White Wolf Publishing

I normally have it so that flaws cost freebies gained x2 (so a 7 point flaw would cost 14xp to rid yourself of)

Personally I may allow it in a game, but it really depends on the situation.  The point of flaws is to give you more at the start of the game than others and freebie points can be worth a lot more than experience depending on how they are spent.  If someone goes into it with the intent of buying off the flaw later then I'm not going to let them take it.  If they are not playing a flaw at all, even after I mention it, then I'm going to force them to buy it off.  If over time the flaw becomes too much of a hindrance then I'll let them buy it off and remove it.  That is one of the reason I usually ask a player to track where freebie points are spent and then pay the cost it would have taken to buy that with xp.  If you don't have that then really 3 times the flaw seems good for most flaws.  It would show the effort that it takes to get rid of a flaw.

on the roleplaying backgrounds idea- If player A has resources 5 ($30k/month), he could grant the poorer members in his coteries low levels of resources with ridiculous ease (for a boon of course, probably a major boon). you could in one month raise three others to resources 2 with some cash left over. raising someone to resources 3 could take a couple months, but its still quite easy to do. past that it slows down a lot, enough so that its not worth 'helping' in the same fashion. sure, you may need someone to make a finances roll to do it properly,



and the thing is, as boons work i can see every reason why those with money would offer to help their poverty-stricken fellow kindred. you get a boon (maybe more than one), and all it costs you is tying up your monetary resources in the short term.