For generations royalty employed you at starvation levels, yet you continue to employ them at top dollar. All I'm saying is, shop around.
"Oh ho!" he said, "Royalty? We did away with that long ago! We have our academics and respected thinkers 'in residence' so to speak. If they wish to serve the nation for the rest of their lives they give us their wisdom freely and in return they have one of the 'idea village' cottages for life. We feed them and such. They live in comfortable modesty, free to think, to do research, to write whatever they please. Usually we recruit them in middle age, some younger, some older at times. It's the inverted triangle model, service and love as our greatest good. Tell me, Alex, when you get back to your time, what will you do?"
Let royalty be sober in the face of challenge, noble when the nation is in trouble, real and loving toward every citizen. In these times we seek not the pomp or glamour, not the costumes and consumption - we seek the wise leaders, the "King Solomons" of our times. Let royalty carry the heavy weight that such privilege brings. The alphas are expected to run toward the trouble and solve it on behalf of the citizens, as proud and protective of the nation as the nation is of its sovereign. One cannot accept the perks and dodge the risks. So act as loving parents to all rather than allowing the rich to manipulate the poor and then say it was their vote to be poor. And if you are not able to do this, find a non-blood relative heir who can, often times this form of "adoptive heirs" works far better in lifetime monarch-type service roles.