Capital and Moral Capital

As Rusty Reno recently observed  in these pages, the poorest have been hit the hardest by the rise of out-of-wedlock birth, cohabitation, divorce, and remarriage. But Harold James , an economic historian at Princeton University and senior fellow of the Witherspoon Institute, notes in his latest column that these phenomena can complicate the lives of even fantastically wealthy and powerful men. Take Rupert Murdoch for example:

Such succession disputes become even more acute when there are multiple marriages and multiple sets of competing children. Until the eruption of the current scandal, the youngest of Murdoch’s three children from his second marriage, James, was generally believed to stand the greatest chance of succeeding his father.

The complexities of modern marriage patterns make family life much more fraught, especially when phenomenal power and huge sums of money are involved. All three of Murdoch’s marriages have produced children, though those from his current relationship are too young to be considered potential corporate successors.

It’s helpful to be reminded that even a very large heap of cash is no replacement for social and moral capital.