The Fallacy of Being “Land Rich, Cash Poor” in Farming

I heard a story about a woman whose family owns a farm in Hawaii. Despite her decidedly hippy-like life leanings, she was explaining why she is now politically conservative.

“You become conservative,” she said, “when you have something to conserve.”

What the women meant for non-conservatives to hear by “something to conserve” was that she’s a conscious environmentalist fighting to protect a fragile and disappearing ecosystem (that’s she’s a conservationist). But what she actually said was she’s a conservative — the thing she cares about conserving is her right to the land, her and her family’s wealth.

These kinds of slight-of-tongue tricks are important to wealth preservation. They lead people away from the inevitable questions about the duties that come with wealth accumulation by saying simply, “my wealth is a selfless thing. It’s not for me, it’s for all of us.”

Interestingly, this “thoughtful caretaker” trope hasn’t caught on as near as well as the previous generation’s strategy, which capitalized on minimizing perceived wealth without actually parting with any of it. The age-old adage I heard growing up was “We’re land rich and cash poor.”

It’s important that in the saying, the “poor” part comes second. When used on a general audience, it allows…