“Another day, another dollar” — common expression
This expression is commonly known by many. It represents a common, core feeling we get as members of the vast work force. We go to work, put in the hours, get paid our wages, and go home for the day. This is not the way to build retirement wealth.
When it comes to building wealth, getting paid on a day-to-day basis is additive. To accumulate enough wealth to last for years, we have to put away huge amounts of money. Typically 30% of our take home pay is a minimum amount.
Why do I say that? Because the tools we are being sold on for investments don’t work unless we compensate by over-saving. A good example is the classic skip-that-daily-latte and instead save the money, and it 20-30 years, you will be a millionaire. I had heard that a few times, and figured it sounded great. Until I read an objective analysis of that. Basically take $5/day and multiply it by 365 days. What do you get? $1825/year. Doesn’t sound too bad. Today. But let’s take this concept and back up to 40 years ago. What was the median income for people back then? According to one source, median household income in 1974 was $9780/year. That would imply that saving $5/day, the price of a cup of coffee, was like putting away over 18% of gross salary. If you can assume 28% in withheld taxes, the percentage saved against take home pay would be 25.7%.
Wow! If we are to read that correctly, it suggests that saving $5/day today may result in $1MM, but in 40 years (if you started this when you were 25), $1MM probably won’t be worth much at all. Instead, we should read that correctly as needing to save AT LEAST 26% immediately.
Many people, if they looked at that, would just throw their hands up in the air and give up. But if you’re here, you surely have guessed that I’m going to say something different.
We need to look for options that have a multiplicative effect. What is that? It’s when you make some making by direct action, but the more actions you take, the more they interact with other actions already in progress.
One thing that I realized as I wrapped up the last chapter of my 3rd book, is that doing something as small as writing books on the side can introduce multiplicative money making. Today I finally got some time to watch a TV series with Neil deGrasse Tyson. I’m quite fascinated by astrophysics and his series seems entertaining. In the opening credits, it notes that Dr. Tyson has written ten books. Something I can realize is that the more books you write, the more books you will sell. Not additively, but multiplicatively. Simply put, people that enjoy one of your books are VERY likely to go and buy your others. My first book has yet to earn enough to pay off the advance I received. The second accomplished that about two years ago. My dream is that my 3rd will accomplish that even sooner, possibly through more social media, more people that read my previous works, and that some will even go back and buy my previous writings.
It’s only natural. I read the first Jack Reacher book, got hooked, and have now read ten so far. I read “Schrödinger’s Kittens and the Search For Reality”, and have since ordered the predecessor. When you go out and invest yourself into more and more and more opportunities that can yield more and more wealth, the opportunities grow.
So I highly suggest that you take some time to sit down and think. Simply think. Look at what you are doing today. What you have done for the past week. And think about what else you could be doing that can generate secondary effects. What if you started a blog and wrote on a daily basis? It could be small stuff. But it might grow your public image. It might open doors you didn’t expect. Open your mind to looking for new opportunities such an endeavor could raise.
These are all important the rather narrow vision the corporate 401K plans have. The general idea of a 401K is to sock away money in a fund that doesn’t grow very fast. And when you hit retirement, you are required to cannibalize it. Why do I suggest this? Because the federal government has a schedule after which you are obligated to start taking withdrawals. If you’re retired and doing just fine, it doesn’t matter. The government set things up such that they can collect taxes on your withdrawals and they will NOT be blocked from you doing just that.
In case you didn’t know this, the rich NEVER cannibalize their assets. There is this mantra out there that rich people adhere to: NEVER TOUCH THE PRINCIPAL.
In essence you are on a mission to accumulate wealth producing assets that themselves generate wealth you can live off of. You can’t wait until you are retired to begin writing books, building a blogger reputation, or something else. Instead, that is what must embrace while you still can earn enough of a daily paycheck to keep afloat. This is your opportunity to start buying real estate, dividend yielding stocks, EIULs, and discounted notes. Simply putting away 50% of your take home pay and planning to live like a pauper doesn’t sell very well. Good luck!