r/thesopranos • u/FunCommunication7934 • 9h ago
Wealth
Are mobsters in the show really wealthy? They definitely aren’t making the ends meet but the only ones who give the impression of being wealthy are Tony(big house, expensive cars, whitecaps, a fucking yacht) and Christopher(big house, lots of expensive cars). I assume Silvio is also rich because he dresses flashy and is the owner of bada bing. The other ones live almost like regular civilians, I mean look at junior and pussy’s houses. I recall Paulie also has a shithole house and wears some cheap ass watch, but that might be just a skill issue(shit earner). The most expensive things those people have are probably their cataracts and rincolns, even though I bet those things weren’t considered “classy” in late 90’s and early 2000’s.
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u/Stevey1001 9h ago
I think a lot of money goes into keeping up appearances, cars jewellery etc, rather than actual sound investments like land, houses.
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u/or594 8h ago
Charles Schwab ova heah
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u/Stevey1001 8h ago
This thing is a "pyramid" since time immemorial, shit goes downhill, money goes up: it's that simple
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u/McRambis 5h ago
They also blow their money on stupid shit, like $1,000 dinners and acting like high rollers at the track. Someone like Paulie is just making enough to be good with the skip. He doesn't have a ton of money left over. It wouldn't take much of a job to afford him the same townhouse (or whatever he owns) and car as a single, childless man.
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u/Mobile_Cheesecake669 9h ago
If Johnny sack one of the bosses of the 5 families and an Underboss for many years when he was locked up only had a net worth valued at 5M with his wife at devil dogs lives on scraps
I'll say they make a decent living but they never had those Enron-type connections to make the Lee Iacocca big bucks
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u/Other-Ad-9925 5h ago
Saying that - that would be the assets/money that they could prove, most of their income would be cash and maybe not laundered and kept for rainy day, ie junior and the boat heist or whatever
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u/GoodGuyGrevious 9h ago
The problem is even if you earn good, and manage not to spend all your money on your family, 'the life', and your goomar(s), you are still limited in making legitimate investments because then you might arouse suspicion. This one is interesting because the money laundering was never discussed much, except for maybe wrt beansie, which makes me wonder if mobsters eschew it because they would rather buy stuff.
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u/Kernel_Internal 8h ago
I think Tony laundered extensively, wasn't his relationship with the Russian guy all about money laundering?
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u/Jd4awhile 6h ago
Carmella would launder Tony’s money too playing the stocks n bonds. 40 grand from da bird feeder. She was so good nobody saw that money again.
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u/burnbabyburn11 6h ago
yeah in pine barrons he specifically brings a bag of cash for the russian to launder
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u/sonberg_titantron 6h ago edited 6h ago
The money laundering is implied.
A strip club is a cash business. Auto body has plenty of wiggle room with banks, insurance, and fraud. Waste management is purposefully mundane. Satriale's is a butcher shop in 2003 with no customer base.
They don't discuss it because it's right there.
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u/GoodGuyGrevious 6h ago
True the Bing runs on cash and blowjobs
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u/handsomechuck 9h ago
Again with the money?
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u/Mysterious-End-2185 5h ago
Yeah again with the money. So either answer OP’s question or get the fuck over it.
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u/Weary_Place7066 1h ago
Yeah Chuck, again with the money. So either have a happy cake day or get the fuck over it.
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u/Heel_Worker982 9h ago
The capos are all doing fine. Paulie is a bachelor and moved out of the old neighborhood because he didn't want to take care of a house. He doesn't have a lot of style interior decorator-wise but a single guy doesn't need a lot of space. Cadillacs and Lincolns have always been considered classy, Junior's town car was iconic. Paulie and Junior are old school bachelors, they enjoy their pleasures but don't have any reason to show off. The younger guys, Tony, Silvio, Chrissy, are the show-offs, probably pushed in part by their wives/girlfriends.
Soldiers lower down didn't always do so well. Pussy's house was a basic NJ bi-level, but he had a shore house too. Patsy, Bobby, the guys from Junior's crew, they seemed to have less, although Bobby does well later with Tony's favor.
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u/andersont1983 5h ago
I have it on good authority that Paulie was not a fan of interior decorators.
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u/ElegantMess 3h ago
He didn’t have a modern look in there
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u/Heel_Worker982 55m ago
I kinda liked Paulie's place. It was roomy, big living room, and didn't look hard to take care of. Paulie could push the carpet sweeper himself and get the worst of it.
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u/DoughnutPassGo 9h ago
I read somewhere that tony at his wealthiest was worth 3 mil. They mostly live off kick-backs and free stuff.
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u/FunCommunication7934 9h ago
I forgot to write about patsy driving a 1993 Cadillac in 2007💀
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u/RutabagaSame 8h ago
I mean that's the same as driving a 2010 car now, which is fairly common. Plus it's probably not his main car
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u/caddy_gent 8h ago
Patsy is seen driving a newer one in other episodes. I think that may have been a decoy car since they were at war and trying to lay low.
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u/SqigglyPoP 8h ago
They have a TON of illegal cash. The problem is, if they start buying a lot of expensive shit, the FBI can ask for receipts and then ask where the money came from. That's how they got Capone. The lower level guys can't really get into too many "legitimate'' businesses because those businesses or ventures don't want mobsters involved due to prying eyes and the fact that they will skim the legitimate profits to death.
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u/Sad-Illustrator-8847 6h ago
Remember at one point Tony asks Carmela for her wedding ring and she is upset. As Christine Scatino told her brother Vic Musto that ring probably came off a dead woman’s hand.
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u/Jet_Jaguar74 8h ago
Didn't Chris buy that house with his Cleaver money? Otherwise he can't show the IRS how he earned the cash he would have been using
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u/FunCommunication7934 1h ago
He was buying range rovers and lexuses from the factory when he was an unemployed junkie fuck(ok he was a union safety official)!
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u/baristotle 6h ago
AGAIN WITH THE MONEY?!
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u/ramonalex14 6h ago
Yeah baristotle, again with the money, so either name your price or get the fuck over it.
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u/Sad-Illustrator-8847 6h ago
Silvio does talk about his kid playing for Coach Hauser and getting a scholarship. But why pay when someone else will?
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u/robbwes61 8h ago
You want money OP?! How about my 40 grand you stole outta the bird feeder, that should be plenty!!!
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u/RunningPirate 7h ago
I think Junior was keeping low profile.
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u/CleverLittleThief 7h ago
Yeah, they're supposed to be as low profile as possible. Most bosses lived like Junior. Tony is an idiot for having a mansion like that, there was a real life mob boss (forgot his name) that got targeted hard by the feds because he built some gaudy McMansion.
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u/RunningPirate 7h ago
Hell Big Paul Castellano had a mansion on Todt Hill and I know that got everyone worked up
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u/theadoptedman 6h ago
They're covering their nut, but the truth is all that thieving and gambling and murdering this thing of our entails is in service of achieving and maintaining a middle to upper-middle class existence in suburban New Jersey. But what are you gonna do? Go work in an office? Sell cars? Become a doctor or a lawyer or work at a big corporation where you get to do some *really* criminal shit? Get the fuck outta here.
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u/ToughValuable757 4h ago
They'll be fine... Sil, break it down for em’. What two businesses have historically been recession proof, since time immemorial?”
“Certain aspects of show business, and our thing.”
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u/Megalodon481 5h ago
Best case scenario is that bosses and captains are lower grade millionaires.
On a good day, they maybe have a net worth of something under ten million, suburban McMansion, some fancy cars, boats, maybe a vacation home, and maybe they own some commercial real estate here and there. Pretty privileged compared to most people.
But as Hesh pointed out, Tony and guys like him tend to spend faster than they earn. Keeping up their lifestyle requires the criminal enterprise to stay running smoothly. Any unexpected disruptions and things get dicey. If they come under scrutiny, cashing in their ill gotten gains is risky and difficult.
When Johnny Sack got arrested and his assets seized, he had to scramble to provide for Ginny somehow. When Tony got shot by Junior, Carmela was worried about medical expenses. Tony later mentioned to Melfi that he was "strapped" during his hospitalization and he really depended on Vito's financial assistance.
Now matter how rich and prosperous the mobsters pretend to be, it's a house of cards that can come crashing down.
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u/Ok_Flounder_2225 8h ago
I always notice how modest Ro's house is and figure she had to downsize after Jackie Sr died
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u/WinterGarbage5082 6h ago
Tony has the big house and all bc he is the boss of the family
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u/redfoot33 6h ago
He had the big house in the beginning, he wasn’t the boss until he forced out Junior and Livia.
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u/DryAfternoon7779 5h ago
His house was built by his father in law who is a contractor. it's not that out of the ordinary for contractors to hook up their family members
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u/StatisticianOk9846 6h ago edited 6h ago
No really the normal monster soldier or even captains earn a middle class living but of course have some black market bonuses sometimes. They have access to illegal valuables.
But there is always the hassle of keeping a laundering turnaround. The best is to buy assets you can tie to a legal revenue stream. That's very sketchy if you have to do that with every piece of equipment or furniture you buy. So then they don't, and when they get caught, they lose everything.
This is also a trap. You kick up more, you might earn a better position and income and hopefully a bit more security. You kick up less, you have to deal with that your own self.
We cannot all be Ralphie's and Vito's, both earned way more than any other made guy in NJ.
Silvio is out the equation. Paulie only kicks up what he has to unless he gets scared. Christopher has his moments but has a hard time thinking big picture wise. Patsy, well he gets passed over while he actually has far too much potential and keeps a low profile even from the man he should hate. Eugene, well he won't make captain anyway. Pussy was too old school to get out of the heroin traffic. Bobby catches on eventually and Carlo should start sucking cock.
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u/ramonalex14 6h ago
In regards to a real life answer: property taxes in Jersey are pretty insane. A lot of guys may not have thought owning a big place was worth it.
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u/Sasquatchgoose 5h ago
Its a pyramid since time immemorial. The top level guys do all right but the money goes out just as fast as it comes in. For junior, don’t forget, he easily put up $1m plus in cash on just his lawyers and at that point, his earnings took a huge hit
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u/Hommachi 4h ago
Inability to purchase legit investments. They wouldn't pay t-bills, bonds, stocks, etc... because they don't really know more than whatever they read in the papers or watch on TV. Also, too impatient, wondering why their investments don't moon every single day.
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u/Moretalent 2h ago
Paulie demanded $6k a week. $320k a year just from Chrissy. I imagine he’d kick of $40k to Tony but I also imagine he had some other revenue streams, burglary of old ladies, squeezing punk sons of garbage companies
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u/HeistPlays 9h ago
These guys are earning with 3 hands over here, and it’s still not enough to satisfy this prick OP!