Crazy Money With Paul Ollinger

Janny Scott grew up on an 800-acre estate near Philadelphia. The descendant of railroad barons and financial magnates, Janny tracks the effects of her family’s multi-generational wealth in her book, The Beneficiary: Fortune, Misfortune, and the Story of My Father. In the book, she lays the details of both the opulence and the tragic complications of her family’s vast resources. While things appeared perfect from the outside, alcoholism, suicide, divorce, and idleness derailed many of her relations. In this conversation, we discuss what it was like to grow up on property the size of Central Park and how the presence of so much wealth affects her attitudes about money today. We also cover the tragedies that befell many of her ancestors as they struggled to find purpose amidst massive affluence.  Janny worked for fourteen years as a reporter for the New York Times where she was a member of the team that won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for national reporting. Prior to the NYT, she reported for the LA Times and The Re