Well, it’s that time again.
Time to address the “it’s easy to be wealthy if you make a lot of money, what about becoming wealthy if you earn little?” crowd.
But this time it’s going to be a bit different.
You see, I think I’ve made a mistake.
Here I’ve been writing about growing your career, creating a side hustle, investing in real estate, and the like so you could earn more money — which in turn would allow you to save and invest more.
But now I’m thinking that’s all wrong.
In Millionaire Interview 157 a reader set me straight with this comment:
I’m sorry I just don’t see how this is helpful. This guy averages $800k in compensation per year – he’d have to be really bad with money to not be a millionaire.
Of course we don’t get a lot of income history to figure out how long he has been earning at this level. We do get that they were making $160k combined when they were married and somehow over the past 18 years they went from $160k to $800k. He made over $1mil within the last 5 years. Which, by the way, fantastic for him just not that helpful for us readers.
What is my takeaway here supposed to be – earn a crap ton of money and you too can be a millionaire?
He’s right. Why are we so fixated on earning a lot of money? Why not ignore our incomes altogether and still become wealthy? That sounds like an awesome idea, right?
But we just need some suggestions for how to do that. For some totally unfair reason it’s very difficult to become wealthy while doing absolutely nothing (or very little) to earn much, so we have to be creative.
That’s why I’ve put together the list of top ten ways to become wealthy when you earn very little. This way, we can all ignore our incomes and concentrate on the easy and free ways to become wealthy! Why didn’t I think of this earlier?!
Anyway, here’s my list of top ten ways to become wealthy while earning a pittance…
1. Inherit a “crap ton” of money.
See what I did there? I used the commenter’s own words. I’m so clever like that.
Why work yourself to death when you can count on your parents to make you wealthy? All you need to do is lay around, stuff them with as many cheeseburgers as possible (heart disease is the #1 killer in America), and wait. No effort required. This is so simple it’s a no-brainer.
Of course you do need a couple things working for you. First, you need wealthy parents, which, on average, are hard to find in America.
Second, if you do have wealthy parents, they have to be willing to leave their fortune to a lazy child with no initiative.
Hmmm, this could be harder than I thought. Maybe a wealthy grandparent or aunt who has a bit more sympathy for your long-term lazy strategy would be better.
Alas, if no one in your family is wealthy and can be counted on to pass along their estate to an unmotivated relative, there’s a way to deal with that…
2. Marry someone wealthy (or someone with a wealthy family).
If you’re like the majority of Americans, you do not have a wealthy family. And since it’s hard to influence what family you’re born into, you’re kind of powerless to impact that fact.
But you can totally impact who you marry and how wealthy they are/their family is. So pick someone who has a ton of money or is set to inherit a boatload from their parents. Forget love, that’s for losers (and the poor). You should focus on net worth! The more money they have, the better match they are.
Again there’s the snag of getting someone to marry a person with little ambition or initiative, so you’ll need to do your best to hide that until you’re married. Then you can let yourself go completely and wait for the money to roll in.
3. Win the lottery!
This is a proven method for becoming wealthy! I have read studies that say your odds of winning a fortune are pretty good — somewhere in the neighborhood of 0.000000000000000021%. That’s a lot better than the odds of you being wealthy doing nothing — so why not?
And what other way of becoming wealthy has an expected return of 1.5 cents on every dollar you spend? Not many…am I right?
Of course some nitpickers will refute this point with some pesky facts about this being a “poor” option (there are always those who rain on dreamers’ parades), so let’s move on to an even better but related way of making a fortune…
4. Gamble your way to wealth.
Pick your wealth-building activity: poker, blackjack, craps, roulette, slot machines — you name it. All have the potential to make you a fortune for almost zero work.
After all, you don’t gambling slobs in TV commercials do you? No, they are all ultra-successful because they’ve each just won $50 million. That could be you as well — all you need is a ticket to Vegas and some seed money (let’s say $5). From there, you just need to win-win-win and you’ll become wealthy beyond belief.
If this doesn’t work for you, you could try sports betting. I hear that is extremely easy and most people win every time. After all, there are no upsets in sports so picking the winner is easy-peasy.
5. Steal it.
I have to admit, this does take a bit of work (which I’m trying to avoid in this list), but not as much as applying yourself to build an income over time. So for that reason it’s a winner in my book.
In this case, you simply take someone else’s money. How easy can it get?
This can take many forms — from the super-easy “rob a bank” idea to the more complicated (but less obvious) embezzlement strategy. Of course you many need an accounting degree for the latter and that sounds like a lot of work, so the bank idea is probably better.
If a bank sounds too complicated, a 7-11 is a viable substitute. I hear they keep about $17 million in the safes at each store, so it’s probably better than a bank anyway. Plus you can have them throw in a Slurpee for free when you rob them blind.
6. Get a hot stock tip.
This one is another no-brainer.
Ask almost anyone — that guy at the gym, your uncle Harry, the Amazon delivery guy, or even (gasp!) your financial planner — almost all of them are bound to know of a hot stock that no one else has heard of. It’s really cheap now, but will multiply about four gazillion times in the next 36 hours — so you better act fast.
Simply take your life savings and buy as much of it as soon as you can. Then you’ll be wealthier than Bill Gates by supper time. Don’t worry what the company actually does — that has zero impact on it’s success — it’s GUARANTEED to work! Uncle Harry couldn’t be wrong, could he?
7. Sell stuff that’s not yours.
Again, this one requires a bit of work — but it can surely be done while earning nothing at work.
Simply find something of value others own that you can get access to. Then sell it!
Some ideas:
- Offer to watch a neighbor’s house while they are on vacation. Then while they are gone, unload it asap. If selling it is too difficult, sub-letting it to a crack dealer is sure to turn a quick profit.
- Ask to borrow a friend’s new Tesla. Then take it to the closest real estate agent, financial planner, MLM “business owner”, or anyone else who scrapes by but wants to look like they make a fortune and sell it asap.
- Rent a storage unit, then use it to burrow into other units where you can find valuables to sell.
This is such a great idea I can’t believe I haven’t mentioned it earlier!
8. Rack up credit card rewards.
Here’s a simple math equation that will make you wealthy:
If you earn 2% cash back on every credit card purchase, then all you need to become a millionaire is to charge $50 million.
Sheesh! Do I have to spoon-feed you all my best ideas? How much easier than this can it be?
9. Create a Ponzi scheme.
Hey, if it worked for Bernie Madoff, why wouldn’t it work for you?
Plus there’s the benefit of hobnobbing at swanky parties as you dupe really smart people into giving you their hard-earned money. It’s the gift that keeps on giving!
10. Commit insurance fraud.
We can all start a fire, can’t we? So buy something of value (borrowing the money, of course), insure it for a fortune, then burn it down.
Or, take out a life insurance policy on someone you dislike, then get cousin Vinnie to take him for a ride (if you know what I mean).
Yeah, this could be called borderline illegal, but it’ll be worth it when you’re a billionaire, right?
Honorable Mentions
There were several others I could have included in this list such as:
- Become a prostitute.
- Set up a meth lab (or illegal marijuana grow facility — these are really popular in Colorado where I live).
- Lie to others to get them to give you money.
- Borrow money and never repay.
- Don’t pay taxes. This comes with the fun side benefit of travel as you run away from the IRS the rest of your life.
- Go on a game show like Jeopardy. Though you have no initiative to make something of yourself, surely you know more than most people! Sooooooo easy!
There are probably others. If you can think of some, leave them in the comments below.
The goal here is that you want to become wealthy without earning much at your job, a side hustle, etc.
There are just so many ways to do this that it’s surprising most people take the hard route and work for their money!
The Truth of Income
Ok, I’m sure you’ve caught on by now, but just in case you haven’t, everything above is written very sarcastically. Obviously all those things are terrible ideas and many are big-time illegal. So if you’re dense and can’t see that, I’m making it clear now — DON’T DO ANY OF THE ABOVE.
Now let’s step back a bit. Why would I write such a post?
Because I still get people ALL THE TIME who want to know how to become wealthy without earning much money. So I thought I’d create a list that’s as stupid as the question it’s meant to answer!
When the commenter above asked, “What is my takeaway here supposed to be – earn a crap ton of money and you too can be a millionaire?” another commenter chimed in with the right answer:
yes… dude you realize ESI… E is the first letter for a reason…
Of course! And despite me saying this over and over again, people still want an easy way to wealth.
Well let me make this as clear as I can (again):
THERE IS NO PROVEN, EASY WAY TO WEALTH!
The key words are “proven” and “easy”.
Yes, there are some easy ways to become wealthy like inheriting money, marrying into it, or winning the lottery but those ways are not proven. They have very low odds of success.
And there are proven ways, but they are not easy. They require effort (heaven forbid), action (gasp!), and change (outrageous!) These are the sorts of things we talk about on this site every day.
If you want high odds of success to become wealthy I suggest you work on earning more money, saving a ton of it, and investing. These steps are proven, though they do take time and effort, two things most people want to avoid.
And just in case you missed it, yes, EARN is the first step in the equation. The more you earn, the better chance you have to become wealthier faster. You still need to save and invest, but earning is vital.
Yes, you can eventually become wealthy with a small income, but it takes longer and your wealth won’t be as large in most cases. This is why I prefer the route of growing your income.
I’ve said a lot of this before (see How to Ignore the Basics of Personal Finance and Still Become Rich for details) but it needs repeating. It must need repeating since I get the same question on a regular basis.
BTW, and I’m mentioning because someone will comment about it, I am not saying you need to make $800k per year to become wealthy. I’m saying that no matter what you make, it you take steps to grow your career income, create a side hustle, and/or develop other ideas for making more, you WILL be better off financially in the long run (assuming you don’t blow it all).
So if you’re making $50k now, just imagine what an extra $10k per year for the next 30 years could do for your finances! It will make a massive impact!
Ok, that’s it for now. Just had to get that off my chest. I feel much better now.
You’ll probably see this type of post again in three months if history is any indication, so prepare yourself. 😉
This is probably the only article you’ve written that’s just bad. Yeah, we get it, earn more, but there’s not much advice here that someone earning an average salary can take away. We know about ‘earn more’, but this article offers little practical advice. But it’s your only blemish in hundreds of articles..
Oh I’ve had worse, believe me.
Here are scores of articles with practical tips:
https://esimoney.com/category/career/
I really enjoyed this article and laughed out loud several times. I’m sure it’s frustrating having a site full of information about how to grow your income and build wealth, yet consistently be asked “yeah, but what can I do?”.
It made me think of your post on the saying “the rich get richer and the poor get poorer”. My middle school band teacher used to say this all the time referring to students who were either improving on their instrument or not. In almost all areas of life, those who are willing to put forth the time and effort to succeed are typically the ones that keep succeeding. Those who aren’t willing to do that typically aren’t going to magically find success, although you’ve given them some great ideas to try! 😉
Exactly.
Lol. Nice troll.
Great humor to get your point across.
The perception of wealth, like beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Some will, others will not, but those who understand, and employ the basic principles will succeed in creating their level of sustainable wealth. There is never an “easy ” route to follow. Glad you got that off your chest. Now take a break and then get back to what you do best. Enjoy all your postings.
Agree with the first commenter that this is the first article you’ve written that is bad. Frankly, I found it a bit insulting. I stopped reading the Millionaire Series because their earning yearly is just out of my range and out of the range of a lot of people. I know we are supposed to glean something useful but what they were doing just isn’t a reality in my world. Yes, I have always strived to make the most salary-wise including leaving a job I liked at 2 1/2 years to change employers because that was the quickest way to increase my salary at the beginning of my career. Yes, I did serious salary negotiations at all of my remain employers. I’ve just now crossed the 100K salary range at 21 years in my career and thrilled. That is my world and I suspect a lot of people’s worlds. I agree that one needs to earn as much as they can but for heaven’s sake bring it down to normal working people level. I also have saved for 30+ years instead of blowing my money on clothes, clubbing, stupid 20’s beach trips, etc. The money I saved, it went into cash reserves for future and index funds. Slow and steady for years and years. Then I too became the Millionaire next door.
The tips I suggest are for “normal working people” — that’s the point.
Do you think I or any of the millionaires started by earning $300k on day one? No. Almost everyone started at a low level salary and built up from there. That’s why I ask them their career history — so people can see that they began at the bottom and worked their way up.
And I’m not saying a person has to earn $300k a year to make it. They simply need to work on the earning end as much as they do the saving end — like you have.
Making $100k a year is awesome! You have done well. But I get email after email asking me how to become wealthy while ignoring the ability (or chance if you prefer) to earn more. It’s like trying to run a race with a 50-pound weight tied to you. Yes, it can be done, but it’s much much harder.
So this post may not be for you (or be your cup of tea). That’s fine. Not every post is meant for everyone — that would be impossible to do. But believe me, this post is meant for many who stop by this site looking for an easy way to a high net worth.
Please remove my last name. Thank you!
I believe Ill get rich betting on pickleball….
Or playing it! I’m going pro!!!!
Glad you’ve kept your sense of humor. Money for investing for the vast majority of us comes from spending less than we earn and continuously working to increase the gap between outflow and inflow so we have more to invest. Instance: as my outflow remains the same but my inflow increases by $12k a year post-tax, I now have $1k extra per month to invest. Tada!
The math behind building wealth is painfully simple. But building wealth is only partially about math – it’s mostly about behavior, and adopting wealth-building personal habits is hard work!
I think the OP’s point was that it’s easier to become wealthy when you make so much that your income far exceeds your expenses (if you are an average person living in an average place). I agree that a family making $800K a year should be millionaires- multi-millionaires, in fact- just because it’s possible to live very, very well with far, far less than that. If they weren’t millionaires, they’d be in an article for being morons. And yes, there are many of those, I know.
In other words- profiles of super-high earners are not all that helpful, because it’s not as if they had to be super creative to amass wealth. But most of us won’t make anywhere close to that level of income, no matter how much education we get, side hustles we start, or employers we hop. I guess it does come down to couponing and giving up the lattes and gym memberships then. 🙂
“In other words- profiles of super-high earners are not all that helpful, because it’s not as if they had to be super creative to amass wealth.”
They had to be very creative — as they moved from earning $10 an hour at McDonald’s to (ultimately) $300k as a lawyer.
And no, not everyone earns that. But EVERYONE can earn more than they do now by applying the tips I share on a regular basis. As I said near the end of the post:
“So if you’re making $50k now, just imagine what an extra $10k per year for the next 30 years could do for your finances! It will make a massive impact!”
I sort of enjoy seeing how the high-earner’s progressed their earnings. The “I worked my tail off to get through Med School” ones are not quite as interesting as the entreprenneurial ones, but still show what can be done.
I finally hit north of $300k/yr. after 30+ years, starting in a factory and a farm for not much over minimum wage. Got an engineering degree from a 3 rd rate state school and played the corporate games to climb the fortune 100 ladder with plenty of job hops.
Now life is almost easy as I contemplate when I “want to” retire. Current gig is actually enough fun to have to think about that!
There are many paths; that is what makes the Millionaire series interesting to me.
I agree that it’s harder to become a millionaire making average salary; however, it is possible. Our combined family income never crossed $120k per year and we recently crossed a $1 million net worth mark (about $800k in investments and $200k in house equity). My husband received about $30k inheritance and that’s about it. We have a 7 year old and are 42 years old. I think the key is to have a low housing payment and no car payments. We drive cars older than 10 years and have not had a car payment in 15 years. Our monthly budget is between $4k to $5k per month and the rest is saved in 401k and/or IRA. I worked full time while going to college so no student loans. Same for my husband. We are not interested in increasing our income as we love our schedules now and believe we don’t have to make much to save enough to FIRE. I hope that families making average income can realize that average salaries should be sufficient to become a millionaire. Those making less then $50k in combined family income would have a harder time saving significant money.
I see what the original commenter was saying … or maybe. It would be nice to have a PAW (Millionaire Next Door) score next to each millionaire interview. It is the first check I do, if they are expected to be worth over 5 million and they are 2 million, I skip the interview and go on to others. By using this method, I can relate regardless of the income of the person. Great blog – thanks for writing it. I always look forward to the next post.
I like that way of looking at it.
Some are PAW and some or not. But I enjoy hearing of their journey no matter what as I always pick up something useful.
True. I do still read most of them. It is interesting to learn.
Byron, what a brilliant way to look/assess each Millionaire in the interview series. I’m going to apply that to weed out the ones not to read. Thank you.
I can see where some may have better things to do than read every word written on this blog, however I get some unique instance of insight out of each interview.
I do not relate to the “start a side hustle” interviews, as my career has taken off and it would detract from my overall ability to earn.
But even with those, there is something in there almost every time that is insightful or interesting. Sometimes those things are reflection on ‘wow, I would never do that’ but still valuable to instill those thoughts in your brain and mold your behavior.
Anyhow, I didn’t like this article either, thought it was bland, but what do I know about being a successful blog owner & writer? I would probably get sick and tired of some of the commentary too, and just might end up lashing a bit myself.
Either way, great content on the site, thanks for all you do!
I’m a fan of your blog but sorry this article was more about your frustration than helping others with this issue. Realistically how can a person making $65k-$75k reach millionaire status? That’s the question. Let’s say E is limited for whatever reason. Can you still become a millionaire doing S and I?
An article touching on that would be extremely beneficial to many.
An article on what?
There are TONS of articles about this out there.
You can become a millionaire with you and spouse maxing out IRAs and put as much as you can into a 401K if you have one. It might take 40 years for the average person, but start as early as you can.
Posts are here for various reasons. Ultimately, this is a personal blog, so yes, some posts will be about me. It’s kinda part of the deal.
To answer your question: it depends. Are you going to limit savings rates and investing opportunities? Do you have five years to make it happen? Are there any other limiting criteria?
Because that’s what this question is — and it’s the heart of this post. It’s about limiting yourself in a specific area.
Are there some people who literally can’t make another penny? Of course. But they are very few and far between. I would say it’s less than 5% of the population and probably 0.5% of the readers of this site. The masses (well over 50% of the population), who can make more (and probably much more), then use those few examples as reasons why they can’t earn more — which they can, but they’d prefer not to have to put in the extra effort, time, etc.
So they throw up false objections of how they can’t earn more. And yet they still want to be wealthy, so they complain, moan, and want some easy path to wealth (and send me their emails saying so). It does not exist.
Here’s the answer to your question:
If you limit yourself in ANY of the three main areas (earning, saving, or investing), it makes it more difficult to become wealthy. So I would suggest you forget the “I can’t earn more money” limitation and think creatively about how you might be able to. That’s my main answer to this question.
That said, the answer you want (which includes not earning more) is simple math — unless you want to add other limitations too.
A person making $65-$75k is doing pretty well. Surely if she can earn that, she can earn more. But let’s say she can’t just for grins.
Is she a good saver or are we going to eliminate that one too? Because if she can save $10k a year, gets an 8% return, and has 30 years, yes, she can be a millionaire.
Or are we limiting investing as well?
Think about it this way, what if the question was as follows:
“Realistically how can a person saving $2k reach millionaire status? That’s the question. Let’s say S is limited for whatever reason. Can you still become a millionaire doing E and I?”
OR…
“Realistically how can a person investing at 2% reach millionaire status? That’s the question. Let’s say I is limited for whatever reason. Can you still become a millionaire doing E and S?”
The point is, earning, saving, and investing all work together and by limiting yourself in any of these you’re at a severe disadvantage. So my advice is to work on them all. That’s what I would do if I earned $65-$75k and is actually what I did…
Good points. If someone makes $70K per year and can save 15% of their earnings or $875/mo. for 30 years, and get an average annual return of 7%, they will have just over 1M saved. If you want that calculus to change, you have to either make more, save more or get a higher return on your investments. Preferably, you’d like to do all three hence, the point of the ESI model. Don’t forget, this is based on one individual so if you have a partner in crime, two of you can make a big difference by working together.
So, when people ask how can we achieve wealth with a more average salary, this seems to be the formula you have to follow unless of course, you achieve it in the unusual ways that John pointed out in the post.
The path to wealth is not easy but it is doable for most who are willing to follow the steps and be patient with the time it takes.
Yes, You defined it well, it’s a limitation question. But maybe that’s what people want to hear about because they can relate better.
Maybe people want to hear the real underdog stories.
Because it hits closer to home, resonates better with most yet still sends a positive message, motivates and reassures them in persistence and sticking to all the other useful stuff You talk about here.
Much Love and Respect, what You do is great,
I just think your audience is trying to tell you something rather than annoy You.
Cheers !
I understand what you’re saying and appreciate your point of view, but I need to make a few things clear to all who are reading this thread.
ESI Money is about becoming wealthy by earning, saving, and investing. These are the three steps to wealth that I write about because:
1. It’s what I did personally and I know it works.
2. I think it’s the most tried and true/reliable path to wealth. IMO it has the greatest chance of success.
3. I think it’s the easiest path to wealth. It’s not easy, mind you, but is the easiest of the options. The non-earn options require almost heroic efforts in either save or invest which are much harder and much less likely IMO.
That’s what I write about and that’s what this site is about.
If people want something else, they are not my audience. They are someone else’s audience.
There are a gazillion blogs that will tell you how to become wealthy by earning nothing but saving 80% of your gross income. Mainstream media will also sensationalize stories now and then of someone who made $25k per year their whole life and died with $3 million. If that’s what people want, they can easily go there and get their fill.
And every once in awhile we stumble on a story like that here. But in the vast majority of cases, E, S, and I are all in play for the stories people share of how they became wealthy.
But that’s not what this site is about and I’m not changing the focus. If the audience wants a tried and true method for becoming wealthy that’s easier than most other options, I offer that. If they don’t, then there are plenty of other sites that will suit them just fine.
It will not hurt my feelings if they go elsewhere in search of stories they want to hear. But I will not be changing my message to fit their desires.
Bravo Zulu.
I like this reply a lot more than the article but that’s just me.
I’ve earned 35-85k throughout my career and started Saving way too late. I got lucky in that I didn’t have to work too hard to increase Earnings, it mostly came with the career I chose and gaining more experience. I did make a decision to leverage equity in my home to buy a few rental properties, and that has likely saved me from the mistake of not saving earlier. I still don’t save as much as I should, but also decide to enjoy life now (travel) and I’m ok with that trade off. My focus is not so much on becoming a millionaire or wealthy, but to be able to hopefully retire a bit early and do so comfortably. ANYONE at ANY income can make decisions to improve ESI, and it will put them in a better position than they were before. The bigger your goals (millionaire/wealthy) the harder you’ll have to work at it.
ESI and other blogs have helped me to learn and become more intentional, so I’m thankful for that, even though I didn’t really like this article 🙂
The problem most don’t want to acknowledge is that the higher salaries come with more responsibilty and being a manager. I went my whole career without ever managing anyone and topped out at 90K. When I would look for higher paying jobs, they wanted management experience. So, many people would rather just be the worker bee, but you will rarely get into the upper $100Ks without some kind of job where you are the boss in a company. Self employed people are a different breed of people as well. Plenty of consultants make $200K, but those jobs aren’t just average jobs.
Yes. Persistence, determination, consistency can get you to millionaire status.
I would love to send this article to my sister who hasn’t held a job in years due to life issues and excuses and now expects me to keep “lending” her money since she has none (and gets mad when I question why I should give her my hard-earned savings). “Read this, Sis, and find out some ways (besides *me* in #1) to get money.” Wouldn’t be worth the long, aggrieved emails in response, though. But thanks for giving me some laughs and future talking points… (-:
Ugh. Sorry to hear this.
Yes, there are so many excuses out there these days…
Sounds like your sister has the borrow and not repay part of the article figured out. I have known quite a few people that have developed expertise in that.
If you want awesome articles to read on having others invest, lose their money and make millions for yourself just look up founder of WeWork. Great articles out there on his story.
I thought this was pretty funny and reading the comments, can see how it can be construed the other way too.
As someone who grew up with nothing and now earns a ton, I do think you can make conscious decisions all your life that keep that “E” going up and up. I started delivering papers for $5 an hour at 13. Decided at 16 that I wanted to be rich someday, and made my decisions based on that. Picked a good field, studied hard, took on weird projects, worked exceptionally hard early on to get noticed, etc. So yeah, now I make a ton, and millionaire status seems “easy”. But it wasn’t – it took hard work and conscious decisions to grow “E” all along the way to get there.
And here’s another example that will resonate…my mother. Divorced at 35 with a child and not a dime to her name. Worked as a nurse for 30 years. Never made more than $60k a year – the only way she could grow her “E” was work overtime, or night shifts. Yet today, she’s in her mid 70s, and I’m managing her $900k investment portfolio for her. Owns her $400k house outright. She contributed to her 401k judiciously, maxed her employer match, lived in the same modest house for 35 years, and lived well below her means. With her nurse pension, she hasn’t really had to touch her portfolio in retirement, so it’s continued to grow.
I might ask her to tell her story for this site, because she’s living proof you can be a millionaire with little “E”, and a lot of “S” and “I”.
First, exactly! You didn’t start earning a boatload, you built up to it.
Second, I would LOVE to interview your mother! She probably had many opportunities to make excuses, feel sorry for herself, and so on, but instead did what she could and made lemonade out of lemons. Well done and congratulations to her! She’s a rare person and one to be admired IMO.
This a good example of the E being very limited. My wife and I have worked in healthcare for more than 30 years each. I get 2% raises and she hasn’t had a raise in 5 years. I realize hospitals margins are slim, but they still seem to have enough extra to redecorate every couple of years. If you work in healthcare, other than a physician, your best bet is to concentrate on the S and I.
BTW-my wife and I have joined the $1million club, despite the limited E and putting two children through college. They both graduated with no debt and good jobs waiting for them.
Maybe…maybe not.
My niece is a nurse and found herself at a pay ceiling. So she got more education and higher pay!
Then she eventually found herself at another pay ceiling so she took a new job at a new hospital. The new job paid more and had better hours. This is common — making more by changing employers.
In ANY profession there are people who get paid more and those who get paid less. Find out what the “get paid more” people did and follow their lead.
Even professions that supposedly are limited in pay advancement have opportunities. Case in point — teachers:
https://esimoney.com/seeking-a-six-figure-income/
And if it’s too hard to make more at your job, there’s always a side hustle to be created. 😉
I am a nurse. I have friends that are travel nurses and others that work in cities where there is a need. My travel nurse friends, when picking up a “critical need” shift can make about $900-1,200 for the shift. I am on call tomorrow, if I get called in, it will be a ~$900 night. Not bad in my opinion. I have friends that also fly to California for shifts, and make bank. Yet the majority of my coworkers just complain and tell me how little we are paid and that there are no ways to make more. I’m also back in school to get on a higher income path.
I, too, would love to read her inspiring story.
I got the sarcastic attitude in your article and enjoyed it. What I took away from your article is it isn’t easy and wealth doesn’t just happen unless it happens in the examples that were in your sarcastic article. It takes time, lots of time and a savings and investment strategy early in your career if you are not already in a highly successful career that will allow you to climb not only the corporate ladder, but also enjoy the salary to go with it to become a millionaire. Anyone who makes these high 6 or 7 figure salaries and isn’t well off, shame on you. The average worker on an average salary can do well, but if you don’t have a strategy or you start one too late in your life, I’m not sure how you can recover. I’m sure there are plenty of examples out there, but I’m where I am because I started early with a plan and stuck with it.
I too have pretty much stopped reading these Millionaire Series because I have nothing in common with them. I’m a single 60 year old female and the most I have made in a year is $88k, but I’m a millionaire. A millionaire with a one (1) but still a millionaire. I was divorced at 32 with $25k (from our joint investments) to my name with no job and no money from my ex-husband. I had to move home and live with my parents for 5 years before I could finally make it on my own. I never remarried and I don’t have kids so what I have accomplished is all on me – an average person. I have a managed investment portfolio – I can hear all the groans as I type this – but it works for me. My plan started at age 32 with my own interest in learning more. We didn’t have the internet – we had the library. As the old saying goes, anything is possible if you are willing to work for it.
The millionaire interviews are all done by volunteers — people who offer to take time to tell their stories.
I would LOVE to hear your story and interview you for the series so we’d have an example of how someone became wealthy on a lower salary (BTW, $88k isn’t a pittance — it’s a decent salary).
Interested?
Thank you for wanting to hear my story. Yes, I’m interested.
BTW, that $88k salary has only been the last few years. My base salary now is $75k – which steadily rose over the last 5 years from $61k – and the rest is quarterly bonuses; which is based on my sales so 100% of my own efforts.
I’ll email you…
@Happy
Your story sounds fascinating and I’d love to read more about it. I hope you will do a millionaire interview. Not many women, especially single women, have shared their story here. I shared mine for that reason vs. complaining about not seeing enough other millionaires I could relate to. I believe my story and yours could inspire many others.
https://esimoney.com/millionaire-interview-99/
@MI#99
Thank you!
I am in the process of writing my story. I’m not a creative writer so I hope it comes across with a sincere message.
Stay tuned!
Your story inspires me. I am now single with no kids. Divorced at 30-ish. Lived at home for five years after the divorce and people ask me why I “hang in there” to pay off my debt. Currently 38 and now back out on my own for the second time since the divorce. There’s been a lot of ups and downs. Now I look at what we made together as a couple and wonder what we spent it all on! Looking forward to reading your story!
@Heidi
I too had many ups and downs. Besides having to deal with the emotional side of a divorce, women often then have to deal with the financial disaster that follows. I was scared, but I will tell you that you own your next steps. Kudos to you for reading this series and taking whatever information that you can and applying it to your situation to make a new life for yourself. I’m writing my story now. I too hope it will inspire you.
Yes, time. It takes time if you don’t earn a lot. But you did it! Also looking forward to the story.
I’d like to offer some perspective to those that don’t have a large income. I have never had a salary that exceeded $60/yr or an household income that has hit the six figure level. That said, I started the saving journey early, saved as much as I could and invested. While I will likely not ever achieve true FIRE, I believe we are on track to be able to enjoy a reasonably comfortable retirement with a Net Worth of $1.75M and another 5 years or so to FRA (Full retirement age). For many, that may not be nearly enough to retire on but when you aren’t accustom to eating out a lot, driving fancy cars, living in expensive areas, I think we will be ok. I read so many of the posts and feel I have failed on the “E” aspect of ESI in comparison to most on this site but we will likely be OK. Keep your heads up low income earners! M52
Here’s a link to the interview noted above:
https://esimoney.com/millionaire-interview-52/
BTW, it does say the following about annual income:
“Mine is variable averaging $40-$60K as a 100% commissioned salesman and spouse is about $45K-$50K with overtime.”
This brings up another idea of how to earn more — work with a spouse or partner. If each of you brings in $50k (roughly the national average income), that’s $100k a year between the two of you.
ESI, this post is great. Love your deconstruction of the crybaby’s complaint, especially #1 where you ‘turned it on him’.
Seriously, where do the crybabies get the idea that this (or any) blog ‘owes them’ some kind of actionable lesson to become a millionaire? Or that the post was some kind of personal attack on them and their shortcomings? Ricky Gervais has a fantastic (1 min.) joke about this very kind of crybaby, who lacks the self-awareness to see how funny their frustration is.
Blogs are entertainment, first, and the Millionaire series is wonderful entertainment. People tell their heartfelt stories (even the trolls!) and it is fun reading. It is a real contribution to the PF community. Well, I have an idea that will allow the crybabies to participate.
May I suggest a new series for that poster and others you describe in this great post? “Crybaby Interview”.
Hahaha! Loved the video and the interview idea! 😉
Over the years I’ve had the opportunity to meet and get to know a lot of very high earners… professionals, entrepreneurs, senior level executives, even the occasional celebrity; and I suppose I am a high-earner myself. The thing that most people misunderstand about high earners is that they think once you’ve hit that jackpot all you have to do is sit back and rake it in. Nothing could be further from the truth.
High earned income requires some significant skills and creativity to sustain, whether you’re a C-suit executive, a doctor or lawyer, a business owner, a real estate broker, etc. You gotta keep hustling. And that income (as well as your prospects for employment) can vary greatly from year to depending on a combo of how hard you’re hustling, where the opportunities are, how inventive you can be, internal politics, and sometimes just plain good old fashioned luck.
Over the past 30 years my income has ranged from $35K starting salary as a sale rep just out of college to $1.2mm (peak, age 45). In the go-go days I was a big kahuna… nowadays in my mid-50’s mid-six-figures, so not exactly hurting (other than my battered ego). Still fluctuates significantly from year-to-year.
Like many high earners, I have mostly been employed in roles where “you eat what you kill”. In other words, pay is directly tied to your performance and the performance of those reporting up to you if you’re in management. A good year can really amp up the pay – but the next year you gotta prove yourself all over again – this is where doctors have it easy IMHO… if I had any brains I would have become a doctor… but I was too impatient.
This is all to say that while most people are not cut out for high-earner jobs, it is still invaluable to hear their stories, and learn about how they did it. Matter of fact, most people aren’t cut out to become millionaires either irrespective of income, but the stories of millionaires are a big chunk of what this blog is about, right? You learn from those who got there before you.
There are literally a million different ways to to become a millionaire. Personally, I think they are all instructive and relevant – cept for the ones highlighted in this article of course 😉
Lots of good points here. I especially identify with the “you eat what you kill” mentality.
Yes, those good years are great. But they always want even better results the next year, right?
No one pays someone $1.2 million for sitting around on their hands…
Yes, indeed they always want better result the next year! In sales it was like a seesaw… after a great year (and great bonus), they would up the budget for the following year, insuring you would have a really lousy bonus in the following year. So, salespeople would “sandbag” (i.e. intentionally underestimate for the uninitiated) the next year’s prospects during budget negotiation. Another trick was to hold back booking some sales at the end of a great year (so you’d have some deals in your back-pocket heading into the new year and would also make the budget negotiation a bit easier). Many tricks of the trade. I’m not in sales anymore. And I don’t really miss it.
FYI, the $1.2mm year was a combo of salary, bonus, sign-on bonus, and newly vested stock grants (later converted to cash)… read somewhere that this type of income is usually a mix of various types of compensation and I have found that to be true.
At least it didn’t go to my head (too much) and we didn’t start living like rockstars, though took some very nice vacations that year. The income volatility and total lack of job security I’ve had all my working life has actually been beneficial to my ESI equation – since we knew there could be a drought coming along at any time, we treated good years as anomalies and tried to set aside a good chunk to manage the risk.
Comments are cracking me up. This has turned into a huge bitch session.
“Whoa is me… I don’t make as much as everyone else so I have no chance of becoming a millionaire or I can’t relate”.
The idea of the blog is to work hard, continue to move your income north, and save/invest for goals/retirement. If you make 800k sure you’ll probably get there faster than someone who makes 100k but at the end of the day you will still be better off than 90% of your peers.
Quit your bitching and let the man blow some steam off with a funny post. I enjoyed the article, nice work ESI.
Hahaha! Thanks!
1995 at 25yo made $32K with $0 net worth. Now, make $120K 25 year later. Net worth over $2M. Sure, now I can buy coffee every day, but 25 years ago? Heck no, but I did anyways, I was a dummy. Made many financial mistakes as other millionaires, but learned and changed my ways over time. Invested late in game, picked bad stocks, etc. Now, all in index funds, no longer picking stocks, paid off house, etc. Where there is a will, there is a way.
Whiners will complain. Stop and figure out how to do it with all these millionaire ideas from when they started out.
Talking to a basketball buddy last week, he was talking about buying a fully loaded Ford F-250 pickup. I did a double take. I had to remind him that why does he need a pickup if he doesn’t tow or haul anything and and and he doesn’t have a JOB!! He is 42yo with no savings, collecting unemployment, not 25yo making bad decisions. To each their own, but don’t complain to me about not having money…
Post is spot on!
Median income in the USA is $63k… save 10% in a ROTH IRA earning 7% that’s after inflation. You’d be a MILLIONAIRE in 38yrs. Want to get there sooner. EARN more… SAVE more… EASY enough!
What a refreshing read, I had a good laugh. I suspected the kind of people who write the comments that initiated this article were going to get butt hurt, lo and behold looking at the comments.
I used to think you only had to commit to the 4 hour work week to getting to riches. That attitude had me earning ~30k a year. Now I’m taking home +100k and working 70 hour weeks.
You can’t and shouldn’t write for anyone. If anything articles like this will cull the herd.
Looking forward to the next millionaire interview,
Colby @ That Charles Life
I really love this blog and the millionaire interviews. I will be honest, when I first seriously started thinking about money, I wanted everything to be easy. I even got depressed when things got hard. This blog has helped me realize that growing wealth isn’t easy (as evidenced by your posts and the people you interview).
I now enjoy working hard and the process. Instead of complaining, I have shifted my mindset to “How can I get what that guy/gal has?” “How can I get my salary up to $150k, $225k, >$335k?” “How can I improve my investments?”
Congratulations ET, sounds like you’re on your way….
For sure, there has to be something stimulating about making money and accruing wealth in order for anyone to stick with it. And earning and wealth building is like a muscle, the more you exercise it, the stronger it will be become. And soon enough you’ll find yourself being able to do some pretty heavy lifting.
As has been repeated many times (but never enough times), people with higher incomes didn’t just suddenly get there. They have typically taken a long road of education, skills building, and relevant experience. They have also often taken some calculated risks – volunteering for tough assignments, taking on new roles, switching to jobs with better prospects, going back to school for advanced training or degrees, even changing careers. I have changed careers at least three times, and had at least a half dozen employers in my 30-some years of work-life. My employer tenure has ranged from 9 months to 14 years… lets just say the 9 months was me quickly realizing I made the wrong move. That’s the other thing… we all make mistakes, but millionaire-mindset folks tend to fix their mistakes ASAP!
If one does nothing, if one attempts nothing, if one never stretches, if one does not commit to goals, if one does not seek to emulate the type of person one wishes to become, then I can guaranty the results with 100% accuracy – that person would achieve nothing. I believe ESI has said some version of “if you want what I have, you have to be willing to do what I’ve done”. That sums up quite a lot.
Ultimately, achieving significant wealth is about incrementally improving on the things you can control – income being one of them, whether that’s squeezing out an extra $5K or $50K or $500K. You gotta start somewhere.
In 1996 my wife and I, married and we earned about 60K combined, split evenly. She is a teacher and I am a police officer. I was 26 and my wife was 22. We started with no assets and 19k in student loan debt.
(I became a police officer in 1994 at 24, my wife a teacher at 22 in 1996.)
My wife continued to go to school as soon as she was hired in 1996, in order to earn her M.A. plus 60 hours. This enabled her to earn the maxmium allowed in her contract early on and for all future contract increases.
As a police officer, I worked as much overtime as I could and security side jobs for the first ten years. And I did both religiously, 60 plus hour work weeks were my norm.
As soon as we got married, I began investing. I opened Roth IRA’s for both of us and began maxing out her 403(b).
We didn’t earn alot and I saw other retired police officers that were working alongside me at my security gigs, and I knew early on that I didn’t want to be like them.
So I read many books and listened to MoneyTalk with Bob Brinker on the weekends and was fascinated by the callers who had questions about their million dollar portfolio’s. This ignited a spark within me. I didn’t possess an M.B.A, just a drive that I wanted to be financially independant.
After devouring as many investment books as I could, we began a journey of living below our means, saving at least 20% of our gross, maxing out our retirement accounts and invested in low cost index funds in a simple buy-and-hold total market index.
While we observed family and friends living more lavish lifestyles, we stuck to our plan.
Along the way we purchased a modest home, 1500 square feet, remodeled it with my security side gigs, and paid off the mortgage in 12 years.
Some of the “sacrafices” we made during this journey were. We drove old but reliable cars. Cars that were purchased for about 4k. We took cheap vacations where we visited family in Florida near beaches. We bought a modest home in a nice neighborhood with good schools.
All those intentional actions allowed us to widen the gap between what we earned and what we saved. By paying less in taxes, insurance, heating and cooling, etc, etc. we were able to save more.
And we never felt deprived for anything. Knowing we could buy what we wanted as our savings grew was enough satisfaction and being debt free after the mortgage was paid off, gave us more satisfaction.
As our incomes grew, our lifestyle has a little but nothing extreme. We take nicer vacations to all inclusive resorts, we bought a nicer car and most importantly money is not a worry. We can eat out at nicer restaurants and not worry about the bill.
We laid out the foundation using E.S.I. early on in our life and it has served us well.
Fast forward to today. We have three children from whom we’ll pay their college tuition, no debt and as of yesterday’s close $2,215,978.09 at Vanguard.
We now earn about $100k each, I usually earn an additional $10k in overtime, for a combined gross income of about $210k. And we invest about 35% of our gross per year. I still work overtime even though I don’t need to.
I could’ve complained and whined when I heard those callers call in to MoneyTalk with their million dollar portfolios thinking I couldn’t achieve that. Instead, I let those callers inspire me.
It comes down to math. The math won’t lie. And you really need to do all three, earn, save and invest and keep a long term mindset.
When I worked a midnight shift for overtime for example, much too my dismay, I did so thinking what will this overtime pay be when it gets invested for the next 10, 15, 20 years.
And lastly, you have to widen that gap early on and keep it widened. We didn’t earn alot for I would say the first half of our working careers, but we kept that gap wide by keeping our expenses low. And the math proves it worked for us and it can work for you.
I LOVED this story! Thanks for sharing it!
Me too!
Great story, thanks very much for your service. Congratulations on your family, and work life.
Your mention of Bob Brinker caught my eye, and the callers. Wow. I started listening to da Brink in 1988 when he first came on the air (my wife-to-be and I were on a road-trip, and Moneytalk caught our ears) until he left his radio gig in 2018 after 32 years. Was a subscriber on-and-off, and loved his simple approach that is very similar to ESI’s.
Many memorable callers, one call was about six months before 9/11 and a caller with an accent (!) called to ask about the potential market impacts for a massive act of terror in the U.S. impacting markets, and asking Bob’s advice. Bob sagely brushed him off with the amended Buffet quote, “in the long run, we’ll all be dead.” But six months later, the world changed and I thought back to that call (as I’m sure many listeners did). Another memorable awesome call was at the end of a ’90s Brinker’s show, with an 86 year-old man asking what he should do with a $4 million portfolio. Brinker quoted his screener Ravi’s advice, saying the guy “should immediately invest in “the services of professional ladies” and a truckload of Jack Daniels. This is MoneyTalk!” *out* Wisdom!:-)
Well done! My wife is a teacher and I work for the state, we’re almost exactly 20 years behind you (age, marriage date, wealth) on this path. Thanks for the encouraging post!
My family makes a high income, but a promotion or two ago we only made a medium income and we were fully on track to prosperity. I suspect that this is pretty common on this blog and among the millionaire interviews. People who are good money stewards of their high incomes were probably also good stewards of their lower, medium and medium high incomes.
Live in the heart of the Silicon Valley, every home here is upwards of a million dollars. Neighbor on one side has 2 Teslas, paying monthly for those and still has a mortgage, refinanced multiple times but mortgage balance higher after every refinance? In their 50’s.
Other side neighbor has a 20 year old SUV “because it fits me and I like it” and she has no debt and a net worth over $10M. Has travelled the world marveling, in her 60’s and loving life…
Keeping up with the Joneses may look cool, but the life experiences others have are so much more rewarding.
We are in stealth net worth mode, no debt, drive older cars as the use for them will entirely stop very soon, don’t feel the need to post our “wins” on Social Media but take International trips to expand our horizons a few times a year. Could buy a super exotic car to impress our neighbors, but relish in the realization that we don’t have to for our feeling like we “made it”. The Millionaire Next Door. Your feel like you have to publish that? Invest in therapy and get over your insecurities. Hope you can feel good about yourself without showing off =)
Love what you do, keep it up
Start a Go Fund Me Account with a sob story. Watch the money just roll on in!
Haha! That’s a good one to add!
The article came at a good time for me. I just paid out $2k to house my sister the last 30 days in a motel. She does not and has not liked to work her entire life, when I told my sister that my husband was suggesting I get a second job to support her, she was okay with that, she did not understand that it was like your article a joke and a play on words.
The Millionaire interviews have a great contrast to them, which I thoroughly enjoy, low income to high incomes, side gigs, etc.. Most of the millionaires that are making large “enviable” incomes are self employed and took risks to get there and made the most of their opportunities.
Hmmm, perhaps we should start up a side support group for those of us with lazy/crazy siblings who expect us to keep giving them money. It’s a weird situation for those of us with a) hard-earned savings and b) feelings of obligation towards family.
Live to 250 years old. That’ll really get the compound snowball rolling.
I believe it was Eddie Cantor who said it took him “20 years to become an overnight success.” My first job was at age 16. I’m 43 now. I lived with my mom, a single mother of two in a two bedroom apartment, and paid her my car payments of $180/month when I started driving because she couldn’t afford this extra expense. I made minimum wage: $4.25/hr and was an honor student at the local public high school. I sacked groceries and then was promoted to cashier. That’s when I realized that I did not want to be a professional cashier for my whole life (because I met people who were and on food stamps!); college was key. I got a bachelors in chemistry from the local college where a professor mentored me and suggested graduate school. Now with a Ph.D., and more than 20 yrs of experience as a professional, I make way more than $4.25/hr. More importantly, I save almost half my income (so does my husband). I think folks read these blogs thinking that becoming a millionaire is fast. Unfortunately, this is our society. Think of all the other issues plaguing our country: National debt, childhood obesity, type 2 diabetes. Many of these issues come about because American’s are great at addressing acute issues but not long term systemic issues that take sacrifice and planning. Keep up the great work with this blog. If it converts a few percent of the population that votes into fervent savers, then your work is well worth the effort.
“It can take twenty years to create an overnight success but what you don’t hear is that it takes the exact same amount of time to create a bitter failure.” ― Marc Maron, Attempting Normal
Shawn, I love your story and congratulate both you and your Mom for your sacrifice and planning. You should both be proud of what you produced!
I should like to add that Eddie Cantor then had to start over again when he was wiped out by the 1929 crash. He never complained but kept plugging away at success.
Hey ESI, honestly enjoyed the sarcasm!
Now off to work up my “go fund me” story! I thing I just got a hang nail…
Cheers,
The Wease
I am someone in a household that has struggled slightly (I think) in the Earn category. My wife and I have averaged modest incomes between us over the years (approximately 80k) and we 100% could have earned more, probably lots more! But here’s the thing, we were comfortable (mostly) with our career paths and even though we worked hard, neither one of us was committed to working ALOT harder! We didn’t go back to school for a masters degree, we didn’t job hop, we didn’t take second jobs, we actually turned down promotions, heck we never even asked our bosses for raises (yes we got them, anyway, but just took what was given). But we decided to do a couple other things extremely well. We lived well below our means and saved a “Crap Ton” (see what I did there?) of money and invested it wisely. We chose not to Earn more and we have never been jealous of people who do make way more than we do, because we weren’t willing to work for it. And… we never made excuses! So now we are a couple of 49 years olds who only work part time (for the last 7 years mind you!) and have amassed over a 2 million net worth. To the complainypants crowd out there who don’t make 800k a year or even 100k a year, get a plan and just do it. It’s ESI for a reason and quite frankly you don’t have to excel at all of them (I believe there was an article or two about this!). We intentionally chose not to make more because we knew that if we excelled at the S and the I, we would become wealthy in a reasonable timeframe that was acceptable to us.
ESI is a great platform and I appreciate everyone sharing “making their way” financially. It’s different for everyone and it certainly doesn’t happen overnight. Some are simply not willing to make the sacrifices today for their future self.
We started our kids’ education funds with birthday and Christmas cash in a savings account until we had enough to open a mutual fund account for them. Once we were no longer buying diapers, that became the college fund contribution of $25 a month. I set this up on auto draft so it happened every month. This was in the 80’s. I mentioned what I was doing to a co-worker and she decided to do the same for her children. It is amazing what even modest savings over a long period of time will do. You just have to be disciplined to do it. Our kids are grown up, but we are very happy we could help them with their education. I imagine they were in the minority of their graduating class to have a “college fund”.
By the way, we also “paid ourselves first” as we went along and we are all in our 60’s, we are comfortable. I am still working, but I see retirement in my near future!!!!
Putting aside the “wealthy” part, if the goal is to retire early, here’s a way to do that, without any of the three parts of ESI, without side hustles, and you don’t have to work yourself to death either.
1. Join the military at a young age. Get degree(s) using the military programs to pay for them, so there are no student loans. The pay is pitiful but almost anyone can retire after 20 years or so as an E-7 (in the AF that’s a Master Sergeant) with 50% or more of your base pay. That’s not enough to fully retire on, but it’s your first guaranteed, inflation-adjusted income stream. (My retirement check has doubled in the 20 years since I retired, it’s not bad now). And your medical will be cheap for the rest of your life. I’m not talking about using VA, you can use the base hospital or use off-base civilian providers, it’s your choice.
2. Next go to work for civil service or a govt contractor. The benefits are terrific, with matching 401k contributions (which everybody should take advantage of, but I emphasize you can retire without it). Retire after another 15 or so years, giving you a second pension.
3. So at age 55 or so you can be fully retired with two income streams and medical is taken care of. Wait as long as you want to start collecting social security. The three income streams will total in the neighborhood of $100k per year, with two of those streams getting COLA increases.
Note that none of this depends on building a nest egg which will be converted to income for retirement. Also, my wife was always a stay-at-home wife and never contributed directly to the income (although her support was much appreciated when I was studying many nights).
I didn’t follow this simple path exactly, I was motivated to do some side hustles and other investing, but it wasn’t necessary to be able to retire well before the SS full retirement age.
JJ, I have a couple of family members who are somewhat following this path (minus the degrees), which works for them because they did not have access or aptitude for higher education, and definitely not on an ESI path. The upside is the military pension plus the civil service pension. In the case of govt contractors, the upside is the attractive pay and benefits, but no added pension. The downside is that (in the case of the people I know) often requires post-military work in the D.C. region (especially in the case of contractors) which is nice, but very expensive. Of course, you can relocate in retirement.
The other good option is teaching K-12 in the public school system. For a couple where both are seasoned teachers, family income could be $150K. You can live and work virtually anywhere in the country, benefits are great, pension is good, and there is ample time for side-gigs, including outside tutoring, for which teachers charge quite a lot. Despite all the complaining coming from the union leaders, the teachers I know do quite well and retire well too.
Agreed, I’m sure there are many variations on this theme. The military gave me a good start when I was young and had nothing but a high school education. This is one of those career paths where the annual pay increases are out of your control, but you can move up the ladder faster by getting good performance reports and scoring well on the promotion tests. I got every promotion in minimum time (E7 under 10 years). Getting the degrees opened doors to jobs after the military. It also let me get commissioned. Officers make more money, but still I never made more than $45k/year in the military.
I tried civil service for a few years, and the benefits were great but I didn’t stay. I hopped around between various contractors. They also had great benefits and retirement plans. They have many jobs that don’t require degrees.
DC isn’t necessary, there are many contractor options in California, Nevada, and Texas that I know of. I don’t know if all of them offer pensions, but my last position did, as well as matching 401k. I was vested in the pension after only 5 years.
Haha, “Steal it”. If only it were that easy! But building a criminal career is like building a business, gotta have experience and good employees (gang members) and good quality equipment (weapons and masks). Seems like just as much work to me!