Why We Want You to be Rich: Two Men - One Message by Robert Kiyosaki & Donald Trump
Posted by admin on Dec 2, 2007
By Corinne H. Smith
“Why We Want You to Be Rich” gives Donald Trump and Robert Kiyosaki (and their co-authors) a chance to hop onto each other’s bandwagons. The two men claim that they collaborated on this book because they are concerned about the demise of the middle class. They see a two-class system in America’s future — the rich and the poor — and they feel obligated to motivate us clueless middles to pull ourselves up to their level. They do this by shooting down over and over what they say has been the standard financial advice for us in the past: get a job, work hard, live below one’s means, save money, invest for the long term in mutual funds, and diversify. They discount our presumed “entitlement mentality” — the one that believes that Social Security, Medicare, and our pensions will take care of us in retirement. We should be investing to win, they say; not saving to avoid loss. And Kiyosaki recommends that we all become Bs or Is — Big-business owners or Investors — instead of Es and Ss, Employees and Small-Business / Self-employed / Specialists. All of these points are easy enough to say and a challenge to actually undertake. But that, of course, is the point. And that’s why a number of middle-class Americans will undoubtedly see this book as an insult to their intelligence and a criticism of their lifestyles.
With the authors’ emphasis on being and becoming rich, you’d think they would start us off with a definition of the concept. Well, you’d be wrong. Kiyosaki finally gets around to it on page 262, where he quotes a Forbes magazine article that states a person is rich if he has a million dollars of income each year. He quotes another source as saying that a poor person is one “who does not have at least $100,000 in cash to invest.” If those figures are to be believed, then we’re probably already living in a two-class system.
The book is written in see-saw fashion: Kiyoskai begins each chapter with his rambling narrative, then Trump adds a shorter post-script expounding more concisely on the topic. There are times when Kiyosaki puts his foot fully into his mouth, as when he uses himself as an illustration of the 90 / 10 rule (10% of the players win 90% of the money). That’s why he didn’t take up golf as a profession, he tells us, because he knew he could never be in the top 10%. What a defeatist attitude from someone who’s supposed to be motivating us! Much later in the book, he has the guts to say: “[I]t amuses me when I meet people who are looking for a job or for a pay raise or wondering how they are going to make a few extra dollars. Obviously, they live in a different world than I do.” (p. 251) Wow, a direct hit on his readers! These kinds of comments, along with the continual Rich Dad / Poor Dad references, make Donald Trump’s portions of the text sound like the voice of wisdom and reason by comparison.
And yet: readers can be motivated by just about anything these days. That’s why self-help books continue to top the bestseller lists. Ignore the insults and the backstepping and the ongoing self-promotion here, and you’ll find a few helpful suggestions to work toward financial independence. The sad truth is, we can’t ALL be rich. (Some of us don’t even WANT to be rich.) And our economy needs Bs, Is, Es, and Ss to work; we can’t all be Bs and Is. Some of us are not cut out for those roles. The world doesn’t need more Donald Trumps and Robert Kiyosakis. Having one of each is plenty.
The text notes several times that the authors (all four?) will be donating a portion of the book profits to charitable and educational organizations that support financial education. Both Trump University and Cashflow Technologies would probably qualify for those funds.
If you’re intrigued by Kiyosaki’s CASHFLOW Quadrant, then you might want to find out more about the standard Myers-Briggs personality test, which divides human behavior into more concise categories. The easiest way to do that is to pick up a copy of the book “Do What You Are” by Paul D. Tieger and Barbara Barron-Tieger. And for those who feel they need someone successful to offer them financial advice, I recommend spending time with two people willing to do just that: Jim Cramer and Suze Orman. Read their books, watch their shows on CNBC, go see them in person. You may be more empowered by them than by Trump, McIver, Kiyosaki and Lechter and “Why We Want You to Be Rich.”
