More stocks, less sweat: Harsh Goenka calls out India’s billionaire heirs & lure of family offices

Economist Sanjeev Sanyal also weighed in on the debate, saying he is glad that the business elite are finally raking up the issue.

"I am glad that the business elite has woken up to the real danger that their heirs are becoming too soft. Instead of leveraging their wealth to take bigger risks, they create “family offices” and spend their time fighting with their cousins over the family art collection," Sanyal said.

Sanyal, who is a member of the Prime Minister’s Economic Advisory Council, said that the parents of young business leaders should insist on their heirs "being on the shop floor rather than doing Ivy League MBAs that are no more than finishing schools."

In his Op-Ed, titled "Hard 'Work' of Heir Stylists", Goenka said there was a time when being born into a business family meant inheriting responsibility before wealth. He lamented that successors once spent their youth understanding supply chains and factory floors, while today’s inheritors are busy "holding a golf club, a champagne flute, or on the steering wheel of a brand-new Lamborghini".

Goenka noted how the rise of family offices—private investment firms dedicated to managing intergenerational wealth—is fast becoming the career choice of many next-gen business heirs due to the lure of high financial returns without the traditional headaches of running companies.

“No labour strikes, no messy operations, no innovation headaches,” Goenka quipped, describing how today’s business successors are more likely to be found managing hedge fund brunches in London than overseeing factory operations.

"Who needs the stress of managing employees and production lines when you can just manage a diversified stock portfolio, and an impressive sneaker collection?" he said, in observations laced with sarcasm.

Goenka also touched upon the debate around long working hours, fuelled by controversial remarks by Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy and L&T chairman S N Subrahmanyan.

“They roll their eyes at Narayana Murthy and S N Subrahmanyan, those 'boomers' who talk about working 70-90 hours a week,” Goenka wrote, and detailed that a typical family office "workday" now involves social media updates, fitness routines with celebrity trainers and high-profile meetings disguised as lavish vacations. He cheekily remarked that "buying a Birkin bag is now called an investment."

Goenka’s column also highlighted a deep irony: while many of these inheritors idolize figures like Elon Musk for his bold risk-taking and innovation, they themselves avoid the hard work and risks required to build empires. “They love quoting him, but could never survive even a week of his gruelling schedule,” he noted.

However, he held out hope for the generation, saying that "some business inheritors are waking up and smelling the coffee."

"Not all of the next gen is lost in the haze of NFTs and chia bowls. Some are realising that real money isn't made by flipping stocks, or posting hustler memes. It's made by actually running businesses," he said.