America's Poorest Presidents (PHOTOS)

US Presidents are, by nature, risk takers. You have to be to "lead the nation into war, annex millions of square miles of territory, or drop the atomic bomb to end a war," news site 24/7 Wall St. aptly points out.

In some cases, the audacity of past presidents has caused some woeful financial collapses. The following list from 24/7 Wall St., America's Poorest Presidents, shows past commanders in chief to have been bold investors, businessmen, and plantation owners who, like most risk takers, had their luck run out once or twice.

For more on the financial lives of US presidents, check out The Net Worth Of The American Presidents: Washington To Obama.

Here's the list of America's Poorest Presidents from 24/7 Wall St.:

(Slideshow text by Douglas A. McIntyre, Michael B. Sauter and Ashley C. Allen, Editors, 24/7 Wall Street)

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Harry S. Truman (1945-1953)

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One of the saddest cases of presidential hardship, Truman was relatively poor throughout his life. He borrowed against his meager future inheritance and invested in a zinc mining operation, which failed and lost him most of his investment. Truman later performed various menial jobs, which barely kept his family afloat. However, the real financial disaster occurred when the clothing store he owned with a friend went bankrupt in the wake of extreme deflation. Truman lost his $30,000 investment, but never declared bankruptcy, despite urgings from friends and family to do so. Truman continued to pay debts throughout his early career, and was still thousands of dollars in debt when he began his tenure as a senator. It was Truman’s sad financial state that inspired the doubling of the presidential salary, which he received after the fact. Truman and his wife were the first two official recipients of Medicare when Lyndon Johnson signed the program into law. -- 24/7 Wall Street

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One of the saddest cases of presidential hardship, Truman was relatively poor throughout his life. He borrowed against his meager future inheritance and invested in a zinc mining operation, which failed and lost him most of his investment. Truman later performed various menial jobs, which barely kept his family afloat. However, the real financial disaster occurred when the clothing store he owned with a friend went bankrupt in the wake of extreme deflation. Truman lost his $30,000 investment, but never declared bankruptcy, despite urgings from friends and family to do so. Truman continued to pay debts throughout his early career, and was still thousands of dollars in debt when he began his tenure as a senator. It was Truman’s sad financial state that inspired the doubling of the presidential salary, which he received after the fact. Truman and his wife were the first two official recipients of Medicare when Lyndon Johnson signed the program into law.
-- 24/7 Wall Street

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Comments

[etiennemacchias]

07:01 PM on 06/09/2010

So poor personal finance management is not only a modern phenomenon but runs deep in America's history. Never knew.

[init]

11:45 PM on 05/31/2010

There's one who must have been wealthy, from wealth but despised the elites, that was Zack Taylor.

[Fidel Kabassu]

06:14 PM on 05/30/2010

I'm curious to find out the smartest presidents. I bet we find out that Democratic presidents are generally better educated. Carter, Clinton and Obama are clearly light years smarter than both Bushes and Reagan.

[Margo Arrowsmith]

04:43 PM on 05/30/2010

They had Thomas Jefferson, who owned plantation and slaves, but don't have Bill Clinton who had no money until he left the presidency and wrote books and did speaking engagements?

[RobtBrock]

05:24 PM on 05/31/2010

Maybe they are saying that TJ was morally bankrupt.

[bdl0715]

05:37 PM on 06/02/2010

I am also surprised Clinton didn't make the list. His salary as Governor of Arkansas was only $35,000.

[MuchMadness]

12:12 AM on 05/30/2010

Most of these presidents lived and served during a time when the U.S. was not a powerful nation. Many of them did not have the benefit of having the Federal Reserve around to keep the economy on an even keel.

[CarterR99]

10:09 PM on 05/29/2010

"Instead, his friends exercised various connections and raised the sum of money on their own, much to McKinley’s perpetual shame."

My, how times have changed since the 1800's. A politician who didn't like taking money from his rich friends!

[Red45]

11:38 PM on 06/22/2010

hear hear

[Julien Henry]

09:13 PM on 05/29/2010

That to me says it all: The first recipients of Medicare Truman and his wife- and these jackasses vilify a much needed program.. I think we need a Billboard in many states - particularly the red states with this information.. What do you think Huffpuffers?..

[catmagnet]

02:10 PM on 06/07/2010

I have serious issues with it, because it doesn't cover the costs that hospitals incur for Medicare's beneficiaries' care. Heaven help us in 2014...

[hmargret]

12:10 PM on 05/29/2010

Some of our greatest leaders were poor. compare to today's leaders.....rich by every standard and completely sold to corporations.

We are not well served anymore....they come to politics to make money, not serve.
CORPORATISM RULES.

[RTIII]

10:56 AM on 05/30/2010

It's not "corporatism", Margret, it's fascism.

[29bela]

01:01 AM on 05/31/2010

It is greed and money addiction.

[GranE]

10:16 AM on 05/29/2010

Considering who wrote this article it is easy to understand why it is void of historical fact that anyone with Wikipedia skills could have written. Harry Truman and every other person who lived during the depression was broke or on the brink of being so. Considering the times, and what events shaped them, made very different "fortunes" for all of the Presidents.

One of the Presidents who gets little respect but who did so much to shape our country was LBJ. If not for his determination to win in Vietnam, he would have a different profile in history. He was a supporter of Rural Electrification along with Sam Rayburn. He got legislation through Congress to fund that program. REA's have remained strong, solvent, and are still operating. His determination to strengthen Civil Rights was a continuous battle.

I see nothing in this article but an attempt to see who married a rich widow or who's kid or relative ruined someone financially. Perhaps the authors would do us a better service by looking into how money was made. GWB was a failure in his attempts to run several oil companies. He lent his name to the group who bought the Texas Rangers so they in turn, could build a stadium with taxpayer money, then sell it. If he made any personal money in the oil business it was while he was in the White House.

This article was written for the purpose of posting the ugly, mean profile on President Obama.

[Luna C666]

03:45 PM on 05/29/2010

Did you continue on to the presidential wealth list?
Because it clearly says Obama is the poorest president since Ford and Carter (with their $7 million net worth, with Obama's $5 million, most of which is from book royalties)..
I don't see your point at all..'ugly, mean profile on Obama' it seems the contrary- when Bush and Clinton both had assets in the $20+ million, and even Reagan topped $10 million (of course he was a movie star). It would seem that Obama is the closest t a 'log cabin' president than America has truly had in a long time..just going by net worth anyhow.

[Hank007]

04:37 PM on 05/29/2010

How the calculated this seems a little dubious. The Bush family, headed by GHW Bush, is worth over $100,000,000. They severely downplayed the massive Bush wealth.

Obama, on the other hand, was still paying his student loans when he was elected to congress, and basically all his money comes from his book sales.

[AnotherMcIntosh]

11:26 PM on 05/29/2010

"basically all his money comes from his book sales"

Are you assuming that all book royalties paid to politicians are legitimately equivalent to book royalties paid to authors who are not politicans and who do have the power to reward their benefactors?

An Obama-supporting organization partly explained the tactic of pushing money in the direction of politicians under the guise of royalties when they described the Newt Gingrich book scandal involving Harper Collins, a publishing company owned by Rupert Murdoch. The organization also explained that "In the past, Harper Collins has offered million dollar book contracts to several conservative politicians in countries where Murdoch was having regulatory trouble."
http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/kay24/gGxSHr

Should we assume that the extraordinary book royalties paid to Obama are legitimate while similiary book royalites paid to so-called conservative politicians are not?

Obama is a Chicago politician who has been successfully swimming with the sharks for some time. He is either an extraordinary swimmer or one of the sharks.

[banja]

09:57 AM on 05/29/2010

What about Pres Woodrow Wilson, i know he was a Prof at Princeton and a Reformer Governor of New Jersey, but he was a poor fellow with all kinds of health problems, he needs to be listed. I still have a bone to pick with him on his civil rights record, he pretty much resegregated the Federal workforce. But Glenn Beck has been on his case in a scary way.

[messy]

09:52 AM on 05/29/2010

McKinely went bankrupt, eh? Today that would be HUGE news...

[1logicalthinker]

03:37 AM on 05/31/2010

It would not be news at all. Who the heck is McKinely?

[Andre C Vaughn]

05:15 PM on 06/23/2010

Are you serious?? President William McKinley??
Either you are a total Moron, or you need to get off this board and go back to your crack pipe!

[trucap]

09:51 AM on 05/29/2010

Well, having read about these great men ,its time to turn to VPs just to mention one of them who was recruited by one of the huge oil companies that rewarded him $34 millions for his sincere loyality .this reckless ,boozer and careless gun shooter who made his wealth by being a great fortune hunter . the people should know more about this kind too.

[Greg0658]

09:13 AM on 05/29/2010

thanks for the work on this article - it was a good read and worth the internet bill to get it - pennies from this booth in the midwest to ya

[Greg0658]

09:21 AM on 05/29/2010

ps - reading the captions (ie little more - the rest of the story) and know'g what I know now (maybe it was different then) .. the rest of the story - under the table favors if we the Estates pull you up and put you in the WH

[Gaylord P Farqua]

08:23 AM on 05/29/2010

President Truman left the White House with his head up. He is one of the most under rated Presidents in history. He was forced to follow a legend during a war and make decisions that set the course of the post war world for decades. He had to earn the respect of the American people when FDR died and left the Nation without the "Father" figure he had represented from 1932 until his death. Compared to the disgraceful behavior of many of those who followed him in office he should be more revered than he is by historians.

[banja]

10:00 AM on 05/29/2010

He should not have dropped the second atomic bomb in my opinion, it was overkill, the Japanese emperor was ready to give up but wanted to save face and dignity, deep down he must have regretted it. I don't care how historians spin this factoid.

[Gaylord P Farqua]

02:07 PM on 05/29/2010

The Emperor had a lot of "face" while millions of Chinese civilians were murdered, while Japanese soldiers raped and slashed their way through almost all of Southeast Asia and the Philippines and topped things off by attacking us at Pearl Harbor. The Bataan Death March notwithstanding the cruelty of the Japanese armed forces is well recorded. The Emperor had to recognize long before even the first bomb was dropped that his forces would lose but he chose to say nothing. His troops would have died or surrendered at his command. Truman's decision saved at least 100,000 American lives.

[cobobs]

09:27 AM on 05/30/2010

You have no idea how scary and fanatical the Japanese forces were at WW2. The sweet, gentle and pacific people of today give you the wrong impression. It was easy to overestimate their tenacity. Truman thought a second bomb was needed, and he was a fellow not prone to overstatement and exagerration. Put yourself in his shoes.

[Sumocat]

07:19 AM on 05/29/2010

Are these the poorest Presidents or the least financially responsible? Kind of hard for me to identify with the "poor" president who was forced to sell his home in Paris.