The Introduction

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So the first book that I decided to read for this business and finance book review section is the book called “Why We Want You to Be Rich: Two Men – One Message” which was created by Donald Trump and Robert Kiyosaki. Just some quick background information about the authors for those who may not know, Donald Trump is a billionaire who made his money in real estate with one of his most notable recent accomplishments being the reality TV show The Apprentice, which I’m a fan of. Robert Kiyosaki is best known for writing a series of best selling books called “Rich Dad, Poor Dad”. Although I never read them myself, the book is apparently about the type of mentality and approach that a wealthy person has in dealing with business and money.

I chose this book because it seems relatively new and the author combination seemed kind of interesting. Since I don’t usually read these types of books, I guess at worst the book will be filled with vague advice that solely serves as a way for the two to advertise their businesses and success or it will actually turn out to be something useful and relevant. Of course, I will read it with an open mind. So, as mentioned I will be basically reading the book chapter by chapter and posting updates as I go along.

The introduction of the book basically explains that the essence of it is to help educate people about successful people’s approach and practices in regards to money and finance. The two author’s concern is that in America it seems like the rich is getting richer while the economy overall is getting poorer due to the middle class shrinking. They explain how if it keeps up it will be a two-sided country consisting of the very rich and the very poor which threatens democracy in general. Because of this, Donald Trump and Robert Kiyosaki would like to help educate people on how to become rich by learning the right attitude.

They try to make it clear that the book is not intended to tell you what to do with your money or how you should be investing it, but again why they are successful and how they win financially. They believe that for example if someone had money problems, just giving them more money won’t solve the problem. The solution would be to educate them about through financial lessons. They used a popular quote to describe this philosophy which goes like this:

“Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day”

“Teach him to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime”

One of the more interesting things in the introduction is how they broke down the type of financial advice that the poor, middle and rich class receive:

Poor Class – The government will take care of them through programs such as Social Security and Medicare.

Middle Class – Simply find a good job, work hard at it, live below your means and invest for the long term in something like mutual funds that has a no risk guarantee to ensure that you will get some money out of it.

Rich Class – Become an “active investor” which means you are working and investing with the intentions of winning to earn the great life.

The rest of the introductions talks a bit about the history and how it affects us today such as 401 (k) plans.

Since I live in Canada, obviously some of the things described in the book are foreign to me. In general so far, I guess the important thing to take out of this is that when reading further one shouldn’t expect this book to teach you what to do with your money which is what I think most people would initially expect it to be. I definitely agreed with the teach the man to fish example in relation to solving money problems. Kind of reminds me of the lifestyle changes post I made more than a year ago where I think you have to change yourself first in order to solve these types of problems.

On to the first chapter.