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It's not how much you earn...

While searching for something else, I stumbled across this ABC News story from October: "Latest Celeb Money Meltdown: Nicolas Cage." The article recounts the financial trials of various celebrities and semi-celebrities who have seen the the financial rewards that accompanied professional success somehow slip away.

Among those on the list:

• photographer Annie Leibovitz ("has struggled to stay out of debt");
• actor Stephen Baldwin (he and his wife "defaulted on over $824,000 in payments to their mortgage");
• baseball great Lenny Dykstra ("foreclosure sale of [his] $18 million California mansion");
• mob-boss daughter Victoria Gotti ("apparently owes $650,000 to JP Morgan Chase Bank");
• actor Willie Aames, former star of 1970s and '80s hit shows Eight is Enough and Charles in Charge ("filed for bankruptcy last year, and his home is in foreclosure");
• actress Jodie Sweetin of Full House fame ("house is in foreclosure...water has been shut off twice").

As for Nicholas Cage, one of Hollywood's highest-paid stars, the ABC report says he "owes the IRS more than $6.6 million in income taxes." A CNN story quotes the actor's former attorney (against whom Cage has filed a lawsuit) as saying Cage needed to earn $30 million a year "just to maintain his lavish lifestyle."

In a court filing, the attorney noted that in 2007 Cage went on a "shopping spree" that included "the purchase of three additional residences at a total cost of more than $33 million; the purchase of 22 automobiles (including nine Rolls Royces); 12 purchases of expensive jewelry; and 47 purchases of artwork and exotic items." Cage also reportedly bought two castles, one in England, one in Germany.

Nicholas Cage may earn millions of dollars a year, but I'm reminded of a line from Dickens:

Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery.

The numbers, of course, are relative. Annual income $20 million, annual expenditure $20,600,000 (or more), result misery.

Financial security/stability is far less about how much you earn than it is about how much you spend — and, of course, how you choose to invest any surplus.

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