The Big Sleep is a classic noir detective novel written by Raymond Chandler, first published in 1939. I read the novel in 1974 when taking a literature course to hang out with a girl I was dating. It was the first novel to feature Chandler’s iconic private detective character Philip Marlowe. The story follows Marlowe as he’s hired by the elderly General Sternwood to deal with a blackmailer named Arthur Geiger who’s targeting the general’s wild younger daughter, Carmen. The novel is famous for its complex, sometimes confusing plot (even Chandler himself reportedly couldn’t answer a question about who killed one particular character), hard-boiled dialogue, atmospheric descriptions of 1930s Los Angeles, and the morally ambiguous world it portrays. The Big Sleep was adapted into a highly acclaimed film in 1946, directed by Howard Hawks and starring Humphrey Bogart as Philip Marlowe and Lauren Bacall as Vivian Rutledge (the general’s older daughter). The film is considered one of the greatest film noir movies ever made and featured the legendary on-screen chemistry between Bogart and Bacall, who were married in real life. The title The Big Sleep is a euphemism for death, reflecting the novel’s preoccupation with mortality and the dark underbelly of society.
I recall one time speaking to my friend and partner in my venture capital company, Bruce, about sleep. We had just cashed out on our biggest deal and the money was, as they say, in the bank. I couldn’t imagine why Bruce said he was having sleep problems. Research shows that financial worries are a major cause of sleep problems for many people. According to a Sleep Foundation survey, more than half of people report losing sleep over financial stress at least some of the time, exceeding the number who lose sleep over family issues (47%), mental health (39%), health concerns (37%), or relationship problems (34%). In a survey by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, a staggering 87% of Americans have, at one time or another, lost sleep due to financial worries, with approximately one-fifth of the population “almost or almost always” losing sleep over money concerns. Financial stress disrupts sleep through multiple pathways. Money anxiety can keep people awake past their bedtime as they worry about bills, unplanned expenses, or other financial concerns, making it difficult to calm the mind enough to fall asleep. Financial stress can trigger anxiety, which raises heart rate and body temperature while activating the “fight or flight” response in the brain—all physiological states that work against the relaxation needed for sleep, so it can wake you up prematurely as well.
Financial stress affects sleep across demographic groups, but some populations are particularly vulnerable. Among those who are unemployed, more than half report losing sleep over financial stress “often” or “almost all the time,” compared to 41% of the general population, who apparently sleep like babies. In this group, 43% say they’re “very anxious” about money. The sleep disruption caused by financial stress can create a dangerous cycle. Financial stress can lead to insomnia and other sleep difficulties, which in turn can cause physical symptoms like fatigue and weight changes, as well as mental health issues including depression. According to a University of Nottingham study, people struggling with debt are more than twice as likely to suffer from depression. The connection works both ways—financial stress not only disrupts sleep but can impair decision-making abilities. Decision-making is quite crucial to extracting yourself from a financial problem, right? Among those facing mental health challenges, 93% felt they had recently spent more money than usual, 92% found it harder to make financial decisions, and 56% took out a loan they otherwise would not have. This all creates a potential downward spiral where financial stress leads to poor sleep, which leads to worse financial decisions, which creates more financial stress. The research clearly shows that financial concerns are one of the leading causes of sleep disruption for a significant portion of the population, with consequences for both mental and physical health.
Interestingly, even people working in finance and insurance aren’t immune—nearly half say they “always” or “often” lose sleep over money stress, a much higher rate than government workers (9%)… though that may have changed recently thanks to DOGE. Speaking of DOGE and losing sleep, how about Elon Musk’s sleep patterns? With at least 16 children to his name, it seems Musk does not place too high a value of sleep per se. Recently, we have seen Elon Musk’s Tesla shares fall in value rather dramatically. The man owns 13% of Tesla. In late December, that holding was worth $210 billion, given the Tesla market capitalization peak of $1.625 trillion. Today, Tesla’s market capitalization sits at a mere $835 billion, a rather substantial fall from grace for the all-powerful man of the moment. That means Elon’s share is worth only $109 billion. There is some real humor in those numbers. Musk set out on his DOGE initiatives to save America $2 trillion in annual spending. So far, despite all the disruption and breaches of cybersecurity that have been well-publicized, the most he can claim is that he has saved $150 billion in savings (some would say that he has also COST the budget at least $8.5 trillion per year in reduced IRS revenues due to the silly attack on our main national revenue engine). This has all come at a cost of over $100 billion of his own wealth. For a supposedly brilliant man, that seems like some serious miscalculation on his part. Given the fact that he has just told his shareholders that he will be stepping back from his DOGE efforts and refocusing on Tesla, it is fair to suggest that Elon may be losing some sleep over all this nonsense.
When Musk went about his craziness over Twitter (a.k.a. X), he pretty much lost $44 billion for what seemed like a grandstand play on First Amendment rights. Of course, he has since gone about censoring certain ant-Musk, anti-Trump sentiment on X. But the real point is that the main cause of the Twitter financial fiasco was to restor Trump’s social media platform. But meanwhile, Donald was trying to create his own social media wealth machine by supporting his own Truth Social as his medium of choice. I see that he is currently posting over 4,400 words of gibberish per week on Truth Social (twice the pace of social media blab he produced during his first term on Twitter). As a wealth generator, Truth Social, the mainstay of Trump’s digital asset company DJT, has done about at well as Tesla has for Musk. It is dramatically down this year, down harder than even the tariff-related bear market would otherwise imply.
Between Musk’s plunging popularity and respect and his plunging net worth have gone so far as to jeopardize his vaunted position as the world’s richest man. The contenders for that throne (Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg and Bernard Arnault, to name a few) are breathing down his neck as he struggles to convince the investor world that the whole DOGE thing was just a temporary distraction. It’s unclear that the reputational damage he has suffered will ever get repaired. Who is Elon Musk if he is not the richest man in the world? That is the big sleep dilemma the once great man is now facing. Meanwhile, back at the White House, as Trump’s popularity and confidence ratings are sinking as fast as Tesla’s share price, Truth Social tweet-storms notwithstanding, there is another big sleep disorder building of presidential proportions.