Chapter by chapter book review: Rich Dad Poor Dad, chapter 2 lesson 1: The rich don't work for money

So recently I was browsing through the books in a thrift store, and I found the financial education classic "Rich dad, Poor dad", for the incredible price of 0,50$.

I put the book away for when I would be having time, and today I took it along to read during my train commute.

I will not bore you with the introduction, and jump right into the meat and bones of this book.

The second chapter is a fairly lengthy one, but I read it one sitting, and I was lucky to have finished it when I was riding into my trainstation, or I might have missed my stop, since I was hooked.

So before I get going on the review of the second chapter: a wee bit of context.

The book is written by a guy who got financial advice from his dad "poor dad" and the dad from a friend "rich dad". The first chapter was set at the beginning of the financial education when they were kids.

Review of the chapter:

The initial setting is great. After having been bullied for being poor, the two friends decide that they have to make money, and they take this seriously, ending up counterfeiting money, being hugely dissapointed when they are explained by poor dad that this is illegal.

Poor dad tells them to talk to rich dad, and rich dad accepts to teach them how to become rich. He does this by having them work at exploitation wages in his store.

He doesn't see the kids, untill they want to quit. And than he explains them that they are behaving like most employees. Working for money, and thinking that more money will solve the problem.

If they want to continue the education, they will start working for free (to be fair, it is 3 hours a week, so they are not being exploited full time.)

After having done this for a couple of weeks, they boys are taken out, and than the real lesson comes.

Most people work from fear. Fear for not being able to pay bills, fear of not having food, housing,... But once they have this, they are led by desire. Desire for a bigger car, a bigger house, fancier food, which feeds back into fear of not being able to afford the bigger house,...

Leading to people having to work for money, and having an emotional relationship with money.

He tells them that they shouldn't work for money. Keep on working for free, and they will see opportunities for making money which they would never have seen before.

A little later, the boys find discarded stuff in the store, which they are allowed to take home, since it(s of no value to the store. They decide to rent this out, and for a couple of weeks, make 9$ a week. (90X the wages they where paid in the beginning per hour). Way more than they could ever have made while working.

The morale of the story is: Rather than working because you need to make money (because you desire stuff, or fear not being abler to afford stuff). Have your money (capital) produce this money for you.

This is a very brief description of the book, but is is magnificent. And it is written in such a way that a child can actually understand this.

Even at an adult age, just reading this one chapter has already made me think in a different way about money.

I'll be keeping you guys up to date on the future chapters of this book which I will be reading. But based just on this single chapter I would say: if you come upon this book somewhere, buy it, and read it!!!