Mon 11 Jun 2007
The Real And ONLY Reason People Aren’t Getting Rich
Posted by RichSlick under Misc
[11] Comments
There is a grand conspiracy to keep you from getting rich and I’m about to reveal it. It’s so sinister that I debated for days on whether or not I should tell all my readers but I decided that it was in the best interest of everyone to reveal this secret.
Before I tell you though I need to give you a little bit of context. The best way to give you the context is to describe a scenario that I’ve seen over and over again that has confirmed the sinister yet subtle conspiracy to keep your from getting rich.
I first learned about this sinister conspiracy as a young kid; when I look back now I realize how ignorant and dumb I was for not seeing it then but it’s all perfectly clear to me now. As I grew older, I saw the same thing happening over and over again. By the time I was a teenager and going off to college I knew that this little sinister plot I had learned about would help and hurt me. I’ve NEVER revealed this to anyone except a friend last week and now I’m telling all of you.
Ok, here’s the scenario that I’ve simplified to make sure it’s easy to understand: First, you take about 100 people and you put them in a room. You ask these hundred people to do various tasks and you secretly test and record their activities.
The first task is to find out which of the 100 people have book smarts. You administer a math and science test and realize that out of 100 people, 10% were really smart, 10% were really dumb and the rest were average.
The second task is to find out which of the 100 people have aptitude for sports activities. It turns out that 10% are great athletes, 10% are horrible athletes and the rest were average.
I hope you can begin to see the pattern here; the sinister conspiracy!
The third task is to find out which of the 100 people have artistic capabilities. It turns out 10% are great artists, 10% are horrible artists and the rest were average.
The fourth and final task is to find out which of the 100 people have an aptitude for finance. It turns out that 10% are great finance gurus, 10% “below average” and the rest were average.
The Real and ONLY Reason People Aren’t Getting Rich is because these people mostly fall into the “average” or “below average” categories. The people that are getting rich are in the top 10% category. It’s plain and simple. It is a sinister conspiracy discovered over and over again by kids in school during athletic play, academic testing, social interaction and many other places. This sinister conspiracy actually has a name, it’s called Normal Distribution and it is embedded into every living creature, every material object, every aspect of the universe. There is no escaping the Normal Distribution but there is always a chance for you to move ever so slightly from one part of it to another.
There you have it and I hope you’ll accept it. You can deny it all you want but the universe operates in this manner and I give you my 100% Iron Clad Guarantee that this is so. Because I learned this secret years ago, I’ve had a head start by constantly working to move toward the right part of the distribution curve. I’m nowhere near the top, just slightly above everyone else and that has made all the difference.
11 Responses to “ The Real And ONLY Reason People Aren’t Getting Rich ”
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October 15th, 2008 at 12:36 pm[...] with the empirical rule and normal distribution curve which I’ve previously written about here. Bookmark to: « What Happened To All The Prosper.com Blogs? | [...]
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December 4th, 2008 at 8:32 am[...] drink” comes to mind often. Statistically speaking however, 5% would fall into the normal distribution curve of “the best of the best” and I often wonder if the successes come from the fact that [...]








June 11th, 2007 at 12:01 pm
I think I could agree with this 10% of the time, disagree 10% of the time, and not really feel too strongly about it the other 80% of the time.
June 11th, 2007 at 12:32 pm
Great point
The important considderation here is that being rich or poor is all relative. So, by definition, only a small percentage can be rich. By comparison, someone with a net worth of $500 would be rich in most Africal countries.
So, if every person had twice as much money, the same number of people would be poor.
If you evaluate your life and you are happy, you are rich no matter what the scale says.
June 11th, 2007 at 5:54 pm
Well, It was Einstein that said everything depends on your frame of reference and although it’s a simple phrase not too many people really get the implications of that statement.
Ironically, I can’t think of a simple frame of reference (involving humans) where the Normal Distribution wouldn’t apply. Even if you picked 100 of the best athletes around the world, 10% would be the top and 10% would be at the bottom, the rest would be average.
The statistical implication here is that only a small percentage will ever control large portions of the wealth in society by virtue of the distribution curve…
June 11th, 2007 at 7:07 pm
If the frame of reference is skill in jumping off a building and flying and I’d say that everyone would be just about as skillful (or not in this case).
Also I wouldn’t call the rest average, it’s probably more like a bell curve where you’d find that if you kicked the top 10% and bottom 10% out of the room, you’d still have 10% of the 80 who are good and 10% who are bad, and everyone else in the middle. It’s not like all 80 people would have the exact same abilities.
It’s also worth noting that some skills are learned and developed and others appear innate. I don’t know if there’s a way that the bottom 10% in smarts can transform himself into being in the top 10%. However, I’m 100% positive (Iron Clad guarantee here) that a person in the bottom 10% of “financial guru-ness” can turn themselves into being in the top 10%. I’ve seen it with quite a few financial bloggers.
It’s also worth noting that many people in the US count in the top 10% of rich when compared to the rest of world. So maybe a lot of people are already rich and don’t need to “get there.”
June 11th, 2007 at 7:12 pm
Well everything is relative, if your talking about Americans vs. the rest of the world then the top 10% of the “rich” are mostly Americans. If you are talking about Americans vs. Americans, then the top 10% control the majority of wealth.
It also goes to illustrate what people consider “rich” rich. A person making 30k/year feels poor to those making 3x that income at 90k but they’re rich when compared to the rest of the world. Everything is relative but no one escapes the Normal Distribution
June 13th, 2007 at 3:56 am
I have never heard of Normal Distribution until now. But I have heard of the 90 10 rule. In any market or business organization, 10% of the people make 90% of the money while 90% of the people share the remaining 10% of the money. I’m thinking the 90 10 rule is just another name for Normal Distribution.
June 14th, 2007 at 2:19 am
very astute observation!
I see this often too. a few of my friends will ask for advice and then do nothing (or what they were planning on doing anyway) while others will ask for advice and follow it.(even if it involves something they don’t understand like opening an account with a bank they’ve never heard of and buying a foreign currency CD).
Guess which people are always complaining about not having money
In both cases, the 2 groups had average or below average financial aptitude. However, 1 group can be shown what to do and the other group can’t. Not only are they financially dumb, they can’t even follow directions! – they’re definitely below average.
June 15th, 2007 at 11:26 pm
Interesting.
This is indeed how it works out if you get enough samples of something.
However, this is like a predestination argument. In essence, you’re saying, “Well, 90% of you will not be in the top 10%, so don’t even bother, or don’t expect to move very far.”
So do we all just throw in the towel, stop reading each other’s blogs, and accept our financial lot in life? Of course not! Weak people can become stronger, dumb people can become smarter, and poor people can become richer. Just because most people stay right where they are doesn’t mean that we all should stop trying to move up.
June 17th, 2007 at 5:47 pm
My argument was that no matter how smart a dumb person becomes or how rich a poor person becomes, there WILL ALWAYS BE A NORMAL DISTRIBUTION.
Imagine if President Bush decided to give every American $1,000,000. Does that mean everyone becomes rich? No, it means the normal distribution is ADJUSTED to factor in. Those that had 100,000,000 still have 100,000,000. Those that had 0, have 1,000,000 but it really hasn’t improved any.
Do you really think most PF Blogs are making millionaires out of anyone? Perhaps the top 10%, just like I pointed out!