What Are the Differences Between the Rich and the Poor?
1st November 2011
In his book, Eker lists seventeen ways in which the financial blueprints of the rich differ from those of the poor and the middle-class. According to him:
- Rich people believe: “I create my life.” Poor people believe: “Life happens to me.”
- Rich people play the money game to win. Poor people play the money game to not lose.
- Rich people are committed to being rich. Poor people want to be rich.
- Rich people think big. Poor people think small.
- Rich people focus on opportunities. Poor people focus on obstacles.
- Rich people admire other rich and successful people. Poor people resent rich and successful people.
- Rich people associate with positive, successful people. Poor people associate with negative or unsuccessful people.
- Rich people are willing to promote themselves and their value. Poor people think negatively about selling and promotion.
- Rich people are bigger than their problems. Poor people are smaller than their problems.
- Rich people are excellent receivers. Poor people are poor receivers.
- Rich people choose to get paid based on results. Poor people choose to get paid based on time.
- Rich people think “both”. Poor people think “either/or”.
- Rich people focus on their net worth. Poor people focus on their working income.
- Rich people manage their money well. Poor people mismanage their money well.
- Rich people have their money work hard for them. Poor people work hard for their money.
- Rich people act in spite of fear. Poor people let fear stop them.
- Rich people constantly learn and grow. Poor people think they already know.
November 2nd, 2011 at 07:18
Tim, I usually love your links, but this one is crap. Many, many people who take risks end up broke. If I focused on my net worth rather than my income, I’d slit my wrists. I thought big, played to win, studied the opportunities, admired the wealthy, associated with the rich and successful, promoted myself, learned and grew, overcame my fears, rose above my problems, linked my compensation to my results than my hours, and got body-slammed. I lost everything but my family, I’m too old try again, I have no savings, no retirement, no college fund for my kids, and no prospects other than to work for a wage.
I don’t resent rich people but it pisses me the hell off when someone tries to ascribe my failure to character flaws. Risk necessarily includes the possibility of failure as well as success, and there are a hell of a lot of poor people who have little or nothing not because they didn’t take risks, but because they did.
November 2nd, 2011 at 07:49
Didn’t I read much of this (the good parts) in Norman Vincent Peale?
Any survey or observations of winners which lists the “traits” by which they win is subject to selection bias. Plenty of people have the same traits and fail.
Rich people act in spite of fear: this accounts for their gullibility in Ponzi schemes.
Rich people constantly learn and grow: the man who wrote on book on human gullibility was taken by Madoff.
Or don’t Madoff’s victims count as rich, since they’re now poor?
Rich people are bigger than their problems: this one doesn’t make sense–measuring stick, please? Rich hip-hop musicians with coke habits are bigger than their problems; poor musicians with coke habits aren’t.
I had discussions once with two different people about travel. One wanted to be Kerouac (why?). He was beaten, robbed, and had to beg from strangers–as he put is, “despicable Christians”–for the money to travel home. Another whose round-the-world backpakka trip was successful included stories how other women in the hostel in which she stayed we raped, beaten, and robbed in the hostel. Her ‘winning personality’ (it’s in quotes because she hadn’t one) wasn’t the cause.
November 2nd, 2011 at 09:07
That depends on what you mean by ‘character flaws’.
When you’ve got nobody depending on you but yourself, you’re entitled to roll the dice in hopes of a big win. I admire such people, although I’m not inclined that way myself; I’m one of the more risk-averse people I know, but that’s a choice each individual is entitled to make for himself.
BUT when you’ve got dependents (spouse, children, approaching old age), then rolling the dice in hopes of a big win is, in my view, a very serious character flaw, because you’re gambling those futures as well as your own; which in the Good Old Days was considered irresponsible — with, I think good reason. People who continue to roll the dice (and lose) while betting what’s owed to others exemplify the very definition of a degenerate gambler, and that’s a character flaw in any reasonable view.
November 2nd, 2011 at 09:51
The one critical element left off the list was “luck”.
18. Rich people were lucky. Poor people were not. (This applies in Paul’s case, probably.)
Yes, all of those other elements are necessary or helpful, but without luck they are pointless.
It’s like the Lotto: Someone is going to win, but your chances of winning are miniscule. Does that mean you shouldn’t try? Hell, no. But even doing everything right probably won’t land you where you want to be, and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something.
November 2nd, 2011 at 11:51
“Chance favors the prepared mind” – Louis Pasteur, but there are many versions of the same saying.
Yeah, it was luck that brought IBM to meet with Bill Gates, but it was Gates’ efforts to push that opportunity that made him a billionaire. Steve Jobs was “lucky” to meet up with Wozniak, but without his efforts Woz would have stayed a garage designer.
Most of the rich people that I’ve met worked their asses off to make their fortunes. Yes, some were wealthy to begin with and some had lots of good things happen, but they were also of a particular mindset that made things work.
I remember reading about a study years ago that showed that “rich” people paid less for basic products than the poor. Laundry detergent was given as an example: The poor bought the smallest box on the shelf – with the highest cost/oz. – while the rich bought the bulk size. As I recall, the point of the study was to try to re-educate people to better allocate their finances, but it failed miserably.
As for luck, an amazing percentage of people who win the lottery are broke within a year.
The list presented is a bit over the top, but there definitely are differences between those who take initiative and those who don’t. Yes, some will fail. Miserably. Multiple times. (See my resume as an example.) And, yes, some will just trip over a pot of gold. But the progs are wrong in their view that life is one bit lottery and the poor are only there by chance.
November 2nd, 2011 at 14:28
Let me be clear: success requires initiative, intelligence, hard work…AND luck.
It’s the luck element which is commonly (conveniently?) left out by the right, and it is that omission to which I object.
Not everyone who is poor is so merely by chance; some just don’t have what it takes, and never will.
But by the same token not everyone who is intelligent, works long and hard, and saves their pennies will become make it, either.
We forget that at our peril.