Why Sting Says Letting His 6 Kids Not Work Would Be a “Form of Abuse"
Generational wealth doesn't always come earmarked for the next generation.
Sting has signaled that he isn't setting his six kids up for life, explaining on CBS Sunday Morning May 3 that he considers telling one's children that they don't have to work to be "a form of abuse."
Luckily, his two kids with ex-wife Frances Tomelty and four with wife Trudie Styler inherited an "extraordinary work ethic," the Police alum noted, and he didn't find it "cruel" to lay down the law in that way.
"I think that's there's a kindness there," Sting, born Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner, explained, "and a trust in in them that they will make their own way. They're tough, my kids.”
Meanwhile, Joe Sumner, 49, Fuschia Sumner Wright, 44, Mickey Sumner, 42, Jake Sumner, 40, Eliot Sumner, 35, and Giacomo Sumner, 30, aren't exactly children anymore, either, and they have all been keeping busy.
But Sting is hardly the only wealthy famous parent in the world who wants his kids to bank on their own futures.
"I don't believe in inheriting money," Anderson Cooper told Howard Stern in 2014. "I think it's an initiative sucker."
And the father of Wyatt Morgan Cooper, 6, and Sebastian Luke Cooper, 4, didn't change his tune once he became a dad, either, saying on Air Mail's Morning Meeting podcast in 2021 that he wouldn't be leaving "a pot of gold" for his progeny.
Ashton Kutcher and Mila Kunis aren't putting their money on auto-inherit, either, the actor explaining on Armchair Expert in 2018 that daughter Wyatt and son Dimitri, now 11 and 9, were learning to be "resourceful," and if they "want to start a business and they have a good business plan, I'll invest in it, but they're not getting trusts."
For further financial planning inspiration, read on for more celebrities who've said that the bucks stop with them:
Guy Fieri
The Food Network star isn't just handing over the keys to Flavortown.
"I've told them the same thing my dad told me," Fieri—who shares sons Hunter and Ryder with wife Lori Fieri, plus the couple raised his nephew Jules after his sister's death in 2011—told Fox News in 2023. "My dad says, ‘When I die, you can expect that I'm going to die broke, and you're going to be paying for the funeral.' And I told my boys, ‘None of this that I've been building are you going to get unless you come and take it from me.'"
Take it from him in the form of going to school, getting work experience outside the family business and then returning to the fold, that is.
"Matter of fact, I look forward to it. I'm almost wanting to cheat the system and bring him back early," Fieri told Delish in 2018 when Hunter was interning for the Caesar's restaurant group in Las Vegas, "but I know what's going to be best for him."
Shaquille O'Neal
When it comes to O'Neal's daughters Taahirah, Amirah, and Me’arah, and sons Shareef and Shaqir—shared with ex-wife Shaunie Nelson—it's education first, spoils of his legendary basketball (and broadcasting and business) career second.
"My motto is, ‘You have to get three degrees to touch some of my cheese,'" the four-time NBA champ, who completed his bachelor's degree from Louisiana State University in 2000, eight years after he was drafted No. 1, said on Good Morning America in 2019. He explained, “You can have all the money in the world, but if you don’t have education, you can’t make it grow. I didn’t want to be like 80 percent of the athletes who stop playing and have nothing…So, I educated myself. I want that for my kids, too.”
Mick Jagger
The Rolling Stones frontman and father of eight said he wouldn't get much satisfaction from leaving all his money to his kids.
"The children don't need $500 million to live well," Jagger told The Wall Street Journal in 2023. "Come on." Rather, he hoped the fortune he'd amassed from his legendary song catalogue could go to charity and "do some good in the world."
Gordon Ramsay
The MasterChef host—dad to Megan, twins Holly and Jack, Matilda, Oscar and Jesse with wife Tana Ramsay—expects his kids to feast on their own earnings one day, but he doesn't want their first kitchen to be a nightmare.
“It’s definitely not going to them, and that’s not in a mean way," Ramsay told The Telegraph in 2023 of the massive amount of money he's made from his restaurant and TV empires. "It’s to not spoil them. The only thing I’ve agreed with Tana is they get a 25 percent deposit on a flat, but not the whole flat.”
The English chef continued, “I’ve been super lucky, having that career for the last 15 years in the U.S. Seriously, it has earned a fortune and I’ve been very lucky, so I respect everything I’ve got.”
Elton John
While the "Rocket Man" singer wants to leave sons Zachary and Elijah—shared with husband David Furnish—"in a very sound financial state," John told The Mirror in 2016, that doesn’t mean an otherworldly sum of money.
The boys weren't "normal kids, and I’m not pretending they are," he continued. "But you have to have some semblance of normality, some respect for money, some respect for work.”
John cited billionaire American investor Warren Buffett as his inspiration, noting his "really cool model in that he leaves his children enough money so that they have a house, a car and all their basic needs covered and cared for so they never need worry. But it’s not crazy, silly, go-wild money so that they could be buying Picassos or private jets."
Bill Gates
"In my case, my kids got a great upbringing and education," Gates, whose fortune is estimated at upward of $100 billion, said on a March 2025 episode of the Figuring Out With Raj Shamani podcast, "but less than 1 percent of the total wealth because I decided it wouldn’t be a favor to them."
“You don’t want your kids to ever be confused about your support for them and your love for them," the Microsoft cofounder—who shares daughters Jennifer and Phoebe, as well as son Rory with ex-wife Melinda French Gates—continued. "So, I do think explaining early on your philosophy, that you’re going to treat them all equally and that you’re gonna give them incredible opportunities, but that the highest calling for these resources is to go back to the neediest."
Kevin Mazur/WireImage
Sting
The singer has informed his six kids that he won't always be watching them financially.
"I told them there won't be much money left [to leave] because we are spending it!" Sting, born Gordon Sumner, told the Mail on Sunday's Event magazine in 2014. "We have a lot of commitments. What comes in, we spend, and there isn't much left."
He continued, "I certainly don't want to leave them trust funds that are albatrosses round their necks. They have to work. All my kids know that and they rarely ask me for anything, which I really respect and appreciate."
Ashton Kutcher
The actor and venture capitalist has said that he and Mila Kunis wouldn’t just be leaving money to daughter Wyatt and son Dimitri with no strings attached.
"My kids are living a really privileged life, and they don’t even know it," Kutcher said on Dax Shepard's Armchair Expert podcast in 2018. "And they’ll never know it, because this is the only one that they’ll know. I’m not setting up a trust for them. We’ll end up giving our money away to charity and to various things."
That being said, he noted, if one of his chips off the old block has "a good business plan, I'll invest in it."
Nigella Lawson
It left a bad taste in some mouths when the Nigella Bites host said in 2008 that daughter Cosima and son Bruno—her kids with first husband John Diamond, who died in 2001—should have "no financial security" from her because not having to work "ruins people."
Wanting to clarify her recipe for success, Lawson subsequently said she had "no intention of leaving my children destitute and starving…I have always said of my children that once they have finished university or training, whatever education they choose, they have to support themselves through work, as I did, but I have never discussed the details of my will with anyone."
Anderson Cooper/Instagram
Anderson Cooper
The son of heiress Gloria Vanderbilt witnessed firsthand that money didn't buy happiness.
Hence he didn't believe "passing on huge amounts of money," Cooper, who co-parents sons Wyatt and Sebastian with ex Benjamin Maisani, said in 2022 on Air Mail's Morning Meeting podcast. "I don't know what I'll have. I'm not that interested in money, but I don't intend to have some sort of pot of gold for my son."
He did plan on taking a cue from his parents, who told him, "'College will be paid for, and then you gotta get on it.'"
Marie Osmond
The mother of eight wants to make sure her kids aren't leaving it all up to her.
"Honestly, why would you enable your child to not try to be something?" Osmond told Us Weekly in 2023 about not earmarking her earnings for the next generation. "I don’t know anybody who becomes anything if they’re just handed money."
"To me," she continued, "the greatest gift you can give your child is a passion to search out who they are inside and to work."
Daniel Craig
The English actor doesn't want his heirs getting the knives out over his Bond money.
"I don't want to leave great sums to the next generation," the father of two daughters— Ella with ex-wife Fiona Loudon and Grace with wife Rachel Weisz—and stepdad to Weisz's son Henry, told Candis in 2021. "I think inheritance is quite distasteful. My philosophy is get rid of it or give it away before you go."
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