How I Spend My Money: Man Raking It In On Emergency Covid Payment

WELCOME to How I Spend My Money, a totally original series on WWN that looks at what people in Ireland really do with their hard earned cash.

This week we chat to Eoin Clangen, a recipient of a Covid-19 emergency welfare payment, who details the extravagant lifestyle the temporary payment of €350-a-week affords him while he navigates life during a global pandemic.

Occupation: I wish.
Age: 31.
Location: Modest 16th Century castle with private cinema, gym and swimming pool.
Monthly pay: €14 million a day according to some Welfare Cheats Us All campaigns.

Transport: fleet of cars replaced every week with new ones.
Household bills: have only two Bills on household staff, but one insists on being called William.
Phone bill: GoMo €9.99 per month, I try to make savings where I can.
Health insurance: does the private hospital on castle grounds count?
Groceries: I’ll ask the private chef when I see him.
Subscriptions: €7.99 Netflix, €44 million for annual Bilderberg membership.

Spending:

9AM: Dead handy, €350 into my account without even getting out of bed. I use this to do some online shopping. I give my wife a few million to keep her occupied for the day. I buy a gazebo, I buy enough alcohol to keep a 30-man strong stag going for the year, replace the fleet of cars and buy a lovely extravagant fire pit for the garden.

I burn my CVs in that because this emergency payment comes with exactly zero strings attached, I will never have to work again. This is a fact.

10AM: Pay off the mortgage on the castle, buy a house in each of the 15 ‘green list’ countries listed by the government. Fuck it, grab another one in France just for the craic. Check my Euromillions ticket – I’ve only gone and won the fucking thing. Burn that ticket in the fire pit too, sure I wouldn’t get out of bed for less than €80 million these days. Then I head out.

First things first – before I leave the house I pop on my face mask; don’t be an arsehole, wear one. I got mine online for €40,000. It’s made of solid gold, has diamonds on it and comes pre-farted in by a famous celebrity of your choosing. Irina Shayk’s one is a bit eggyer than I’d like but sure.

74.0016PM: I’m so rich that I no longer experience time in a linear fashion like you plebs not on the Covid-19 Free Money Special, nevertheless watch out for that new tap limit on Debit Cards, gone up to €50, you’d be tearing through the spending and before you know it you’re down to your last €500,000 from the weekly payment.

Chef cooks me up something nice for what I’m guessing is lunchtime? But I replace him with Gordan Ramsey and I get great craic out of paying him to call me an idiot sandwich. I’m generally not a tipper so Gordan has to make do with picking up €100 notes I dropped on the floor and lost interest in or taking down a Banksy original off the wall and bringing it home with him.

It’s not all spend spend spend – I’ve actually switched to a high end Tesla car so it’s electricity all the way which saves a bit. The helicopter on the other hand is a fucking killer, gobbles up the QAV-1.

Sort of bored now and have bought everything I need for the day, so for shits and giggles I hire a private militia to stir shit up in Ukraine or Belarus or somewhere. I’m not ideologically driven in any way, but it’s fucking gas watching it come up on the news later. I’m all like “I did that, that’s me” but Irina Shayk, who I’ve paid to replace my wife, isn’t all that impressed. Gordan Ramsey comes in with an omelette for dinner but I don’t let Irina near the thing, not with her IBS.

What I’ve learned: Nice one taxpayer, keep the millions flowing into my bank account, I’m just happy to provide an accurate account of how the system works. And boy does it work.