← Networth and Chill with Your Rich BFF
Networth and Chill with Your Rich BFF
Sophia Bush on Pay Gaps, Podcasting Money, and Getting Rich While Staying True to Herself
01:01:23
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- [00:00]
Sophia Bush
When you start acting, you're going on hundreds of auditions a month. You hear no 99% of the time. If you're making it, they can cancel your show at any time. But you can't leave or ask for a raise because you're on a six. Deal.
- [00:16]
Vivian Tu
Six damn years.
- [00:17]
Sophia Bush
Now we live in a world where they're like, we're Netflix or Disney or whoever. Go fuck yourself. Take what we owe you or we'll hire someone else. Foreign.
- [00:33]
Vivian Tu
What'S up, rich friends?
- [00:34]
Podcast Announcer
And welcome back to another episode of.
- [00:36]
Vivian Tu
Net Worth and Chill. I'm your host, Vivian Tu, AKA your rich BFF and your favorite Wall street girly. As everyone knows, I am a woman about that money. I want to talk about money. I want to know what you're making, and I want to make sure you are getting paid. Because I love when someone builds wealth while staying true to their values. It's just true. People ask me all the time how to make money without selling their soul. Also, you know, you could sell your soul, which is, let's be clear. You can make money without selling your soul. It's totally possible. And seeing someone do it at the highest levels makes everything feel more achievable. But here's the thing. Most of us think we have to choose between making money or making a difference. We're told that activism doesn't pay the bills or that speaking up is going to hurt our careers. We're basically convinced that integrity and income can't coexist. But today's guest has spent over two decades proving that wrong. She's built serious wealth while never backing down from what she believes in. From teen heartthrob to Hollywood power player, she's literally redefined what it means to be successful in entertainment. I'm here live with her today at Tech Futures. I'm so excited to sit down with the actress, activist, entrepreneur, and host of both the Work in Progress and Drama Queens podcast. Everyone, please welcome Sophia Bush.
- [02:21]
Sophia Bush
Hey, baby.
- [02:25]
Podcast Announcer
Support for the show comes from Bumble. In dating, just like in finance, you tend to get out what you put in. The more intention and openness you bring to the table, the more likely you are to see the kinds of returns that matter. Deep, lasting connections. That's why I'm excited to talk to you about Bumble. Today's sponsor, Bumble, encourages people to show up as their most authentic self, helping them to date with clarity and confidence.
- [02:45]
Vivian Tu
So.
- [02:46]
Podcast Announcer
So when you find a spark, you can explore it with an open mind. If you're thinking about dating, you can jump right in with Bumble.
- [02:51]
Sophia Bush
Well, hi, everyone. I'm so glad you're all dry. This is fab.
- [02:59]
Vivian Tu
Everyone looks very beautiful today. And listen, before we get started, I always like to, you know, warm us up with an icebreaker. So I need to know, Sophia, what is the dumbest purchase you have ever made?
- [03:13]
Sophia Bush
Anything still in my closet with a tag on it feels like a really dumb thing to have spent money on. You know, at the time, you're just like, I can't live without this. And six months later, you're like, wow, I'm just. I'm getting got by the algorithm like everybody else. Great.
- [03:32]
Vivian Tu
Do you have a specific piece in mind? Are they, like, purple ostrich feather boots or, like, something crazy?
- [03:38]
Sophia Bush
Crazy. Oh, man. You know what's really weird is I'm going to the thing I don't regret buying, okay? Which, like, the very first movie I ever did for scale, which, like, before you pay your whole team and your taxes, you get 600 whole dollars for the day. And I, like, I took the, I don't know, $210I had left and went to Bloomingdale's and bought a Marc by Marc Jacobs orange jacket on sale. And I was like, I've done it, and I still have that jacket in my closet. Like, I'll never, ever, ever get rid of it. So for some reason, my brain wants to choose joy. Maybe because the world is burning. I don't know. But, yeah, the shame stuff, I'm like, let's put that in a box and sell it for charity. I'm mortified.
- [04:29]
Vivian Tu
I love that. And you mentioned acting and how much you were being paid when you were on the scale, and, like, you had to pay out all of your team. But when you first started acting as a teenager, what was your relationship with money like? And were you excited? Did you think you were gonna get rich?
- [04:46]
Sophia Bush
Like, no. Because I think when you start acting, you're going on hundreds of auditions a month. You hear no 99% of the time if you're making it because it's not 100%. And then, you know, you're. You're working these, like, day rates. You're so used to not having any money, but then when you start to make even a little bit of money, it's like, well, this feels fun. But again, by the time you're working, you have no credits to your name. There used to be a thing in my industry where you'd earn a quote. So, like, through the years, every time you did a job, they'd have to Match your last quote so your quote would slowly go up through your career. Now we live in a world where they're like, we're Netflix or Disney or whoever. Go fuck yourself. Take what we owe you or we'll hire someone else. So I think I've really, interestingly watched the industry change from what we heard was happening for people who were working a lot when we were coming up and having to be really scrappy. And then we were like, oh, are we. Oh, we're the generation that has to be scrappy forever. Okay, okay, that's fine. Great. I still make, you know, play pretend for a living, so it's a champagne problem, to be clear. But, like, nobody I know's really making crazy money.
- [06:10]
Vivian Tu
Did anyone give you any really solid financial advice early on, you know?
- [06:16]
Sophia Bush
No. And I really. No. Girl, you could have used me. Honey, I really wish you had been around. I had not heard of compounding interest until about four years ago and was like, really? This is the time we're going to learn about this. Great. I couldn't have used this. I'd died at 21 at all. I think it's an interesting thing because I feel like everybody knows this, right? When you don't come from money, you don't really know anything about it. And my parents both didn't come from anything. Like, my mom, you know, spent a portion of her childhood in a housing project. Like, they really. They built a life for themselves that no one expected. And I was a very comfortable kid, but I wasn't, like, a wealthy kid. And so it's been an interesting thing over the years, especially being really curious and deciding to go to, like, nerdy conferences instead of parties and wanting to learn about all these spaces. There are things I've heard, like, really rich people say where I'm like, sorry, repeat that. You did a what?
- [07:23]
Podcast Announcer
What?
- [07:24]
Sophia Bush
So I'm starting to learn about over the last, I'd say five to 10 years, so much of what you're teaching people. And let me tell you what. Knowing the things Vivian teaches you on the Internet in your young life versus your midlife would be a full game changer.
- [07:41]
Vivian Tu
That's so kind of you to say True. And since we are here to talk about money, I'm about to ask a big question. So many of us first saw your face, got really, you know, fell in love with you, frankly, from One Tree Hill. And I have all of the fans. I have to ask the question everybody's curious about. How much money did you actually make from that show?
- [08:09]
Podcast Announcer
Was it a Lot.
- [08:11]
Sophia Bush
No, I'm really gonna bum you out.
- [08:15]
Vivian Tu
Tell me, tell me, tell me, tell me.
- [08:16]
Sophia Bush
So again, and this is like the thing where sometimes I'm like, am I the little. Am I like the sad cloud from the Depression commercial when people ask me.
- [08:25]
Vivian Tu
About the balloon from inside out? Yeah.
- [08:27]
Sophia Bush
Like, I don't want to be, but I want to be really honest. You know, the way it works, again, is you get hired, and especially as a young person, you don't have a quote. And if you've not been a regular on something before, you have, like, literally no quote. So when I started on that show, you know, pretty much everybody was coming from something. You know, Hillary had been a vj, Joy had been on soap operas. I had been the philanthropy chair of my sorority at usc. I was like, I'm raising money for cancer. And they were like, okay. You know, it didn't really matter. And so the. The difference in pay scale was wild. What I can say is once I paid, you know, 10% to my managers, 10% to my agents, 5% to my lawyers, paid a publicist fee, paid my taxes, and then paid the, like, $3,000 a month that my two bedroom apartment in Wilmington cost me, I was taking home about three, $3,000 an episode. And when you get a death threat in our industry, it costs about $2,000 per threat to have, like, a professional team analyze it. So you have to kind of gamble on, like, well, how many of these people who say they want to wear me like a skin suit can I afford to investigate? And when you sign a TV contract, you sign a contract for six years, they can cancel your show at any time, but you can't leave or ask for a raise because you're on a six for six.
- [10:08]
Vivian Tu
Six damn years.
- [10:10]
Sophia Bush
So the other thing that was interesting for us, again, we were this sort of sandwich generation of strangeness in the industry. What you really hope works for you in tv, even if you're not making a lot of money at the time, is, well, we'll get syndicated and we'll get residuals. Except when we signed to do that wonderful show that we all loved. And to be clear, people will tell me they are Brooke Davis biggest fan. I'm like, no, that's me. You can all fight for second position. There was no streaming. Our show is syndicated on streaming, which means the studio that owns the show makes all the rituals and we don't. No. And look, it's what it is. Like, that's the breaks. Still a champagne problem. Like, I spent nine years getting paid any Money at all to be like, no, but I love him. It's not like I'm complaining, but I want to tell women the truth. Because there's this idea that everyone's doing better than you. Everybody has it figured out. Maybe if I had that job, it would be easier. It's always a hustle. And it took me 20 years in this industry of doing 15 straight years of network TV without taking a year off. Finally taking like a moment of a break to make sure I hadn't turned into a complete pod person. And like, you know, Runaway Bride style. I needed to know what kind of eggs I liked, not just what was available at work in the morning. And then it was literally year 20 was the first time I got paid equally to my male costar.
- [11:54]
Vivian Tu
20 years.
- [11:55]
Podcast Announcer
Wow.
- [11:56]
Vivian Tu
First off, I want us to clap for that because what the hell, it was a fight.
- [12:02]
Sophia Bush
And no shock to anyone who knows me, I won. I was like, we're not doing this anymore.
- [12:09]
Vivian Tu
And to bring us on that topic of pay gaps in the entertainment industry, I mean, it's pretty egregious. We've seen the headlines. Some of these famous women actresses are literally just fighting for a tiny percentage of what they're maybe like, I don't want. Maybe it's not nice, but like a mid tier male actor is making. And I want to know, how do you approach salary negotiations now that you are big bad Sophia instead of philanthropy chair of my sorority, Sophia, What I.
- [12:45]
Sophia Bush
Think is really important is it's kind of like a seesaw. You have to know your worth and you also have to understand how to make the best product. Once I started producing, which, by the way, I sort of did before, no one asked me because I just trailed my producers around asking them questions and asked if I could sit in on, like, the notes meetings. And then I wanted to meet with the UPM and look at the budget. Like, I want to understand every single aspect of how a film gets made, what it costs per episode costs for television. Like, if you don't really know the full picture, you also can't accurately figure out where you fit inside of it. So I got really nerdy on the math side. And what I started to really understand is you can kind of shoot your project in the foot if you lead with ego and ask for too much or if you lead with. Well, I spent 10 years being underpaid. Like, girl, same. Also, most people, like, everybody out here is struggling. Everybody's got to have a side hustle. There's a moment where I think you have to say, what do I deserve? But also, how do I be a good team player? I don't know that that's necessarily encouraged of our male counterparts, but I also think that if women go into higher and higher levels of professionalism, acting like men, we're just going to do the same shit men have been doing to us, to everybody else forever. And that's not a great way to operate. So clearly, I will walk in somewhere if I'm going to produce something and talk about what my expectation is. And then I want to analyze the whole budget, and then I want to know, who are we going to to cast? How do we do that fairly? You know, I have on projects taken less money than I was told I could earn so that the women I'm working with can all be paid equally because I think it's the right thing to do. And my agents don't love it, but it creates a very different experience in the workplace. And I think at some point, if we want to shift from the crazy beast of oligarchy we find ourselves in in our economy to anything that actually works. And I'm not saying, like, I'm not going to be a Pollyanna about it, but, like, conscious capitalism is possible. I think there has to be a re. Kind of like a recalibration of how we do things that was very foundational. You know, coming from my podcast, Work in Progress, it's like my baby. It's my favorite thing to do. I literally made a job where I get to ask interesting people questions and they have to talk to me like, what? It's my dream come true. And when we decided, when I had the. The idea in a brainstorm with my team for drama queens, my team, you know, they're my team, they were like, well, it's your idea. So you're the creator, you'll be the owner, will hire your friends as your co hosts. And I was like, nah, dawg. Like, those girls and I have been through the trenches together for 20 years. We will co own it. We will split everything equally. Everybody told me I was insane, but it was the right thing to do. And I don't say that to be like, you guys, I'm so great. I say it to be like, we have to either take leadership on change or we have to stop complaining about how things aren't changing. And. And I think the only way to do it is kind of like this. It's to be really frank about how things work. It's to be frank about how sometimes you might have to give Something up to get where you want to go. But you might win bigger than you could possibly imagine by doing that. And, like, let me tell you what that podcast that is a rewatch of a teen TV show has crushed. So we're doing great, splitting it three ways. Thank you very much.
- [16:45]
Vivian Tu
I love that. I feel like one of my big takeaways from our conversation just now is that knowledge is power, and it is so important to know the facts and figures. You were talking about being the math nerd on set and following producers around and learning everything that you could. Were you ever having conversations with your women co stars, men, costars, about how much everyone else was making? Were people open about that? It sounds like this is something that you're passionate about, being open and transparent about going forward. But when do you think that started in the industry?
- [17:27]
Sophia Bush
Listen, I understand why it's not a common practice, because our industry is very feast or famine. You could have a great year and then have a year where nothing's quite working. You could have the worst year ever, which our whole industry had. And to be clear, that's folks like me that you know. And it's the 200 people on our cruise that you don't. It's our DPs and our electricians and our catering managers and our wardrobe supervisors. Like, when we went into one strike followed by another strike after full shutdowns during COVID Like, I can't explain to you how horrible it was for everyone. And so when you know there's a chance that you could make some money this year and maybe not make any money next year and have to figure it out and have to figure that out with your family and have to figure that out with the people on your team who only eat if you do. I get why everyone's always trying to make sure they can hoard or get whatever they can in the moment. You know, again, having a parent who grew up in, like, pretty gnarly poverty, like, I know all the stories. I know all the things. I know why I hoard hotel shampoo bottles. And my mom had to be like, girl, I know why I used to do this. Brands will literally send you shampoo. Stop doing that. You know, but it's ingrained in you and I.
- [18:49]
Vivian Tu
It's scar tissue.
- [18:50]
Podcast Announcer
Yeah.
- [18:50]
Sophia Bush
I never want to act as though scarcity is not a struggle. And I also don't want to pretend that once, from the outside, it looks like you've made it. You never experience it. Like, we are all humans trying to survive on this planet. That at the moment, doesn't seem to want many of us to do even. Okay. And I get it, why people don't talk about money, but I also think you have to get a little uncomfortable to change the thing that keeps so many people in discomfort, in dis Ease. And so I really admire that so many people that I came up with have just started to talk to each other about this stuff. You know, I did a show for a season with one of my favorite actresses and friends on the planet. Her name is Sky P. Marshall. She played my best friend on Good Sam. She. She is the lead of Matlock opposite Kathy Bates. Casual, like, absolute legend. She's crushing nominated for Critics Choice Awards. Like, I just want to shout her name from rooftops. And when she was doing her test deal for Matlock, she FaceTimed me and was like, I have so many questions. And I was like, tell me all of them. And like, let me tell you what I went back and asked for. And let me tell you how I pushed for this. And let me tell you how it took me 20 years to. To get my location housing covered by our studio. 20 years. Ask for it now. And like, these are the arguments you can make, and this is how you do it. And I don't think it changes unless we change it. And I don't think I would have known to ask for certain things had I not had friends who'd been doing this longer than me. Like, let me tell you what, Connie Britton, the icon who played Tammy Taylor, that woman will be like, what did they say to you? Oh, no, honey, no. This is what you're gonna do. So she's taught me, and now I get to teach someone else. And I. I think women are particularly good at it. You know, we've had to have a lot of whisper networks for generations to survive some shit. Like, why not take the whisper networks onto the social media like our friend Vivian over here, and tell everybody the tea.
- [21:09]
Vivian Tu
I love that you just shouted out a mentor and a mentee of yours, because it really is like, paying it forward. You want to make sure that the same community that helped you, you can help as well. So since we're talking about money, you've certainly diversified your income streams. What started just as acting is now producing, podcasting, investing. Was this purely a. I love it. I'm creative, I want to do this decision. Or was it also would be nice to, like, balance out my income and have multiple different lines of business?
- [21:44]
Sophia Bush
Yeah. I wish I had understood the excitement of a multi hyphenate. Career or a side hustle earlier. Like, I look back and think to myself, even the fact that I didn't start a merch line while I was doing One Tree Hill, like, hello, who was advising any of us? You know, it's kind of crazy what we missed. But I think the interesting thing about the years that I've been in this industry was watching people do things. Even though the advice early on was like, pick a lane, stay in it, I never liked that. Now I understand because I'm one of the many adult women my age who's been diagnosed with adhd. I'm like, oh, my brain doesn't like to focus on just one thing interesting. And I'm not quirky, it turns out, but following passion, following curiosity. It's that relentless curiosity that makes me a good artist. And it turns out that makes me a good entrepreneur. I just didn't know that when I was younger. And so truthfully, there was a thing happening kind of in my mid to late 20s. I was really doing a lot of, now I look back, like radically nuts philanthropic work. Like my best friend Nia, who, you know, who is my business partner, and we run our fund together. We were just like walking into boardrooms telling people to give us millions of dollars for charity. And they were doing it. We'd be like, you need to write this check to this organization. And they'd be like, okay. The audacity of like a 27 year old, you know, with a cute blazer. I was like, who did I think I was? But I started to learn from some of the people in those rooms. I'd hear about a conference, and to be clear, not a gorgeous one like this, like a nerdy one with no good lighting, no step and repeat, and no snacks. But I'd go take notes and hearing about what was emerging in technology, watching friends of ours start these unicorn companies, whether they were Uber or Warby Parker or, I mean, you name it. I was like, well, what are all these guys doing? So we started to ask to go to some things with them. And then we started to ask if we could get on a cap table. And yeah, maybe a man in my industry could write a quarter of a million dollar check. And eight years into a TV show, I could only afford to write a $10,000 check, but like, let me try to write two or three of those in a year and see what happens. And so it was curiosity first and then, which will come as a shock to no one. Then I was just pissed. I was like, well, why aren't There more women on the cap table. And why are Nia and I the only two girls in this room? And why is she the only black person in this room? And why? And people were like, oh, my God, here she goes. Because, you know, insatiable, curiosity, neurodivergence, whatever. I had a lot of questions. And the cool part of it was I think I just kept asking questions until people started answering them. And that's how I started my podcast. And then I realized, oh, this is a thing that works. And then I saw Jenna Fisher doing the Office Ladies and I was like, well, I don't know any fan base that's more fun than the One Tree Hill fans. Why don't we do that? Especially since all the girls were underpaid. Why don't we make our money now? Like, it's always kind of been a thought because of a curiosity. And I learn, I learn about the money as I go. So now I'm trying to tell all the women coming behind me, like, learn about the money first, Ladies, your retirement accounts will be better. That's what I want for people, is to take whatever level up we've had in our particular, you know, age bracket or generation or whatever. I want people to take that and be armed with it earlier as they.
- [25:43]
Vivian Tu
Follow along, building for the next generation. I love that. So I want to have a moment of transparency now. Okay. You do a lot of stuff, but if we were looking at a pie chart, where would you say the percentages of your income come from? And then keep in mind, I'm gonna ask you a follow up question, which is after you give me the percentages of how you make your money is the most lucrative thing your favorite?
- [26:16]
Sophia Bush
No.
- [26:17]
Vivian Tu
Okay, break it down for me.
- [26:19]
Sophia Bush
I. There's something really magical to me about something like this.
- [26:27]
Podcast Announcer
Yeah.
- [26:27]
Sophia Bush
A sit down with a person, having a great conversation. It lights me up in a way that I love more than anything. An interview podcast about, you know, how to. How we all human is maybe not the most profitable thing in the world, but it's the thing I love the most. I will say acting as an art form is one of the loves of my life, but the. The making of something is quite difficult. I get that high. I get that like, oh my God, humans are gorgeous feeling when we're really in it in a scene and we. It's like something happens that's unexpected and you know that it's amazing and people are having real emotions and it's great. And then they call cut and then they gotta like, move a Light around, and then somebody's gotta do a thing and then. And you lose it. And. And so I love being an actor, but it's a little more of like a zigzag. The 16 hour day is not the best thing, but the scene you make is the best thing. So I would say sustainably from start to finish. A podcast kills me because it's like I'm having the best scene of my life for one straight hour that doesn't happen on a set. It's much more interrupted. But I will say as well, there are things that people would think I get paid for that I don't. You know, people are like, oh, well, you know, you must be doing all this politics because you're getting paid. I'm like, no, it turns out people show up for democracy for free. You just have to get paid to lie to people, I guess. So that's a little disconnect. But I've learned to kind of figure out, can I go do a speaking engagement on a topic that's meaningful to me at a corporate retreat once or twice a year that will then cover all the flights and hotel costs that I incur? Going to work on an issue at the border in Texas or going to advocate for reproductive rights at Bryn Mawr to college students, or those things I.
- [28:43]
Vivian Tu
Figure out do good and well at the same time.
- [28:46]
Sophia Bush
Yeah, you know, so again, as an artist, you kind of like, never know where your next paycheck's gonna come from. You figure it out. The diversification helps with that, certainly. But for me, there's also the added layer of what corporation that has like hundreds of millions or a billion dollars, can I get pay me for something so that I can go do these other five things for free for people who can't? And that's not necessarily something I think my accountant loves, but it feels right for me.
- [29:20]
Podcast Announcer
Support for net worth and chill comes from Bumble. No matter how seasoned you are, dating, like any investment, can always feel a little scary. I know so many couples who have met on Bumble who put in time, energy, and emotions into finding the right partner. Someone who has shared goals and genuine compatibility. But the more intention and openness you bring to the table, the more likely you are to see the kind of returns that matter deep, lasting connections. When you're approaching dating with authenticity, it's also an investment in yourself. Be thoughtful in crafting your Bumble profile and bring the same energy to connections that you hope to receive, because all that energy enriches you too. Bumble has prompts and interest badges so you can show off your own personality and make it easier to find compatibility with others. You can get to know the little things, like how they take their coffee and the big things, like their goals for the future. So if you're ready to find a meaningful relationship, one of the most important investments, investments of your life, you can do it on Bumble. Hi, friends. Quick pause in our show to take a question from my besties in phone a friend presented by Bumble. Where I'm answering your burning questions. Andrew asks, I'm about to move in with my boyfriend, who makes a lot more money than I do. He wants to get a place that's way out of my budget. How do I talk to him about what I can actually afford so that we can split the rent fairly? He doesn't want to look for a cheaper place that's more in my budget because he's bougie. Ah, bad and bougie. So first things first. I think you need to have a real honest conversation about money. I know this is super uncomfortable, but if you're moving in together and you're building a financial partnership, you need to be able to talk about this stuff openly. And here's the thing. If he wants the fancy place that you literally cannot afford to split 50 50, then you have to have that conversation about how that doesn't feel fair to you. Fair does not always necessarily mean exactly equal. What I encourage you to have is a conversation about prorating. So I'll give you an examp. When I first moved in with my now husband, he made a lot more money than I did, and he wanted a apartment that was a lot closer to his office. It was going to shorten his commute. And I told him, you know, point blank, hey, I can't afford to go halfsies on this, and I don't want to be a mooch and ask you to help, you know, cover more. And he actually said, no, I'm happy to cover more because it makes my life easier when it comes to getting to work. We prorated our rent based on how much we made, so it was a commensurate burden of our incomes. So neither of us felt financially put out. But he could still get that nicer apartment and feel really happy about where he was living. I think this is so important to have as a conversation when they talk about having money conversations with your partner, it doesn't necessarily have to be once you're engaged, once you're married. In fact, it's a lot easier to have these conversations earlier on. And frankly, couples that talk about money are that much more likely to stay together because they're just not fighting about it.
- [32:17]
Vivian Tu
I want to pivot us to talk about my favorite subject, investing. But first, I want to open up with a stat that's probably going to make you angry. You probably already know it. Less than 2% of all VC funds go to women teams. But you are a general partner at Union Heritage. It's a VC fund. How do you pick and choose what ideas and investments to make? Is it, you know? Oh, it's just a gut feeling. And how do you know what's worth your time and money?
- [32:47]
Sophia Bush
Well, even. Even for us, starting the fund took a lot of time. You know, Nia and I started making these, like, little angel investments alongside each other in our late 20s. And then there was a point probably 10 years ago where a lot of the men we know that are just a little older than us, who'd done very well on things, were like, well, you ladies should have a fund. You should. And I was like, who has time to do that? Like, what are you talking about? I have six jobs. Like, no. And then the interesting thing was we keynoted the Forbes 30 under 30 conference in Detroit, where at the time, we were running our deeply intersectional salon that we had opened because we got really pissed that his two best friends, because one of us is a white girl and one of us is a black girl, we couldn't get our hair done together. We were like, no, this is just not gonna fly. So we decided to try to fix a problem. And, you know, a mile from our salon, we sat on a stage like this, giving a talk. And Nia's dad, who works on the public market money management side, you know, pension funds for, like, police, fire, cities. Who's my favorite bonus dad, who jokes that I'm his bonus daughter, sat us down and was like, you girls, you think you're angels. You think you're these cute little philanthropists. You think you're like, these little radicals. You're investors. The way you talk, the way you analyze. Why are you so against what all these other people tell you to do? Why don't you want to start a fund? And we were like, we just don't know that we're qualified for that.
- [34:32]
Vivian Tu
A man wouldn't say that.
- [34:32]
Podcast Announcer
By the way.
- [34:33]
Sophia Bush
He hit us with a stat. He said, isn't it interesting that women won't apply for a promotion until they're 90% certain they can do the job? And men apply once their certainty crosses 40%. And we were like, okay, dad, are we getting called out? And it really was a powerful moment because we realized we're so much more skilled at this than we give ourselves credit for. And Nia's dad is one of our other general partners. There's four of us at the fund. And we decided to institutionalize what we'd already been doing together for 15 years. And we really built a strong thesis around it. Our funnel is incredible. Even onboarding, you know, to apply for the fund is incredible. And it was actually a very amazing lesson in ownership of self for me. And it was like something I had to process not only in terms of our business plan, but with my therapist. And I was like, huh? Money really is. It is really an emotional inherited story as much as it is a tangible fiscal element. And so that's really the origin story for us. And we run a philanthropic fund already that deploys in Michigan to really boost the early stage ecosystem. What we find is that founders at the earliest stages aren't getting the kinds of support and resources they need. So we built a platform of wraparound resources for them to try to shore up the market, to try to support people in Detroit and in the greater Michigan area. And frankly, it helps us de risk our investments as well. So it's the do good and do well thesis in action. And then our first fund deploys in Michigan or works with companies that have some sort of Michigan footprint, whether that's research at our university system. Just have to shout out the Michigan university system. We have three and a half billion research dollars moving every year. It's more than Harvard, Stanford and Yale combined. If you need a place to research, you might want to come to Detroit. And for us, you know, some people said, why not do a traditional national fund? And we said, this place is our origin story as partners. And frankly, when you think about a healthy economy, if we keep building up on the coasts and the center of the country collapses, like, where goes the American dream? So to have a really robust tech sector and research sector there is very meaningful to us and feels like a way to actually support the whole country. And then our second fund, when it's time for that, will be a more traditional national fund, but always Michigan first.
- [37:34]
Vivian Tu
Love that. And you talk a little bit about the American dream. It's very clear to everyone in this city giant room that activism is such an important part of your life. How'd you get involved? Was it just one day you were like, this is so unfair. I need to, you know, do something?
- [37:52]
Sophia Bush
Yeah, I think for me, the. The way in was the environment because I had the privilege of growing up in California. And. And, you know, you can. It's a state where you can literally wake up and snowboard and by sunset be surfing. To be clear, I don't surf. I'm like, let's leave the ocean for the fish. Not everything is for us, but, you know, whatever floats your boat. But I grew up, like, camping in our national forests. I was a camp counselor. I love being outside and the idea that we ever were not taking care of our environment. You know, I grew up in a time in our school system where we were studying the environmental movement in our state of the 60s and 70s, and I was looking at the places I frequented, just looking like, I mean, apocalyptic almost. The air, the garbage, the sludge in the water. And realizing that environmental policy shifted my own city from something I couldn't recognize in a photograph to a place I loved living. And it might also be, you know, the asthmatic kid who, like, can't breathe. That thought, you know, no matter where you live, your environment shouldn't determine how or whether you live. And the interesting thing about moving into environmental justice in my teens and twenties is that once you pull on the thread, you cannot escape immediately learning about gender disparity, what women go through all over the world about racial disparities, about what communities live close to incredible polluters. I mean, we see it today with a data center in Memphis that is poisoning a black neighborhood. Like, the second you see start to analyze the system in which we all live, you realize how unless you are a rich, straight CIS white man, you are already placed so far behind. And so working on issues of racial justice, of gender justice, of education, equity, like, it all just came tumbling. And every time someone would say that thing to me that they love to tell actors, women, I guess, really, anyone stay in your lane. I was like, don't we understand that the world is an ecosystem? You can't pick a cause. You have to try to fix systems. And they're all interconnected. And so I think, much to the dismay of the people who have to try to help me schedule my life, I'm not doing less, I'm constantly doing more. But I think it's worth it. And especially in my position, having a digital megaphone, essentially, not every single person who follows me is going to care about education or finance or systemic racism, injustice, or the fact that much like the stat about finance, women's health has only ever received 1% of our healthcare investment dollars. 1%. We're 51% of the population, we have a problem. But every single person that I get to speak to is gonna get fired up about something. So I feel like the more I can be the Cheesecake Factory menu of pick a pause and I will direct you there like the better in service I am. Also I would like to go to the Cheesecake Factory. Unrelated but spinach artichoke dip really hits.
- [41:43]
Vivian Tu
And you mentioned how we should all be a little bit more emboldened to support causes we believe in. We are at an event called Tech Futures. I want to ask you a question. What is your perspective of how tech should play a role in one supporting these causes but knowing that some of the things that tech requires can often be the biggest oppositions to some of this justice that we want to find, whether it be racial justice in certain communities that are disproportionately disadvantaged because of data centers being placed there or environmental issues because we are polluting, we're using.
- [42:24]
Podcast Announcer
Up all of the water.
- [42:25]
Vivian Tu
How do we balance this desire to grow and move forward into the future while also not completely destroying what we already have?
- [42:37]
Sophia Bush
Just a casual question.
- [42:39]
Vivian Tu
It's a simple question. Yes or no answer, no pressure.
- [42:42]
Sophia Bush
Listen, I. I don't have all the answers. What I do think is incredibly important is for us to zoom out. So for example, is the amount of water these data centers are using a problem? Yes. Is the amount of water we use on bad agriculture systems in this country a gargantuan amount? Comparatively, yes. So we actually need to fix our water usage problem regardless of industry. And then things get better in industry. I think we also have to begin to ask what we really need, you know, is it is a data center worth the health of itself neighbors? I would argue no. Mass corporations that for example have built refineries, factories, you name it. The list is longer than I have time to read to you right now. Along Cancer Alley in Louisiana, they call it a sacrifice zone. Oil companies literally call the people who live in a part of Louisiana that's awful. Residents in a sacrifice zone. They think it's worth sacrificing people for profit. I disagree. And that might seem like a lofty goal, but it's not impossible. We just have to shift our priorities. Why? We're allowing shareholders to buy back their stock with government bailouts rather than invest in health care or I don't know, pay their employees a living wage is a problem. These are things we have to organized to fix. But tech is absolutely a part of that. What worries me more in real time than the issues we need to fix around energy usage for a data center is the abuse we already see happening because of this technology. And it's part of the reason that Nia and I try to use our investing work at Union Heritage and also also our media backgrounds to do these larger zoomed out, sort of. I think about them as like pieces of coverage, even though that's like a news term that doesn't really make sense here. It's just how my brain understands it. So we invested in an AI company that is literally working to unbiased AI. Its tech is unbelievable. I am so incredibly proud of the founders and the work that they're doing. And at the same time, we executive produced a documentary called Another Body about one woman's story of deep fake abuse. And we used that film to go and advocate in front of Congress to call on our lawmakers to pass laws to stop the digital rape of women and girls, because we are 98% of the victims of AI abuse. And over the span of two years, those videos went from around a half a million views to 4 billion views in 24 months. So we have a problem. And those are the kinds of things that I think it's incredibly important to address while we build. We have to have guardrails while we expand. It's like you would never build that bridge without guardrails on the side of it. You just wouldn't do it. And we shouldn't be doing that. As we design the future of tech, we should be saying, how do we build things that will better the lives of humans and how do we legislate them to not hurt us? How do we build technology that might be able to give people some of their time back to not just, you know, work, eat, sleep, repeat, to work a little, family a little, I don't know, read a book. Do you miss those? I do. Like, how do we use these things to make the world better, not just to continue to pillage the world? And that's kind of above my pay grade in terms of the answer. But I promise I will always be a pain in the ass and ask the question anytime I have the opportunity. I'm always down to brainstorm solutions. I just think they're complex.
- [46:59]
Podcast Announcer
Yeah.
- [47:00]
Vivian Tu
And I think one of the solutions that most of us can agree on is it's going to take legislative change. You have been incredibly outspoken in the policy arena. Can we just get a little bit of a pep talk? Because everything feels like a huge fight these days. Like, it feels like we're climbing up A hill always rolling the boulder.
- [47:23]
Sophia Bush
You mean because we're battling authoritarianism and. And the lawmakers don't respect the law and they violate it all the time and we have a modern Gestapo attacking people in America. Yeah, it's not funny. It's really, really bad and dark. It is. But I think what's really important is to also seek out, in the absolute nightmare storm we're watching, seek out the good. There's like, I literally follow a good news account because I need it. And despite how bad things are, we are still winning. People are still standing up. You still have judges saying, no, you cannot deploy the National Guard against American citizens. No, you cannot do that. We still have people willing to fight back. And I think the flood, the zone analogy that they came up with in his term one really was designed to exhaust us. But there are so many more of us than there are of them. And when we really make a lot of noise, they do get scared. It took 48 hours to uncancel Jimmy Kimmel because Disney lost $4 billion. And I guarantee you not everybody we know even had a subscription. But we are more powerful than we know. And so it's important to remember those sorts of shifts. It's important to remember that there are people standing up. It's important to remember, by the way, that they shut the government down and they don't want to swear in that new representative from. Oh, my God, is it Arizona or. It's Arizona, right? Yeah, because she's the 218 vote to release the Epstein files. It's coming. They can't stop us from caveat. We've done a lot of absolutely horrendous, fucked up shit trying to get toward the ideals of what America is supposed to be. To be clear, we're not perfect, but the ideals, like the golden nugget at the center of this democratic experiment is incredible. And we're not going to stop fighting for it. Like, I think about this, the stuff my mom had to go through, that my grandmother had to go through, like, ladies, we couldn't even have a credit card until 1974 unless a man signed for it. And we're going to act like we're going to stop now? Absolutely not. So we can be exhausted, we can be pissed, we can tell the truth, but we're not going to stop. And what I would recommend, if you feel that overwhelm, is to go hyper local. Figure out who in your zip code is making a difference. Volunteer at a food pantry, go work at a shelter, organize your neighbors to do Something. There's a letter writing campaign being planned online right now, which I love because voicemails can be deleted, emails can be ignored. Paper mail is delicious because it's a pain in the ass. And just imagine how quickly we will break the system at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and in the halls of Congress when they start getting 10,000 letters a day from us. Paper mail has to be scanned and cataloged. We can resist in ways that seem silly, and we can resist so powerfully that we can move behemoth corporations again in 48 hours. I promise you, all is not lost. And it's always darkest before the dawn. And now I'm quoting rock bands, but they were onto something.
- [51:04]
Vivian Tu
I mean, what a pep talk.
- [51:08]
Sophia Bush
We're gonna be okay, guys.
- [51:11]
Vivian Tu
I love that. So, as we start to wrap up a little, I do want to shift gears and talk about something much lighter.
- [51:20]
Sophia Bush
Okay.
- [51:20]
Vivian Tu
I want to talk about love. Okay. So not too long ago, last year, you came out as queer.
- [51:27]
Sophia Bush
Yeah.
- [51:27]
Vivian Tu
And you said, my people. And you said for the first time that you felt like you could breathe. Talk to me about that.
- [51:38]
Sophia Bush
You know, for me, not worrying about taking up too much space or not taking up enough space, just saying, like, yeah, okay, I mean, first of all, was everyone living under a rock? Like, has anyone watched any of the movies or, like, TV shows I've ever watched? Hello. I've been able to kiss so many hot women. Thank you, and you're welcome. But, like, the number of people that were like, you were my gay awakening and John Tucker, I was, like, proud to be of service. Also. Same, I think, and I think there's a particularly interesting thing that I can't say. It's just queer people. Anybody, again, who's not like, rich, straight, white, CIS guy, There's so much you go through about how you are or are not allowed to own your story, identify, whatever. And for me, I think I just happened to get on TV in a time where we were doing so much advocacy work and there was such a continued push for a fight for change after the horrors of the 80s and 90s and what happened to our community. And an elder gay who I love was just like, girl, you're not like that into women. You don't get to be famous and on TV and come in here and, like, take up space in this. In this world, be a good ally. And I was like, okay, I can do that. Yeah. I'm not. I'm not like, struggling in this way.
- [53:19]
Vivian Tu
Right.
- [53:20]
Sophia Bush
So who can I show up to defend? What can I do? And Eventually I realized, like, oh, nobody else actually gets to tell me what I can or can't say about myself or what I can or can't feel about my myself. And, you know, I just happened to, like, start dating one of the hottest lesbians in the game. And then I was like, well, yeah, I mean, she's the most symmetrical face. Like, can you believe perfect Fibonacci season?
- [53:50]
Podcast Announcer
No.
- [53:50]
Sophia Bush
It's actually so crazy. Like, I have to get ready to show up and, like, look cute. I wake up like a bridge troll, and she just wakes up like that. Like, she is. She is like that Beyonce energy incarnate. I'm like, how? But, you know, again, lucky me. I do love that for you.
- [54:12]
Vivian Tu
Since this is a money conversation, do you guys talk about money? Is it any different than conversations or norms? Different from when you were, you know, with money men?
- [54:22]
Sophia Bush
Oh, 100%. First of all, there's no, like, underground rage from a partner when they, like, land the bad bitch they say they wanted, and then they're mad at her for her career. I don't have that anymore.
- [54:35]
Vivian Tu
Yeah, yeah.
- [54:36]
Sophia Bush
So that's lovely. Also, to be clear, like, her and her teammates had to sue U.S. soccer for equal pay and still didn't get what they were owed. Like, there's two people in our home who have been historically underpaid their whole careers. So we have to talk about it, and we talk about it in a really healthy way. And it's really interesting to just not just in terms of the conversation about money, but in general, to be in such a gorgeously healthy, equanimous intimacy with a person. I'm like, oh. Oh. Maybe this is why I always, like, got a little itchy before, because I never had that. Yeah. And so even though we're dealing with double the gender oppression in our household, I've also never felt safer. And that. That goes so far beyond how we're negotiating for what in our careers. But, yeah, we go over all of each other's stuff. Like, that's my biggest hype, woman. And vice versa.
- [55:39]
Vivian Tu
I mean, you really do want to just live with your number one cheerleader. Why not? They should think the sun shines out of your butt even on days when you don't.
- [55:48]
Sophia Bush
Yes.
- [55:49]
Vivian Tu
So we're gonna do a fun little rapid fire round to wrap us up. Just think of the, you know, first thing that comes to mind. Okay.
- [55:55]
Sophia Bush
Oh, God.
- [55:58]
Vivian Tu
Best financial advice you've ever received in your life.
- [56:03]
Sophia Bush
Compounding interest. Start putting money away, guys. I don't care if it's like, 10 bucks a month. Do it.
- [56:08]
Podcast Announcer
Start investing. Okay.
- [56:09]
Vivian Tu
Worst money mistake that you are willing to share.
- [56:15]
Sophia Bush
No, I can't share that.
- [56:18]
Vivian Tu
She sandbagged us.
- [56:20]
Sophia Bush
I got a pass. I'm sorry.
- [56:22]
Podcast Announcer
Oh, wow.
- [56:23]
Vivian Tu
Okay, okay, okay. One money habit that you swear by.
- [56:31]
Sophia Bush
What do I swear by? Honestly, if you can like, well, literally hire the best accountant you can afford because they've just got tips and tricks, they'll pay for themselves, I'm telling you, it really makes a big difference.
- [56:51]
Vivian Tu
That's a good one. If you could go back and tell 22 year old Sophia one thing about money, what would it be?
- [56:59]
Sophia Bush
Most of the stuff you buy, you won't remember, so don't buy it.
- [57:04]
Vivian Tu
Do you think spending on experiences is better?
- [57:07]
Sophia Bush
Yes, absolutely. Stuff is stuff. It's like. And we're all stressed out by our stuff, so why were we sold that we needed so much stuff? It's so stupid. Travel experiences with your friends. Like, my favorite thing to be able to do. You know, if I'm like working on a show, I love to sneak my credit card to the waiter and at the end of the night be like, oopsie, like that to me. That's what I want to do with my money.
- [57:33]
Vivian Tu
And in that same vein, best splurge of your lifetime.
- [57:39]
Sophia Bush
Oh, the very best thing. Okay, this is not a rapid answer.
- [57:46]
Vivian Tu
But I'm going to give it to you.
- [57:47]
Sophia Bush
So I grew up, like, I don't know why my dad and I were just always obsessed with those old Land Rover defenders. Obsessed with. And they used to not be expensive like they are now. And we were like, that's what we're gonna do. We're gonna get one when I turn 16 and we're gonna like tinker with it and we'll, we'll fix it up and then that'll be my car. And then my mom was like, hey, psychos, that car has no airbags. Like, our teenage. A teenage girl is not getting in that vehicle with no airbags. No. And she was right to be clear, like, always listen to your mother. But I just never got over wanting one. And for my 34th birthday, I bought myself a Land Rover Defender. And I love it. It's like the best thing I've ever spent money on.
- [58:34]
Vivian Tu
I love that.
- [58:35]
Sophia Bush
Thank you.
- [58:37]
Vivian Tu
First off, thank you so much for spending some time with me. But tell us, what is next for Sophia Bush and where can everybody find you?
- [58:45]
Sophia Bush
Oh, my goodness. What is next? So many things. Something I'm not allowed to talk about, which is really a bummer. I would love to Be a spoiler, but I might get sued. So, you know, we talked about it backstage. That's what she was talking about. I'm on my way up to Canada in two weeks to shoot a film that I'm really excited about. I'm in development on two series that I'm very excited about, one you may have heard about that I'm also not allowed to talk about. The like secrecy in the social media age really sucks. But yeah, I'm just feeling really joyful. Life feels really great. I live with a person who is like human sunshine. I have survived all the things I thought would kill me. I get to come hang out in places like this even though things feel very scary in the world. Like, look how many lesbians we got in a room. To be like, fuck the patriarchy and all of our male allies. Thank you so much for coming. We appreciate you. Like, it matters so much that we stay engaged, but we also remember that we can't live without delight. And finally in my life, I feel like I'm taking agency over my own delight. And it's lovely. So that would be my parting piece of advice to anyone here who's like, what the fuck is 2025?
- [60:12]
Vivian Tu
Yes.
- [60:13]
Sophia Bush
And find your delight where you can because that's going to be the thing that really carries you through. And also, listen to everything Vivian says and invest your money. Okay?
- [60:23]
Podcast Announcer
Thank you so much for your time.
- [60:24]
Vivian Tu
And thank you for being here with me.
- [60:28]
Sophia Bush
Thank you all so much for coming.
- [60:31]
Podcast Announcer
Thanks for tuning into this week's episode of Net Worth and Chill, part of the Vox Media podcast network. If you liked the episode, make sure to leave a rating and review and subscribe so you never miss an episode. Got a burning financial question that you want covered in a future episode? Write to us via podcastourrichbff.com follow Net Worth and Chillpod on Instagram to stay up to date on all podcast related news. And you can follow me at YourRichBFF for even more financial know how to.
- [60:56]
Vivian Tu
See you next week. Bye.
- [60:59]
Podcast Announcer
Thanks to Bumble for their support of the show. With Bumble, you get a glimpse into someone's personality, interests and lifestyle right on their profile. Their prompts make it easy to see if you're compatible right away. Like when someone answers, the way to win me over is having a retirement plan for us and our future dog. You see their humor, but also their approach to money and long term thinking. Those first impressions let you skip the small talk and dive straight into building a real connection. So if you're ready to put yourself out there. What are you waiting for? Start your love story on Bumble.