There is a Quebec expression, “né pour un petit pain” (born for a small loaf of bread), that is fairly well known, I think. But maybe I’m wrong.
Maybe it’s simply because I so often find myself in discussions about money and the ways families handle it that I hear it more often than others do.
What I can tell you is that the Quebec attitude toward money really is distinct from what we see elsewhere in Canada and in the United States.
Coming from an anglophone family (but still fairly comfortable in French) gives me a different perspective that I notice quite often, and that I like to share from time to time.
I write the vast majority of my blogs in English, since I consider my market to be “North American,” and because I express myself much more easily in English.
I’m a West Island guy, married to a woman from Abitibi, so our two teens are quite bicultural, on top of being bilingual.
When I decide to write a blog in French, it’s often when I want to deal with a topic related to our Quebec reality, one that will be of less interest to my English-speaking readers.
This week, I read an article in L’actualité about Mitch Garber (Mitch Garber: le «dragon» mordu de Montréal) that I found quite interesting.
He mentions that Quebecers don’t like to talk about money, but that he likes talking about it. He also said he saw it as something of a duty to get people used to talking about it, since people talk about it elsewhere.
I agree with him, and I find his attitude refreshing. This fall, he will co-chair Centraide’s annual campaign, and his goal is to motivate the wealthiest to increase their donations and to promote philanthropy in general in Quebec.
That’s another part of our distinct society when it comes to money.
Wealthy families have been getting more and more involved in philanthropic activities for some time now, especially in the United States. In Canada, it’s starting to develop too. In Quebec, it seems we’re still lagging behind.
Quebec entrepreneurs are often less interested in the idea of passing their business on to their children, and those who sell their company are not as inclined to create a family office to ensure the continuity of their wealth.
I’m not saying that what we do here is inferior to what we see elsewhere, but in talking with families from here and elsewhere, there are a lot of differences, and it’s not only the language that changes.
We can learn a lot by looking at what is done in other regions and countries. At the end of the day, each family will make the decisions its members consider appropriate.
Eventually, with globalization, social media, immigration, bicultural families and so on, changes will come, and the differences between what is done here and elsewhere should shrink.
In closing, I’d like to clarify the title of this blog. I chose “Born for a medium-sized loaf?” because the changes to come will certainly not happen very quickly, and we won’t go from a “small loaf” to a “big loaf” all that fast.
It could even stretch out over several generations. But why not start with yours?
