Money doesn’t change people as much as it exposes them. Give someone enough comfort and power, and the mask slips. Studies keep finding that the richer someone gets, the less they seem to notice the people around them, whether it’s cutting off a pedestrian or bending the rules when no one’s watching.
A team from the Academy of Finland found that drivers of luxury cars were more likely to cut off other vehicles or ignore pedestrians. Another study linked higher income to a drop in compassion and generosity. The trend repeats across experiments: people with wealth show fewer prosocial behaviors and more willingness to bend rules if it benefits them.
Psychologists often point to something called “the dark triad”—a cluster of traits including narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism. These personalities thrive in high-status environments because they combine charm, ambition, and a lack of guilt.
A 15-year study found that people scoring high on these traits were more likely to rise in organizations and accumulate wealth. In corporate boardrooms, clinical psychopathy rates appear up to three times higher than in the general population.
Science Says Money Really Does Make People Less Nice
Still, experts say money itself isn’t the villain. Wealth tends to magnify what’s already there. A generous person might donate millions. A ruthless one might justify exploitation as “strategy.” Power creates distance, and distance erodes empathy—the exact ingredient that keeps most of us from acting like cartoon villains (Cruella de Vil and Scrooge McDuck, anyone?).
Psychologist Daniel Kahneman’s famous research on happiness and income found that well-being levels off once people earn roughly $110,000 a year. Beyond that point, the emotional payoff flatlines. Chasing more money doesn’t necessarily make people happier; it can deepen the feeling that something is still missing. That emptiness can feed the same impulse that made them ambitious in the first place.
It’s not that every billionaire secretly dreams of being Lex Luthor. Many use their money for good. But the data suggest that the more wealth piles up, the more it separates people from the social norms that keep everyone else polite, grounded, and accountable.
Maybe that’s why altruism still feels like a luxury item. The richest among us can afford anything—except the sense that enough is finally enough.
The post Rich People Aren’t as Nice as the Rest of Us, Science Says So appeared first on VICE.
