I have spent the past 15 years researching the offshore wealth of the super-rich. In my efforts to understand how oligarchs’ wealth was hidden from tax agencies, divorcing spouses, and disgruntled business partners, I have been astonished again and again at how many oligarchs cannot seem to live without the splashy public display of their wealth, even when it puts them at risk. In recent days, Internet sleuths and government agents alike have been closely tracking the movements of Russian oligarchs’ private jets and multimillion-dollar yachts. Instagram posts from plush locations are a major strategic asset for anyone seeking to impose accountability on people who otherwise seem to be untouchable. For example, a niche profession has developed in tracking down transnational oligarchs via their social-media posts so they can be served with legal papers to freeze their assets in debt-collection proceedings. These high-end collection agents, the Boba Fetts of the ultra-high-net-worth crowd, can do their job precisely because the oligarchs and their globe-trotting family members can’t help themselves. They seem compelled to post photos of themselves hobnobbing with celebrities or posing with race cars, even when they know they are under investigation. Many people claiming bankruptcy in the face of heavy fines and court judgments have been exposed to the courts as frauds after unintentionally or intentionally exposing the extent of their assets.

This tendency appears pronounced among the families of Russian oligarchs. The now-locked Instagram account “Rich Russian Kids” acquired 1.5 million followers just aggregating the images of decadent luxury posted by the sons and daughters of wealthy Russians.

As social scientists have argued for more than a century, the evidence is overwhelming that, beyond a subsistence level, people will fight even harder for status than they do for money. We see that fight now in the anti-war comments and peacemaking efforts of Russia’s elites, after just a few days of sanctions pressure.