Private Jet-Addicted Millionaire Decides to Sell Private Jet Because It’s Too Polluting

Until recently, that was reality for Stephen Prince, a millionaire businessman from Georgia, U.S., at least five times a year, when he'd fly out for business or pleasure, either alone or in the company of like-minded, similarly well-heeled friends. Prince is a millionaire, but he would have you know he's unlike most millionaires out there in the sense that he's been spending his time (and money) trying to improve things for the rest of us.

Prince is the co-founder and co-chair of a group called Patriotic Millionaires, whose name is, or should be, self-explanatory: they're wealthy individuals from all walks of life striving to erase some of the social and financial inequality in the United States. One way they hope to achieve that is by lobbying for higher taxes for the rich, as Prince explains in the video interview included at the bottom of the page – an older one, but still relevant today.

Prince is back in the news today after he's decided to sell off his final aircraft, a twelve-seat Cessna 650 he owns alone, and which he's been flying at least five times a year to go hunting in Nebraska or vacationing in the Caribbean. Any other decision of the kind from any other millionaire would have barely registered; after all, millionaires and billionaires trade multi-million toys on the regular, usually for upgrades. But Prince's stands out because he says he's doing it for the greater good.

In other words, Prince says that he's decided to ditch private jet ownership because he's finally clear on the impact it has on the environment and the economy. Private jet ownership and chartering have boomed over recent years, fueled by the grounding of commercial flights in 2020 and the rise of the new generation of the nouveaux riches, the influencers and insta-celebrities of the moment who have turned private flying into the trendiest flex.

Flying private is a flex, Prince agrees. It's also the nicest way you can spoil yourself and, as he explains for one media outlet, quite the addictive habit you can pick up when you're rich. No one shouldn't board a private jet if they're not mentally prepared to become addicted to this kind of lifestyle.

So, what gives? All things considered, it sounds almost like Prince is either pulling some sort of farce/online experiment or shamelessly lying. Call it a come-to-Jesus moment, belated as it is: Prince has been doing his research, and he now knows that private jet flying is the number one cause of environmental pollution. His Cessna 650, for example, burns an average of 241 gallons of fuel per hour, and Prince is convinced no amount of carbon offsetting will erase the CO2 the jet has been releasing into the atmosphere so he could go on vacations.

"I get on my plane and I'll spew ten times as much carbon into the atmosphere as I do when I get on a first-class flight on Delta or American Airlines," he says. "It's just unconscionable – it's incredibly selfish."

He doesn't expect his wealthy peers to ground their aircraft, too, Prince adds in a separate interview, but they should at least be taxed extra for the privilege. Himself, he's decided to switch to first class whenever possible and to hitch a ride with any one of these peers when he doesn't have a direct connection to where he needs to be. Assuming they'd still do him a favor after all this, of course.

Jokes aside, Prince does have a point, and the fact that he's willing to be the one to walk the walk as well, instead of just talking the talk, shows that there might be light at the end of the tunnel, still. Various non-profits and government bodies worldwide have been ringing the alarm on the high carbon footprint of the aviation industry for years, and louder still recently, as private aviation boomed. Any one of the world's richest people has a carbon footprint dozens of times higher than the average individual, and it's from private flying only.

Carbon offsetting, which billionaire Bill Gates swears by, is one way of reducing the impact of private flying on the planet. But common sense should tell us that it's far better to simply not pollute or to pollute less than to do it shamelessly and then plant a bunch of trees thinking they can magically reverse the damage overnight. Prince is just one of the few millionaires who seems to get it, and he's willing to part with his private jet to set an example.