jimmysong

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Many Bitcoiners are thinking about families and legacy, which brings up the topic of how to raise your kids. They are the ones that carry your legacy and figuring out what to do with them can be daunting, especially in the modern world.

The author of this volume gives us an outline of what Habsburgs have been doing for centuries. They are famously a royal line that ruled the Holy Roman Empire from the 13th century until its end in the 19th and had a very long run, at one time being monarchs over a significant part of the world. The book is written by a modern Habsburg and is meant as a guide to help families that are looking to leave legacies.

# Religion

Perhaps the biggest emphasis in the book is the imparting of values to the next generation. This is understandably very important for royal families as they need heirs in the typical primogeniture system of rulers that most engage in. And a large part of the success of the Habsburgs was that they were raised to be very devout.

There are a lot of stories in the book about various Habsburgs and how they conducted themselves, but perhaps the most famous and instructive example is how they conduct their funerals. Before the coffin is carried into the family crypt, it has to go through a door which is closed. The pall bearers knock and a monk on the other side asks who wishes to enter. The first time, the pall bearers answer with all the titles of the deceased, to which the monk replies that they do not know this person. They knock again and the monk asks the same question, to which the pall bearers answer with all the accomplishments of the deceased to which the monk replies again that they do not know this person. Finally, they knock a third time to which the monk asks the same question. And the answer the third time is "such-and-such Habsburg, a poor sinner." The monk then opens the door and welcomes the newly deceased in.

While it's typical to be cynical about monarchs, especially in the modern day, this type of role modeling is useful, even inspiring. And indeed, that's the main message of the book. The role modeling is the main method by which you can teach your children and leave a legacy. Of course, they're taught the same values, but they stick a lot better when you model your values by living them.

# Monarchy

The other interesting tidbit that I got out of the book as a Bitcoiner was the idea of subsidiarity. I was not familiar with the concept before reading the book, and it's a word that describes a type of governance that monarchs exercised. The main idea is that decisions should be made as close to the people that are affected as possible. That is, a decision about what to do about a well in a town should be made by people in the town, and not by bureaucrats that are far away.

The idea is that people closer to the problem are more aware of the solutions and centralized planning from a far away ruler is generally not going to work out as well. The impression I got from reading the book is that this is a piece of wisdom that has been passed down through the generations of Habsburgs because it works. And given that they often ruled over very large areas, such wisdom should not go unheeded.

Contrast subsidiarity to current systems that are almost entirely centralized where decision makers are far from the problem. There is much inefficiency, and often absurdity that they come up with. The difference between monarchy and dictatorships is exactly this willingness on the part of monarchs to allow for local autonomy, and the unwillingness on the part of dictators to not do so.

Similar to the argument Hans Hermann Hoppe makes in Democracy, the God that Failed, monarchy is actually more compatible with local autonomy than even democracy in large polities.
# Virtue

Perhaps the biggest impression I got from the book is the importance of virtue. The Habsburgs have a history going back over a thousand years. And they didn't get there by sheer luck (though they did have a good deal of it). They got there by developing character in each generation and raising their children to prepare for the role as rulers.

It's easy to be cynical about such people, but given the sociopaths that end up in power in democracies, would monarchs be worse? Especially if they've been raised for the role their whole lives, there's a significantly higher chance of virtue and character in such people.

And that's really what the Habsburgs have done. They've set up a family system that raises devout people that care about legacy, that care about their people, that want to please God and their ancestors. It's a lot better than many of the politicians that we've been stuck with, whose desire for power create incentives for high time preference behavior.

Book Review: The Habsburg Way

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Legacy is one of those things that, depending on your personality, you think way too much about or don't think enough about. For the people that don't think about legacy, they're usually not thinking about it because they're drowning in the day-to-day, going through money troubles, focusing on career, figuring out what to do about kids schooling, etc. Legacy is far from the minds of people that are busy because it's a little too big picture, a little too far away to matter when daily survival is at stake.

The people that think about it too much do so because they have achieved a lot of the goals that they've set for themselves. Maybe they're older, maybe they've done many things that they've set out to do. As cool as those accomplishments might be, there's something missing when the achievements are solo. Legacy is a bigger and more daunting group challenge and seemingly worth the effort you put in.

Yet the topic is overwhelming. How do you make plans that your heirs will execute on? What can you do about stuff that you intend to last many years after you're gone?

Planning for something so big is scary because there's no guarantee and you're not going to be around to fix things should anything go wrong. It's a lot like what you'd imagine Satoshi felt before releasing Bitcoin. You want to design something that will run on its own, with enough room to correct any systematic weaknesses, yet with enough structure so that a single generation can't completely ruin it.

Johann Kurtz does a great job with this topic, breaking down our modern biases about inheritances, giving a much fuller picture of what a leaving a good legacy looks like and strategies for putting your family in a position to succeed in that regard.

## Love as the Basis

The book was a lot more focused on love than I expected, and this is partly due to his framing of the issue as one of true charity. We tend to think of charity as doing something great for a people far away, which, as he points out, is much closer to philanthropy. And philanthropy is a fiat phenomenon that's much closer to blind almsgiving. Real charity is much more local and much more focused on people you actually meet and have relationships with. And it's from this framing that he shows that leaving a legacy necessarily means a much deeper love for the people that you are closest to, your family, your neighbors and your community.

For me, the book challenged me to love my children, not just in getting them opportunities and skills they need, but in helping them to handle the wealth that I will be leaving them. The problem with leaving wealth is not in the wealth itself, but in preparing those that are receiving it. They need the virtue to resist the enormous temptation that comes with such resources. And it's not just temptation to indulge in whatever addictions they might have, but the temptation to go with the flow, to do what's considered "good" by the mores of the day. They need the virtue to be responsible with the power entrusted to them.

Inheritance in that sense, is a bit like handling a firearm. You need training to use it properly so you don't hurt yourself. And if I'm honest with myself, training them to be responsible is the part that I've been doubting about myself. Can I teach my children to not waste the money and indulge themselves? Can I raise them up so that they, too, leave a legacy? Will they also leave the family behind better than they found it?

There's a Chinese saying about how wealth dissipates in 3 generations because so few wealthy people succeed in this endeavor. Yet, as Kurtz shows, there are many families that haven't dissipated their wealth, and seeing how they raise their children is a big part of leaving that legacy. In other words, the inheritance can't be just the material goods, it has to also be virtue and character that can handle those material goods.

## Illiquid Estates

Which brings me to the intersection with Bitcoin, because Johann recommends that we leave our children with illiquid assets. The reason being that something liquid is very tempting to spend and indulge in. It's way too tempting and easy to blow liquid wealth than illiquid, which is one of the subtle ways in which fiat money, making everything liquid, has destroyed legacies.

Bitcoin, unfortunately, is also very liquid. And indeed, this is at a deep level why it's so hard to hold. It's too divisible and too easy to spend and holding on to it in the midst of every temptation that money can buy requires an enormous amount of restraint.

So this book has me rethinking what I can leave to my children that they can take care of for their children and grandchildren. Is it land? Is it buildings? Is it, perhaps, even a city or a citadel?

These are useful questions for me to ponder. And I appreciate Johann bringing them up in a framework that helps me align my wealth to my goals.

Book Review: Leaving a Legacy by Johann Kurtz

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The Woke War on White Millennial Men (Reason, Robby Soave)

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I mean, haven't they been for the last decade? And it's going to get worse when the leftover talented old white men retire or die in these institutions.