There's a lot of talk about "eccentric billionaires". In fact, "eccentric" is almost a standard modifier for the word "billionaire", so that one takes it for granted that if you're a billionaire, you must, indeed, be eccentric. I think this is rubbish, however. Billionaires are boring!

The last truly eccentric billionaire we had was Howard Hughes, who was not so much "eccentric" as "completely insane". These days there are, according to Forbes, 793 billionaires, worth a total of $2.6 trillion. This is a lot of money, you'll note. What are we getting in return? Bupkis!

In ages past, egocentric eccentrics used their vast coffers to build ridiculous monuments to themselves which have served as some of the finest examples of architecture and sculpture in human history. And, after their deaths, they were frequently appropriated for the public good. Royalty is probably the prime example of this (e.g. the Louvre, Versailles, Buckingham Palace, the Taj Mahal, the Forbidden City, the Great Pyramid).

But our modern billionaires have given us nothing. Gormless glass buildings we can work in, maybe. Mansions for themselves off where we can't find them (not built to last, of course). Not a one has used their wealth to enrich the lives of their fellow citizens in some absurd, fabulous way. Who is paving the sidewalks with marble? Building kites the size of a house and flying them over the city harbor? Hiring an acting troop to dress up as gnomes and skulk around in alleys? Why isn't there a giant glass fish half-buried in the middle of the Charles River? Et cetera.

Boring, I tell you.