What People Make      

There doesn't seem to be a middle-class. When you find out how much people make you notice that you're either rich or poor. Now I'm not saying that everyone is poor, as in poverty, where you can't live..but compared to the other income spectrum - we aren't that wealthy, financially. What you do with your money as you age can make you wealthy for retirement age or earlier. I just can't fathom the fact that some people make more in a year than I will ever make, working 2 jobs, in my whole lifetime.

The News and Observer had about 75 people, famous and 'average-joes' and their incomes. The collection of people are very random and does not say their education or experience, but it gives you a good idea. From my review, I can say the average income for people from the age of 22-65 is between 26k and 65k. Besides the bulk of the individuals being in this range, there were a few making 70-80k and only a few making 100-300k. The celebrities start at 5 million and get a good bulk of them in up to 33 million. Then there are a few celebrities in the 90-115 million range, and a couple of CEO's making in the hundreds of millions. Now to make a joke out of the whole situation, a dog (Leona Helmsley's dog) makes 12 million - a DOG.

If your goal is to be young and rich, as my goal is - but I am starting to find is nearly impossible - you need to have a brand new idea, a niche or improvement in an existing business, be an entrepreneur, or be very good at investing, and with any gateway, find a way to make a money, little or substantial, from a large group of people. There aren’t too many positions, even in large corporations, that will make you extraordinarily rich.



What I mean by idea, for example, is the computer, radio, TV, the car, phone and then the revision with the cordless and cell phone; or the idea of reality TV shows.

What I mean by a niche or improvement in an existing business, is CarMax (selling used cars has been around since there have been cars but CarMax buys a good percentage of certain colors [silver, green, blue] family-type cars, making a little money at a large volume), program software for businesses that will help them out - such as SAS with their statistical software, LCD TV's(getting bigger screens, making the insides lighter and smaller), you get the idea. Make sure to patent your ideas and then you have to 'sell' the idea. You have to sell it to people on why doing things from A to Z your way is better than the previous, or other ways.

Being an entrepreneur and investing is pretty self explanatory. You need to be outgoing, creative and take risks.

To live well, though, and be in the higher income spectrum you need education, willing the learn, be adaptable, be a people person - and to make things easier, you need connections or be in the right place at the right time – such as a position opening up from someone leaving the company or an expanding company.

As I grow up I am finding out that you need to be a thinker AND a doer, you need to be adaptable and you can never settle. You always need to continue to learn how to better what you are currently doing, learning new technologies and how they can benefit you and find what interests you. What you may be good at and interested in now doesn’t mean you will be interested or want to continue to do that career in 5 or 10 years. The majority of people work for a good majority of their life in the amount of years they work and hours per week. I also believe it is good to have little businesses or services you can do for others to make additional money on the side. Of course being smart with your money will get you more no matter how much income you make. Also you need to keep up on your education, always show you are interested and willing to learn and go above and beyond sometimes if it is possible – work a weekend or bring in treats for your coworkers and bosses. Most of us will need to work for a long time, it doesn’t have to be miserable, but hitting it big would sure be more fun!