subject: Even Famous People Need Help With Debt [print this page] Who doesn't dream of being famous? Who wouldn't want the glamour, fame and money that comes with being a well-known face? When you are a celebrity, the wins can be enormous. But sometimes the fame can go to your head and make things more complicated.
The majority of household names who find themselves in the civil courts do so because they fail to sort out their tax affairs and debt that, as we all know, can get out of hand very quickly indeed.
Take former Atomic Kitten member Kerry Katona. The mother-of-four and reality TV star was declared bankrupt in August 2008 when she failed to pay the final 82,000 of a 417,000 pound tax bill. Another case is that of Comedian Frank Skinner. Although he was not declared bankrupt, he thought he had lost millions of pounds after putting his life savings in a bank which later collapsed in the recent financial crisis. After getting help with his debt he later took the route of insolvency.
Even the fantastically rich can financially stumble sometimes. Look at Elton John, over a 20-month period between 1996 and 1997 he spent 205,774 dollars on flowers alone - and that's just a smidgen of his spending. In 1999, the BBC reported that John asked a merchant bank to help him borrow 40 million dollars to pay off his debts. A year later he admitted running up debts more than $2 million a month. His spending sprees were reported to include purchases of classic cars, clothing and jewellery.
Even Hollywood stars are susceptible to debt and financial problems. Michael Jackson, Kim Basinger, Burt Reynolds are just a few of the high profile stars that have struggled with debt. The most recent example of this is the film star Wesley Snipes who was jailed for three years in December 2010. At the time of his conviction in April 2008, prosecutors said Snipes had earned more than $37m (24 million pounds) in gross income between 1999 and 2004, but had not filed tax returns, paid any federal taxes or actively sought any debt help at all.
So why is it that celebrities are just as likely to fall into debt and money problems as we are? One of the reasons could be that celebrities work for themselves. They are effectively self-employed and if they don't keep their finances in check then they are all too quickly bought down to Earth with a bump and suddenly not treated like a celebrity anymore. For us everyday members of the public, it's nice to be reassured sometimes that famous people are just like us and need help with debt just as much as we do.
But it just goes to show that debt can literally affect anyone at anytime, whatever their job or background.
Fame might last for only five minutes, but the effects of debt can be felt for a lifetime.
by: Bill Weston
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