be donating 99 percent of their inheritance to charity. “Like all parents, we want you to grow up in a world better than ours today,” read the post. “…We will do our part to make this happen, not only because we love you, but also because we have a moral responsibility to all children in the next generation.”

The couple also share daughters August and Aurelia.
Sting

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Sting believes in working hard and spending his own money — without leaving much to his offspring. His kids include Joe and Fuschia with Frances Tomelty, and Mickey, Jake, Eliot, and Giacomo, with Trudie Styler. Sting told the Daily Mail in 2014 that they should each work to earn their own money.

“I told them there won’t be much money left because we are spending it,” he said. “We have a lot of commitments. What comes in, we spend, and there isn’t much left.”

Sting added, “All my kids know that, and they rarely ask me for anything, which I really respect and appreciate. Obviously if they were in trouble, I would help them, but I’ve never really had to do that. They have the work ethic that makes them want to succeed on their own merit.”
Nigella Lawson

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Food writer and TV cook Nigella Lawson wants her two adult children Cosima and Bruno to stand on their own two feet. “I am determined that my children should have no financial security,” she told My Weekly in 2008. “It ruins people not having to earn money. I argue with my [now ex] husband Charles, because he believes that you should be able to leave money to your children. I think we’ll have to agree to disagree.”