Anderson Cooper won't leave his son an inheritance. Do trust funds do more harm than good?

Celebrity offspring may have hit the genetic jackpot, but these kids won’t inherit a pot of gold.

Anderson Cooper, Ashton Kutcher, Marie Osmond, Simon Cowell, and more stars have their own reasoning to not leave their fortunes behind, arguing that passing down large sums of wealth can be harmful rather than helpful. But are their decisions practical?

"What I’ve seen from other parents is that they don’t want to provide too much money that they take away their child’s sense of purpose," Debra Radway, a certified financial planner, trustee and investment advisor with Radway Advisory Services LLC, tells USA TODAY.

Cooper, who welcomed son Wyatt Morgan via surrogate in April 2020, is the latest celebrity to declare that he won’t leave his son an inheritance.

"I don’t believe in passing on huge amounts of money," the CNN anchor revealed on Air Mail’s The Morning Meeting podcast in late September. "I'm not that interested in money, but I don’t intend to have some sort of pot of gold for my son. I’ll go with what my parents said… 'College will be paid for, and then you got to get on it.' "

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Cooper, who has an estimated net worth of $200 million, is following in the same financial footsteps as his late mother Gloria Vanderbilt, who "made clear to me that there’s no trust fund," Cooper told Howard Stern in 2014.

"I think it’s a curse… From the time I was growing up, if I felt like there was some pot of gold waiting for me, I don’t know if I would have been so motivated."

As a trustee and investment advisor, Radway says many of her clients want to provide a safety net for their children, without making them "dependent on money left in the trust."

Do trust funds cause more harm than good?

"It’s not whether their child is going to be a billionaire, or a millionaire or a middle-class individual, they just don’t want to provide too much wealth that will squelch their child's desire to contribute something to this world," she says.

When you think of trust-fund babies, names like Paris Hilton, Rob Kardashian and Lisa Marie Presley come to mind. The term is usually associated with individuals who depend on their family’s money without the need to work in any substantial way.

Some stars claim that leaving their children with an excess of wealth may limit their desire to forge their own path. "It’s terrible to give kids a silver spoon. It ruins their life," Elton John told the Mirror in 2016.

"If you leave hundreds and millions of dollars to a child, there is a potential (they won't) have work ethic and will sit around living off the money," Radway says. "That’s not healthy. Most people need to work to feel fulfillment in life."

But Radway says it's ultimately up to individuals on "how they want to use their money," adding that it's not always cut and dried.

From wanting their children to grow up to be self-sufficient to choosing to donate their wealth to charity instead, these are the celebrities turning their back on generational wealth.

Ashton Kutcher

Estimated net worth: $200 million

In 2018, Kutcher said he's not leaving trust funds for his two children with wife Mila Kunis – daughter Wyatt, 7, and son Dimitri, 4 – in hopes they will earn their own living and "be motivated to have what they had, or some version of what they had."

"My kids are living a really privileged life, and they don’t even know it. And they’ll never know it because this is the only one that they’ll know," Kutcher said on Dax Shepard's Armchair Expert podcast. "We’ll end up giving our money away to charity."

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Elton John

Estimated net worth: $500 million

In 2016, John said he plans to leave his two sons with husband David Furnish – Zachary, 10, and Elijah, 8 – a small sum of money, but "anything beyond the basic, they have to go out and earn it themselves."

"Of course I want to leave my boys in a very sound financial state. But it’s terrible to give kids a silver spoon," he told the Mirror. John, who grew up in a "very working-class family," added that he "earned everything (he) did from hard work" and that's what he hopes for his children as well.

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Jackie Chan

Estimated net worth: $400 million

Chan, who was named one of Forbes' 10 top-paid actors last year, said he will donate his entire fortune to charity, leaving nothing for his son Jaycee Chan, 38.

"If he is capable, he can make his own money," Chan said during an awards ceremony in Beijing, China in 2011. "If he is not, then he will just be wasting my money."

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Simon Cowell

Estimated net worth: $600 million

In 2013, the creator of "The X Factor" and "America's Got Talent" said he also plans to donate his wealth to charity instead of son Eric Cowell, 7, who he shares with partner Lauren Silverman.

"I’m going to leave my money to somebody. A charity, probably – kids and dogs," Cowell told Mirror U.K. in 2013. "I don’t believe in passing on from one generation to another."

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Marie Osmond

Estimated net worth: $20 Million

In 2020, the singer and actress announced on "The View" that she's not leaving "any money to (her) children." Instead, she said, "I'm going to give mine to my charity."

"Congratulations, kids. My husband and I decided that you do a great disservice to your children to just hand them a fortune because you take away the one most important gift you can give your children, and that's the ability to work."

Osmond is a mother to eight children from two different marriages.

She shares Jessica, 33, Rachael, 32, Brandon, 24, Brianna, 23, Matthew, 22 and Abigail, 19, with ex-husband Brian Blosil. The pair also shared son Michael, who died in 2010 at age 18.

Osmond shares son Stephen, 38, with her current husband Steve Craig.

"You see it a lot in rich families, where the kids don't know what to do so they get in trouble, so I just let them be proud of what they make," Osmond said.

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Sting

Estimated net worth: $400 million

In 2014, the Police frontman said he's raised his six children to "have the work ethic that makes them want to succeed on their own merit."

"I certainly don’t want to leave them trust funds that are albatrosses round their necks," he told the Daily Mail. "They have to work. All my kids know that and they rarely ask me for anything, which I really respect and appreciate."

Sting has two children with ex-wife Frances Tomelty – Joseph, 44, and Fuchsia Katherine, 39 – and four children with current wife Trudie Styler: Mickey, 37, Jake, 36, Eliot, 31, and Giacomo, 25.

He added, "People make assumptions, that they were born with a silver spoon in their mouth, but they have not been given a lot."

Gene Simmons

Estimated net worth: $400 million

In 2007, the Kiss frontman said his two children with wife Shannon Lee Tweed – Nick, 32, and Sophie, 29 – will "never be rich" off his money.

"There’s gonna be a yearly allowance so that their rent and their food (is) taken care of, but if you want riches, you should do that yourself," he said during an episode of his reality show "Gene Simmons Family Jewels."

He added, "I don’t want them to say, 'Thanks, dad, for making me rich.' No, you wanna be able to stand on your own two feet and say, 'I did that.' "

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Anderson Cooper, more stars say no to inheritance, generational wealth