Where is that? In all the countries I have been the wealthy like to wear special clothes, build large houses, drive expensive cars. In some countries they wear more jewlery, in others they talk about expensive trips they go to.
Fundamentally, it's a way to promote social cohesion, albeit in negative terms. It's not, however, against success, but against the idea that success inherently makes you a better person deserving of putting on superior airs: the successful should not rub the faces of others in their success.
In Vienna in my experience it is very important to seem cultivated (knowledgeable in the arts, music, etc), but wealth doesn't seem to be as big a factor (more so than in Berlin though).
Munich is supposedly a lot more wealth-focused but I think probably still not quite as much as some places in the US. Extreme but slightly relevant example: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3260135/I-ve-created...
"The multi-millionaire and his pneumatic wife told us how they were hounded out of Germany for being too flashy, saying people would spit on their Ferrari and sneer at Maria's large breasts.
So Bastian packed up his life and settled in LA to fulfill his dream of living the 'Baywatch life' after he became obsessed with the show while growing up in cold, landlocked Munich."
The difference between the an American and an Irishman is that the American looks at the mansion on the hill and says, "someday, I'm gonna be that guy". The Irishman looks at the mansion on the hill and says, "someday... I'm gonna get that bastard".
(I'm sure this is an old joke and he didn't think of it, and it's probably been applied to many nationalities)
Read about the "Law of Jante" for the extreme of this mentality (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Jante). I think the first rule pretty well sums up the thought behind this:
You're not to think *you* are anything special.[Edited to add more ”meat” to the comment.]
The fact that he also owns several sports cars and a villa on the French Riviera, is not something he wants publicized.
Steve Jobs never swanked up his house either.
Bill Gates's mansion was built primarily to try to showcase Microsoft development efforts (don't laugh! okay, laugh).
That seems like a bad idea to me. Old Volvos were indeed very safe by the standards of the time, but compared to a modern car, they're simply not. Here in the US, 30,000 people die in auto accidents every year (it's somewhere around 250k/year worldwide). If you have a ton of money, you might as well get a new car and protect yourself. A brand-new bottom-of-the-line Volvo will let you walk away from crashes that some old Volvo would kill you in. And surely a new V60 or S60 (their lowest-end models IIRC, unless they still have S40s there) wouldn't look too out-of-place in Sweden of all places (where the cars come from).
I would rather someone who has legitimately made a billion dollars just go buy a yacht and a Ferrari and drive them around.
Kamprad has a pretty solid tax-avoidance scheme going on too. Completely legal but frowned upon by those who think he should "pay his fair share".
But he is the exception not the rule when it comes to how the wealthy live typically.