You mean buying a 75 inch flat screen on credit even though I had a perfectly good 50 inch one already won't make me instantly rich? But everyone on TV has a 75 inch screen!

Mentat: Woo hoo! I'm rich!

im not yet, but i will be.

The secret to being rich is to talk other people into giving you their money to invest

This article is all wrong. I know the real secret to getting rich.

Just send me $29.95 plus $5 for shipping and handling and I'll send you all the secrets to getting rich that other people won't tell you!

vpb: Not really news. You don't get rich by working hard, it takes an obsession to do the things that you have to do to make real money.

That's why I think housewife is probably going to be the most important occupation this century. It takes time save that kind of money, and we don't have it right now with all the adults working full-time jobs.

Or you could rob a bank, which sounds more enjoyable, even if you get caught

doglover: But you can't have cake and eat it. It's one or t'other. If you want to be REALLY rich, you need compound interest. That means you need to make your money unavailable to yourself for a time. The more you invest, the more you harvest.

Pretty much. And for that you need to be at a point where you can assume risk. Once you've covered your basic needs, you apply the rest to making more. There is always the sperm lottery, celebrity, etc. but what separates the real rich is their ability to take advantage of opportunities when they come up. If 99% of your income is spent on sustinence and impulse purchases, you can't do that.

Brown bagging FTW!

Depending on your state and local income tax rates, bringing your lunch rather than eating out each workday is like getting a $2000 raise.

Wellon Dowd: Brown bagging FTW!

Depending on your state and local income tax rates, bringing your lunch rather than eating out each workday is like getting a $2000 raise.

Nah. Your wife ends up spending it anyway.

Wealth is what you have, not what you spend.

Wellon Dowd: Brown bagging FTW!

Depending on your state and local income tax rates, bringing your lunch rather than eating out each workday is like getting a $2000 raise.

Yeah, but you have to sit at your desk even longer every day

Actually, the secret to being rich is having mental problems.

Okay, maybe it's not that extreme, but look at the really wealthy, especially those who manage to make it big young. There are the basic necessities in most of them like important connections and, particularly in the case of the super-wealthy, a deep disregard for basic human decency on some level, but in ALL of them there's really only one reliable connector: an insane level of determination and drive.

The fact is, most people, myself included, aren't wealthy because we don't WANT to have to spend 100 hours a week doing our jobs. I like being able to come home at the end of the day instead of having to go to a meeting or dinner to schmooze clients. I like not having to get up at 4:00 A.M. to get on a conference call to Brisbane. I like having my weekends free to do what I want instead of being obligated to offsite meetings. I like not getting calls at 2:30 in the morning because something big happened on the other side of the planet that impacts the business and needs immediate strategic attention.

Most of us want the money that comes with success.... until we see the exceptional amount of effort required to maintain it in most cases.

If you don't have that single-minded drive required to spend 12 or more hours a day on your work, chances are you're going to hit the limit at being comfortably middle class and most of us are, even if it's tucked away in the back of our heads somewhere, perfectly okay with that.

/ then there are the people who have to work 12 hours a day just to scrape by... they're totally screwed

Lost Thought 00
Depending on your state and local income tax rates, bringing your lunch rather than eating out each workday is like getting a $2000 raise.

Yeah, but you have to sit at your desk even longer every day

Is there a park near by... Hell at one job I used to drive to a supermarket parking lot down the road just to get away from the office on lunch.

Splinshints: Most of us want the money that comes with success.... until we see the exceptional amount of effort required to maintain it in most cases.

Wholeheartedly agreed, and you didn't even have to mention the fact that the sort of attention to your work this requires means you aren't paying attention to things like a spouse, children, friends, exercise, etc.

Splinshints: Actually, the secret to being rich is having mental problems.

Okay, maybe it's not that extreme, but look at the really wealthy, especially those who manage to make it big young. There are the basic necessities in most of them like important connections and, particularly in the case of the super-wealthy, a deep disregard for basic human decency on some level, but in ALL of them there's really only one reliable connector: an insane level of determination and drive.

The fact is, most people, myself included, aren't wealthy because we don't WANT to have to spend 100 hours a week doing our jobs. I like being able to come home at the end of the day instead of having to go to a meeting or dinner to schmooze clients. I like not having to get up at 4:00 A.M. to get on a conference call to Brisbane. I like having my weekends free to do what I want instead of being obligated to offsite meetings. I like not getting calls at 2:30 in the morning because something big happened on the other side of the planet that impacts the business and needs immediate strategic attention.

Most of us want the money that comes with success.... until we see the exceptional amount of effort required to maintain it in most cases.

If you don't have that single-minded drive required to spend 12 or more hours a day on your work, chances are you're going to hit the limit at being comfortably middle class and most of us are, even if it's tucked away in the back of our heads somewhere, perfectly okay with that.

/ then there are the people who have to work 12 hours a day just to scrape by... they're totally screwed

So are you saying the rich are hardworking, driven, and sacrifice a great deal to earn their wealth?

I thought it was just handed to them and only poor people actually do any work. That's the usual mantra anyway.

watson.t.hamster: I thought it was just handed to them and only poor people actually do any work. That's the usual mantra anyway.

No, it's not, that's just how you choose to dishonestly rephrase legitimate, arguable points when you don't feel like having an honest discussion about real and measurable problems with wealth disparity that are causing actual negative effects on our economy and society.

These are garments, Mr. Cratchit. Garments were invented by the human race as a protection against the cold. Once purchased, they may be used indefinitely for the purpose for which they are intended. Coal burns. Coal is momentary and coal is costly. There will be no more coal burned in this office today, is that quite clear, Mr. Cratchit?

vpb:
Driven to lie, cheat, steal, risk prison, sacrifice any shred of human decency.

That's better. Someone came dangerously close to praising the wealthy.

vpb:
It is the most undervalued occupation. If you think about it, much of the cost of living today is is labor saving items and services. If you have the time, you can save a LOT of money doing things yourself.

Much of the standard of living we enjoy today is based on labor saving devices.

Look at how the third world spends it's time. Preparing food, acquiring water and firewood, and then all the rest (cleaning their homes/clothes, walking rather than driving, and the like). Although they do save a lot of money by grinding their own grain rather than buying than pansy pre-milled stuff.

Our current standard of living is based around those "money-wasting" labor saving devices. That and cheap food.

vpb: Driven to lie, cheat, steal, risk prison, sacrifice any shred of human decency.

It's easy to think this, because it lets you off the hook for being a miserable failure. Some of us have a pathological need to believe the 'other guy' cut corners to get where he is. Sure, in some instances this is true. In the vast majority, it is not.

I give you Jon Huntsman. If there is a more moral, ethical and upstanding person in business I would like to know about it. So tell me : given that in his entire life there can't be an instance found of how he lied, cheated, stole, risked prison, or sacrificed one shred of human decency, how did he acquire his wealth?

It's easy to let envy, jealousy and greed lie to us and make us thing the other guy is somehow ripping us off. It's much harder to look in the mirror and admit the true failing in our lives is staring right back at us.

1macgeek: I give you Jon Huntsman.
From your link:"Mr. Huntsman leaves egg packaging business to form Huntsman Container Corporation with brother Blaine Huntsman in Fullerton, California."

Kudos to Mr. Huntsman for his support of cancer research, but it's hard to be well off if you don't have some kind of help of some kind right at the start.
From Wiki:"His father is billionaire businessman and philanthropist Jon Huntsman, Sr. of the Huntsman Corporation.[4]"
It's a lot easier to make money if you already have it.

1macgeek: I give you Jon Huntsman. If there is a more moral, ethical and upstanding person in business I would like to know about it. So tell me : given that in his entire life there can't be an instance found of how he lied, cheated, stole, risked prison, or sacrificed one shred of human decency, how did he acquire his wealth?

The Huntsman group defaulted on $2 billion in junk bond issues just about a decade ago (even though they were worth more than that, but in other subsidiaries). But, hey, it's not like those minorities who bought more house than they could afford.

1macgeek: I give you Jon Huntsman. If there is a more moral, ethical and upstanding person in business I would like to know about it. So tell me : given that in his entire life there can't be an instance found of how he lied, cheated, stole, risked prison, or sacrificed one shred of human decency, how did he acquire his wealth?

Huntsman was born March 26, 1960 in Redwood City, California.[2] His mother is Karen Haight Huntsman, daughter of LDS Church apostle David B. Haight.[3] His father is billionaire businessman and philanthropist Jon Huntsman, Sr.

Not saying he is or isn't a decent guy but people who are the children of billionaires are hardly a rags to riches success story.

If jerks like Einstein had only "made better choices" they could have been rich.

Peki

That's why I think housewife is probably going to be the most important occupation this century. It takes time save that kind of money, and we don't have it right now with all the adults working full-time jobs.

A large percentage of millionaire households are single income. The wife (in almost all cases, the husband is the single income) is usually more frugal than the husband too.

Home economics is hard work.

My grandmother grew up in a Glasgow orphanage during the Depression. Thrift is something of a family value.

Thrift makes it relatively easy (no guaranteed thing, mind you) to get from a position of even a few hundred grand ahead, early enough in life, to low-millionaire status, a relatively early good (but not too- wild) retirement, and without struggling very hard at any point in between. And you get full power out of thrift (pushing off taxes with IRAs, high-deductibles on insurance, credit card rewards, driving decent but out-of-warranty cars since you could afford a repair without panic).

Thrift, with diligence and decent luck, may get the American-middle $50k household to a couple hundred grand by about 65. Which doesn't go too far, really. It never makes you rich.

Getting to a few hundred grand to the positive early enough, though, is the challenge. That's luck in cash or brains, talent, dedication, avarice, denying biological imperatives (DINKs) or any of those other things. Not thrift. But, thrift is a component of most modest long-term millionaires, because those without it burn out like not-that-great NBA/NFL players, lottery winners, etc.

Jubeebee: You can't penny-pinch your way to rich. At some point, you need to make more money.

This is true, however, you can't spend your way into affluence either. If all your pocket change is going to cigarettes, beer, and lottery tickets, you aren't going to claw your way out of poverty.

I recommend the Thomas Stanley series of books for those interested in this topic.

Millionaire Next Door is getting dated, it was published in the 90s.
Millionaire Mind I havent read, I think it updates the former.
Stop Acting Rich isnt as good as MND, but is still interesting, and is post housing crash.

Interesting table showing certain professions ranked in 3 categories:

% millionaires
% high-income producers
ratio of millionaire/h-ip

Mining and geological engineers are the best at turning income into wealth. Only 1.49% are high-income, but 4.51% are millionaires.

Doctors, on the other hand, are bad at it. 10.01% are millionaires, but 38.30% have high incomes.

/High-income producers are $200k or more in household income per year

vpb: Peki: vpb: Not really news. You don't get rich by working hard, it takes an obsession to do the things that you have to do to make real money.

That's why I think housewife is probably going to be the most important occupation this century. It takes time save that kind of money, and we don't have it right now with all the adults working full-time jobs.

It is the most undervalued occupation. If you think about it, much of the cost of living today is is labor saving items and services. If you have the time, you can save a LOT of money doing things yourself.

I work part-time from home, so I'm kinda a part-time housewife, and it does save us a lot of money. First, I don't have to commute anywhere, so I put less wear on my car. I enjoy cooking, so I make dinner from scratch most nights, including enough leftovers for my husband to take for lunches. When something breaks, I order a part and fix it when other people would just replace the whole thing. And I'm good at home repair, so we only have to call our plumber for problems that really warrant $90/hr.

In spite of this, I don't save us anywhere near as much as I could make. But I'm a lot happier with what I do day-to-day.

I just think too many people get excited thinking, "Oh, we could double our income!" without taking into account all the expenses they'll accumulate both working full-time (biggest of all being childcare if you have 'em). If you really figured it all out, they might find it's not worth so much putting up with that shiatty job.

watson.t.hamster: That's better. Someone came dangerously close to praising the wealthy.

And, again, you dumbly refuse to acknowledge the complexity of the argument and instead try to turn it into a simple black and white picture.

How terrible your life must be when you can only see things in a single dimension. I feel sad for you, in a way, knowing how much of the complexity of life your terrifyingly rigid mind must be missing out on.

Tjos Weel: I recommend the Thomas Stanley series of books for those interested in this topic.

The problem with Stanley is his dependence on interview versus any kind of actual case studies. Not that anyone is likely to do better... getting the frugal millionaire to talk all day for a crisp $50 bill and a Bud Light is easy. Getting him to open books is another matter.

One thing I've seen amongst the working-class frugal rich (and I'm finding that I'm going that way) is a tendency to downplay their beginnings. Inheritances or even just a paid-for college degree. When you're a 'welding-shop and a few rental properties' 55-year-old F-150 millionaire, the job at your dad's shop and the 50k inheritance you got at 29 seem like ancient trivia. You've worked 50+ hours a week for 35 years. But, it got you the first rental property, a few tools, a decent credit score, and the ability to weather a short downturn. Huge differences.

DUH! You don't get rich by giving it away.

It takes money, to make money.

Problem is, I don't have money, because all of the damn "basics" take it all.


So, in the end, from what I've seen...it's about working your ass off, so you have no life.
And making a buck from a sucker...because they aren't paying attention.

Most people don't have money until the end...then you don't have the energy.

Best quote I've heard,
It takes you making 20 other people millionaires to make you a millionaire.

No one gives it to you for free or out of the goodness of their own hearts.

Skirl Hutsenreiter: I just think too many people get excited thinking, "Oh, we could double our income!" without taking into account all the expenses they'll accumulate both working full-time (biggest of all being childcare if you have 'em). If you really figured it all out, they might find it's not worth so much putting up with that shiatty job.

Yeah, my husband and I did the math once and, taking into account the cost of daycare and the cost of losing his dependent-spouse tax write-off, I would have to earn something like $20/hr full-time right off the bat just to break even. That's assuming we wouldn't need to get a car: we don't have one and didn't think to factor it in, but the chief reason we don't need a car is because I have the time to walk or bus everywhere. Sure, that turns a trip to the library and grocery store into an entire morning's work, but as long as I get to the kids' bus stop on time, it's cool.

I admit there was a while at the start where I had to check our bank balance down to the penny before I went shopping to see if I could buy bread AND milk, but we got through that and as time goes by, we are more and more reaping benefits. The only thing we've ever gone into debt for--barring unofficial debt to parents, which got forgiven as often as not--was the house, meaning that although we had to go without fripperies like a deep freeze, a microwave, or bloody chairs for a while, once we got the damn things, they were OURS and vacuumed up no further money except the cost of electricity to use them. And we're considering getting solar panels when the time comes to reroof.

TL;DR: time cost + money cost = constant. Yes, luck is a huge factor in life, but so are the decisions you make. If it is at all possible to feed your family on one income--and I know not everyone can--do it. If that allows you to give up a car, do it: cars burn money better than gasoline. If you have a choice between buying something now with debt or buying it later with cash, buy it later unless you will literally die without it. Fast forward ten years: you'll thank yourself.

vpb: Not really news. You don't get rich by working hard, it takes an obsession to do the things that you have to do to make real money.

Pretty much. But I think you can break it down to 3 categories.

1. Born rich, or Born on 3rd base. These people either have such a network of social and familial connections that failure is impossible, or they were simply just born with millions. Not even worth thinking about because their success can be boiled down to the mommy-lottery.

2. Visionary Thinkers. The Bill Gates types. Small percentage of mega-rich. Again, not really worth thinking about because you know if you are one of these people. I'm not.

3. The vast majority of rich = The self made, financially minded. I know quite a few people in this category. They literally view every aspect of their lives in terms of a spreadsheet. If they spend money, somehow they make money on top of it. Want a yacht? Buy it and sell time shares off of it. Want a cabin in the woods? Buy a really big hunk of hand and hire a townie to run a ranch and make money on cattle. Enjoy your private retreat AND make money off it at the same time. Need a hot water heater? Contact the factory directly and buy 10 of them at wholesale and have the factory drop ship the other 9 to contractors.

These people can be annoying to be around, constantly trying to put you together on something. But they are generally wealthy as well.

No matter how hard you work, you will never get rich by hard work alone.

Lawnchair

One thing I've seen amongst the working-class frugal rich (and I'm finding that I'm going that way) is a tendency to downplay their beginnings. Inheritances or even just a paid-for college degree. When you're a 'welding-shop and a few rental properties' 55-year-old F-150 millionaire, the job at your dad's shop and the 50k inheritance you got at 29 seem like ancient trivia. You've worked 50+ hours a week for 35 years. But, it got you the first rental property, a few tools, a decent credit score, and the ability to weather a short downturn. Huge differences.

That is basically having a functional family. Which is a HUGE factor. But, a large number of people have that, and not all take advantage of it.

jst3p: Huntsman was born March 26, 1960 in Redwood City, California.[2] His mother is Karen Haight Huntsman, daughter of LDS Church apostle David B. Haight.[3] His father is billionaire businessman and philanthropist Jon Huntsman, Sr.

Not saying he is or isn't a decent guy but people who are the children of billionaires are hardly a rags to riches success story.

In a culture that uses money to define a man's worth, the children of the rich are born saints.