The Wealth Delusion

THE WEALTH DELUSION: How Money and Power Distort the Mind By Paul Green, M.Ed. Something happens to people when they accumulate enough money and power. The research has known it for decades. Most people have felt it firsthand. This book finally names it. The Wealth Delusion is a synthesis of neuroscience, social psychology, organizational behavior research, and developmental psychology that maps what the author calls the Wealth Insanity Cycle: six documented stages by which extreme wealth and concentrated power reliably alter human cognition, erode empathy, select for psychopathic traits, enable moral disengagement, and ultimately reshape the institutions and regulatory systems that might otherwise check them. Drawing on peer-reviewed research from Dacher Keltner, Paul Piff, Lord David Owen, Jennifer Freyd, and others, the book translates academic findings into a rigorous, readable account of why the patterns most people observe in wealthy and powerful people are not accidental. They are documented, mechanistic, and - crucially - addressable. Includes practical guidance for surviving proximity to these dynamics, strategic use of DARVO recognition and documentation, and a final chapter on structural policy interventions with an evidence base. For readers of Keltner, Giridharadas, Ronson, and Piketty.