Wealthy People Depicted as Charitable

Overrepresentation Bias  
Table Of Contents

Main Description

In movies, wealthy people are depicted as charitable much more than in real life, and in the cases where they are depicted as greedy, they usually change their tune by the end of the movie as a plot point ala Scrooge. It is rare for a wealthy person to go an entire movie depicted as not being very charitable, but in real life it happens much more frequently. Also, many wealthy people donate to candidates who will pass laws more beneficial to them and less beneficial to average citizens which counteracts any charitable giving they do. Wealthy people depicted as charitable helps conservatives promote the false idea that poorer people are better off relying on private charitable donations than government programs funded by a progressive tax system.

Conservative Trope Examples

How Trope is Biased

Overrepresentation

  • Wealthy people are more charitable overall in real-life because you have to have more money than you need in order to donate it. But, there are a lot of exceptions especially amongst conservatives who donate to the Republican party hoping to get laws passed that benefit them financially
  • One Republican donated his entire $1.65 billion fortune to a right-wing organization led by extremists with ties to the Federalist Society

Conservative Biases

  • Republicans often support policies that benefit the wealthy at the expense of average workers so anytime wealthy people are depicted as philanthropic on screen that greatly helps them.
  • Republicans want a flawed system where help for people in need comes from private charities instead of government programs which are more fair and effective in helping people. In order to sell this idea, they need for wealthy people to be depicted as charitable.