Millionaire Robert Kiyosaki believes in financial education across the socio-economic classes. Focusing on the United States, Robert makes it clear that he thinks the government is not going to look after its people.

The Problem Is Education

America went from being one of the richest countries in the world to the biggest debtor nation in history. Both Donald Trump and Robert Kiyosaki place the blame on a lack of education, financial education. In their new book 'Why We Want You To Be Rich' they address this problem.

enewsletter signup:
Why subscribe?View archive

Robert Kiyosaki - The Art Of Being Financially Literate

Millionaire Robert Kiyosaki believes in financial education across the socio-economic classes. Focusing on the United States, Robert makes it clear that he thinks the government is not going to look after its people.

Robert Kiyosaki - The Art Of Being Financially Literate

Millionaire Robert Kiyosaki believes in financial education across the socio-economic classes. Focusing on the United States, Robert makes it clear that he thinks the government is not going to look after its people. If this is so, then who is going to take on the job? His meassage is simple, the best way to get ahead is to educate yourself!

An entrepreneur, investor, self-help author and motivational speaker, Robert Kiyosaki is the man behind the bestselling Rich Dad, Poor Dad book series. He continues his authorship by collaborating with Donald Trump to write Why We Want You To Be Rich, released in 2006. While the two businessmen work in different fields, they have a common conviction in one thing: financial education.

Living in an era which he calls the Information Age, Kyosaki states that “the economy itself is collapsing in America”. He believes that financial problems that exist in the United States today are most often interlinked and impossible to be fixed by the existence of money alone. Situations such as increasing national debt and the exportation of jobs are some of the few threats this first-world country is facing.

The rapid growth of technology has allowed the world to become a global village, and this means that job opportunities tend to gravitate towards wherever it is that will produce the most efficient results. In this case, goods manufacturing has almost entirely shifted from the European and American countries to Asia, particularly China and India. This is due to the fact that living costs, labour costs and material prices are lower in this part of the world.

By mid 2005, there were a total of half a million job cuts in the United States. Meanwhile, the growth rate of the work being exported is estimated to be 20 to 30 per cent per year.

Middle class shrinkage
Rapid changes in the financial world have caused the size of the middle class population to shrink. People in the United States today are either getting richer or poorer. Soon enough, there will only be two social classes – the rich and the poor.

In his latest book, he mentions that the United States is “filled with people like my poor dad.” Robert is referring to the main group of people who are well-educated and hard-working, but are dependent on the government to look after them when they retire. They are blindly following advice that Robert believes is no longer valid for today’s society.

There are about 46 million Americans benefiting from Social Security today. However, this program won’t be feasible for long as ‘these programs are doomed’. Dependency on Social Security is an increasing trend and soon 40 per cent of seniors will not receive their monthly benefits as there is, in 2001 alone, an average of 3.4 workers paying for each retiree.

Educate yourself
This is where Robert and Donald’s belief in education comes in. As businessmen who have established themselves, succeeded and occasionally failed, Robert and Donald’s insights to the future of the world’s economy are valuable and wise to be taken into consideration.

If the government-run services are on their way to bankruptcy and there are even less jobs to go around, how are the people outside the rich class suppose to stay afloat? The first step, as written in Why We Want You To Be Rich, is to change the mindset of ‘invest not to lose’ to ‘invest to win’.

Think positively
Bearing the positive way of thinking in mind, financial literacy plays a crucial role in making wise decisions. For example, the knowledge of the importance of investing in both time and money is a form of financial education. This information, if carried out, will reap its benefits as putting in a little more effort may be able to save you unnecessary expenditure.

Not trusting the US government to support them, Robert and Donald find means to be independent. The experience gained early in their lives to practice entrepreneurship became part of their financial education. For Robert, he was fortunate enough to have a mentor, his well reported rich dad and poor dad. He took up apprenticeship at an oil company which gave him insights about the oil market and how it controls the world’s economy.

Simple tips such as making informed choices and not conforming to society’s norms on handling money are just some of the things that the two businessmen believe will make a lot of difference between the rich and the poor.

Be realistic
In chapter seven of Why We Want You To Be Rich, Robert and Donald talk about choosing an area which a person can realistically be successful in. For example, both authors choose the ‘B’ and ‘I’, which stand for big-business owners and investors respectively, because they know they can ‘win’ in those areas due to factors such as character traits and personal interest.

According to Robert’s rich dad (mentor), he was ‘too much of a rebel to follow orders from people.’ This led to self-examination and a reality check for Robert which he fortunately benefited from. He did things which he was good at (entrepreneurship and investing) instead of doing something which he thought would keep him safe financially (work hard and getting a job).

Most people would expect people like Robert and Donald to solve their problems or improve on their situations, but it is impossible to determine what works best for each individual. The aim of these adventurous entrepreneurs is not to spoon-feed today’s middle class group, but to teach them the necessary skills and trades they need to be successful in a fast-paced society.