How to Get Rich (2019) | Hacker News Reader

How to Get Rich (2019)

nav.al

94 pointsmottiden56 comments

I think it is sad that we let others steal our freedom and then fall for the illusion that we need to steal others freedom just to get our own freedom back.

>You want wealth because it buys you freedom—so you don’t have to wear a tie like a collar around your neck; so you don’t have to wake up at 7:00 a.m. to rush to work and sit in commute traffic; so you don’t have to waste your life grinding productive hours away into a soulless job that doesn’t fulfill you.

>The purpose of wealth is freedom; it’s nothing more than that. ... It’s about being your own sovereign individual.

Don't want a collar around your neck? Tie collars around other necks!

I think the whole premise of these statements are wrong. If you want to work for money, and go home not bothered with it, then get a job. If you want your whole life ruled by the business, then start a business.

The most hard working people I know have businesses, so starting one in the illusion that it will buy you freedom is very strange. Start a business if you want to start a business, but it will take over your life, not give you "freedom". If you want "freedom" in the weekends and evenings, just get a job.

Freedom != time spent, it's time spent on your own terms.

I think koonsolo has a point, namely that you may start a business thinking “yeah my terms”, but pretty soon the business will determine the terms - and the times.

Some industries including large subsets of the tech industry have become essentially zero-sum games. It's almost impossible to make money in those industries because they have been monopolized. If you happen to launch a software service in those industries, you will not be able to get any serious traffic from Google or social media because those platforms favor certain providers over others (e.g. US-based providers). Also you need to be careful of launching in an industry which is about to become monopolized.

So if you're not based in the US or you don't have many personal connections, you shouldn't dream too big; you need to find a niche which isn't going to be gate-kept.

You're insane if you don't launch in the US - even virtually. US is where the money is, US is where the market is, and US is where the only customers that matter are (unless you're selling to defence, gov or niche regional finance).

It makes acquisitions easier, it makes hiring easier, it makes marketing and sales easier and it makes billing easier.

Unless you want to bootstrap until you retire because it's a lifestyle business, then just do it where you are and chill - you are the 0.001%.

> US is where the only customers that matter are

I’d love to hear the rationale behind that.

If you can name a global organisation that doesn't get the lion's share of revenue from US organisations, or doesn't make major purchasing decisions out of the US - feel free to correct me. If you're a startup, you should only be going after low-hanging fruit, and that's only your existing network, and in the US.

Have rich parents. Add ready as that.

The author grew up poor and was raised by a single mom.

> Ravikant was born in New Delhi, India in 1974. He moved to New York with his mother and his brother, Kamal, when he was 9.

On a scale of 1 to average Indian person today where would you put him?

Yeah ... I think most people do not realize that most Indian people they interact with are not from the lower classes.

I was invited and attended the wedding of my former Indian room mate and only then I realized that his family was pretty wealthy with a nice house in a nice district of Bangalore.

Today he's one of the richest people, not only from India, but anywhere in the entire world.

That's why so many people pay attention to his advice about how to get rich. He's not selling you course in order to become wealthy. He already has, and he's sharing what he learned without asking for anything in return.

He gets wealth vs status wrong.

Status is nothing but the "bigger guns diplomacy."

Historically, the highest status person has always been the warlord.

Today, the highest status person is arguably also the biggest warlord in the world: the US president.

Wealth on the other hand is made through trade. You can buy a certain amount of status (guns) with that and climb your way up.

But it is always about guns, humans are monkeys after all. And if you have the guns, you can just take wealth from the trades-folk.

> And if you have the guns, you can just take wealth from the trades-folk.

“In a room sit three great men, a king, a priest, and a rich man with his gold. Between them stands a sellsword, a little man of common birth and no great mind. Each of the great ones bids him slay the other two. ‘Do it,’ says the king, ‘for I am your lawful ruler.’ ‘Do it,’ says the priest, ‘for I command you in the name of the gods.’ ‘Do it,’ says the rich man, ‘and all this gold shall be yours.’ So tell me – who lives and who dies?”

Where's that from?

Killing the rich man is the clear winner here. 10/10 would slay again.

It's from Game of Thrones, and there's no right answer. The point is that power lies where people think it lies.

The sellsword swings and chops off three heads at once and becomes the new incredibly wealthy god king.

On the other hand, the sellsword could kill just the rich man and the King, and be legitimized by the priest as the next god king. Then he could use his power to slowly delegitimize the priest.

Well spotted, you’ve read a bit on the hit story of the papacy I see :)

It probably depends on the personal values of the sellsword. Maybe the sellsword is a true religious believer. Maybe they are a true patriot. Maybe they are in it for the money.

He kills no one and they live happily ever after.

> But it is always about guns, humans are monkeys after all.

That makes no sense as monkeys don't use guns. I'm not sure if it's a mixed metaphor or what, but I can't figure out what is meant here.

No, they don't use guns, but if you spend any time watching our closest primate cousins, the chimps, they sure do love their displays of domineering force and tribal violence, with throwing weapons like sticks and rocks even. So yes, the phrase makes perfect sense unless you're completely literal-minded about it.

If wealth is assets that produce income for me without doing anything, then, logically, either someone else is doing work for which I receive some portion of the income, or I am benefitting from inflating asset prices, which make it harder for others to purchase those assets. This is socially unproductive and I have no real interest in it.

Assets that produce income aren't acquired for free, so you are doing something (exchanging money for assets). That is absolutely productive.

Naval admitted this was a clickbait title. It should read “How to Get Wealth”, which he admits requires luck/timing.

One criticism I have of Naval is he thinks anyone can get wealth.

Overall his material is A+ for anyone with average intelligence.

I went through many of famous 'sayings'. I found them way too simplistic at best (so much so that they end up being completely useless). He says abstract things like "learn to sell, learn to build, if you can do both, you will be unstoppable". Oh really? Isn't it known to everyone? But how to do that, that is the hard part. I could have just said "learn to be like Steve Jobs, then you will be unstoppable" instead. Correct, but of no value.

Moreover, I very politely found out some logical flaws in some other comments of his on Twitter. I'm a nobody, he's the famous Naval. Just on that small thing he blocked me (no, I didn't use any rude words or bad language etc.)! I found it too shallow for a person of his stature.

What do you mean by "logical flaw" in these sort of motivational/inspiring-type quotes?

Two of his quotes that were logically inconsistent with each other. I forgot the exact ones and can't search them right now but that was it.

I agree. All the “advice” is describing what the end state looks like. How any one person achieves that end state is a complete mystery, and it’s not clear at all to me that knowing how the end state looks is useful for getting there. In fact, I would say it’s more often a detriment.

relevant: how to draw an owl http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/000/572/078/d6d...

Gold.

> Oh really? Isn't it known to everyone? But how to do that, that is the hard part.

100% agree. The only thing I think is meaningful, and its not specific to gaining wealth, is the part about becoming the person you want to be, about making your own luck. I'm not particularly wealth (yet?), but I think broadly in life, making your own success is something people don't do enough, at every level in life. You're not going to win the lottery without buying a ticket, and planning has better odds than the Powerball.

Specifically, I've noticed some people are always waiting. Waiting for the right moment, waiting for a sign, waiting for enough experience, waiting for an opportunity, waiting for something. For example, I have a good job. People want my job, and ask me how I got it. Yes, I have a good degree, and had prior good jobs, and did well, etc. But people with more experience and better degrees bring up how they wish they could have my job. They could! They're just waiting for one more successful project on their resume, or a less busy time to start interviewing, or a few more academic accolades, or whatever.

Many people I talk to about their career (friends, family etc, I'm not a coach) will tell me the exact steps they think they should take to be successful, and why it's the right steps, but few of them are taking those steps. My cousin is 35yo wants to be an artist, but she struggles to sell her art (understandable struggle, but IMO her art seems particularly monetize-able). I asked her how she might succeed, since she complained she wasn't satisfied, and she immediately listed off a bunch of things she could do (put art on pillows, create art for tourist souvenirs in her city, illustrate for books, etc). BUT she only tried one thing a few years prior, and it didn't work so she stopped while waiting for the right opportunity to try again. Would she succeed? IDK, art is hard to succeed in. But I know she won't succeed without trying again, and she probably shouldn't wait for an unsolicited email from Hallmark or MOMA to give her a big break.

> Specifically, I've noticed some people are always waiting. Waiting for the right moment, waiting for a sign, waiting for enough experience, waiting for an opportunity, waiting for something.

I think one reason for this is the fear of failure. If I say “in the future I’ll do X and be successful” then I can live in that fantasy: “I am successful - just not yet”. If I actually do X I know there’s a chance it might not succeed.

I completely agree with this perspective. Basically, they are procrastinating on their action to success. Just by thinking that they have a good plan, or once I have X -> I will do Y. But in the act of planning, they fail to act on the plan and live in their fantasy of I am good, but just don't have the right resources or the right time.

As much as planning is important to success, I also think, action is equally or more important. If one acts, one may fail, but they would also be closer to understanding why did they fail, and they can course correct. And if one repeats this enough time, I believe, long enough, one will eventually succeed.

I feel the 2 main things that paralyze or keep the people in fantasy world is 1. Fear of failure 2. Not knowing what they really want.

They want something, but they don't want it enough (or) the expectations of the society overpowers their own motivations / desires.

Yes, “learn to be unstoppable and you’ll be unstoppable” is a convenient tautology.

Survivorship bias is a hell of a drug. And people really look up to the survivors. Thing is most people can’t tell you they will be wealthy before they are :)

Nassim Taleb has something to say on this. The wealth is in the long tails, the Jobs, Gates, etc. If you take the mean income of all people running businesses, then it's probably less than the average worker.

I doubt that. Most businesses hire employees, and they pay them less than the owners pay themselves (as otherwise, what's the point of having a business?).

The point of having a business is a chance at the long tail

99% of business owners don't have a hope of hitting it big (at least I hope so, because they never will). It's just that, for them, being an owner of a small plumbing operation and making $200k off of it beats being a plumber in somebody else's operation and making $70k.

Just the status game being played by equating status with wealth? This parallels how Nietzsche's slave morality vilifies power, but this vilification is merely how the powerless and weak express their will to power.

Excellent advice on how to play the game best according to the rules*

* rules as in "rules for thee, not for me"

Despite all the criticism, this remains one of the best threads on Twitter so far.

There's a hilarious book by the same name by an actual (late) billionaire. It won't help you get rich unless you change your thinking and go with what works.

PS: I'm always sad that so many corporate employees are content with not attempting to do the work to get rich and put their futures and their family's future in the hands of capricious managers who will happily fire them and make it next to impossible for them to be rehired anywhere else if they're "too old". If you're not trying to get rich in meaningful ways, then someone else is getting rich off of you.

the implication is the only way to get rich is to exploit other people, and you could reason from that that the reason so few people try to get rich is that they would rather not get rich and not exploit people than get rich and exploit people.

What do you mean by "exploit"? Do you mean people shouldn't hire other people to help them in the company they want to start? Do you mean that there is a black market for slavery and people are buying other people in Istanbul or Madagascar or Iceland and making them work in their parent's basement for them for free and they keep them in chains? Does exploit mean that you try to sell your products to people and that they buy them and you get money from them, when you should give everything away for free, a la Richard Stallman? "Exploit" is a pretty vague word, what specifically do you mean by exploit? Because honestly, I have zero idea what you mean.

Exploit: Pay them (much) less than their work is worth. Because some of that money that comes from their work goes to other people that don't work (previously called slave owners, then feudal landlords, now called shareholders).

How do you know what someone's work is worth?

Also, if I should happen to save some money up, shouldn't I be able to invest is somewhere and get a return on it? Or is charging interest or getting a return on your money bad? Because if one gets interest or loans money to a corporation, and expects to get some kind of dividend at all, then that is using someone else's work for me to get money.

I'm not pro or con here, just trying to understand.

It doesn't matter how much is work worth. Their work generates some amount of money and some of that money goes goes to people that don't work. That is all.

In my opinion, investing and expecting returns (above bank deposit rate, which would be very low in normal, stable economy) is the bad and unfair thing in all this. It is unfair because it allows a person that has a lot of money to get even more money in a self-sustaining loop without work. I have nothing against being rich. Just don't get even more rich doing nothing.

So what do people do with the money they make? Just keep in in the bank with no interest? Put it in a shoe box?

Also, what about people who have so much money, like Jeff Bezos, that it doesn't matter if he gets interest because he has so much money he doesn't have to work.

Also, what about business owners - if they have employees, they can't just sit at home and watch movies all day? Or are you saying that they should be in their business working all day, and they have no options, they must work, just like a slave - not allowed to not work? Or if they don't work, then are you saying that they get their business taken away from them? And given to whom, if so? The employees? The government?

How would people get rich in your scenario? Is it only by working, like a surgeon who can charge $1 million per year, but still works? What about if someone sells info online but once he or she creates the information, people keep buying the info, but the person doesn't really work, except for the one time? Since he or she is not actively working, do 100% of the profits go to the government?

It's so confusing. Is there a book about this economic system that you are talking about?

> So what do people do with the money they make? Just keep in in the bank with no interest? Put it in a shoe box?

Any of these. Or buy stuff, just like 99% of people do with their money. Or give for charity. Or start a space program / rocket industry. It's their choice.

> Also, what about people who have so much money, like Jeff Bezos, that it doesn't matter if he gets interest because he has so much money he doesn't have to work.

So what? I'm not proposing to take their money away.

> Also, what about business owners - if they have employees, they can't just sit at home and watch movies all day?

You mean like a modern slave owner would do, if slavery was legal?

> Or are you saying that they should be in their business working all day, and they have no options, they must work, just like a slave - not allowed to not work?

No. Be in business, work all day for a number of years depending on how much successs they have, then sell the business, retire early and stay at home spending the money they got for selling the business. In a world where having money won't bring more money, I imagine a business won't be worth as much as it does in the current world, but they can still retire early.

> Or if they don't work, then are you saying that they get their business taken away from them?

No. Simply not get paid. It would be difficult to tell if a person actually works or not, I know.

> And given to whom, if so? The employees? The government?

Any proposition for improvements can be stretched into a horror dystopia by an extremist. Tere's far-left extermist dystopias and there's also far-right extremist dystopias.

> How would people get rich in your scenario? Is it only by working, like a surgeon who can charge $1 million per year, but still works?

Yes. Is that not fair? If you think it's not, create more medical scools. In ~5 years there will be more competition.

> What about if someone sells info online but once he or she creates the information, people keep buying the info, but the person doesn't really work, except for the one time?

To create information worth selling he/she would have to work (unpaid) for some time. Getting paid after seems very reasonable to me. And he/she won't get paid forever. Copyrights expire after a while.

> It's so confusing. Is there a book about this economic system that you are talking about?

I'm not aware of any.

----- Let me say it again: just having lots of money should not bring even more money.

"How to Get Rich" by Felix Dennis. A great and hilarious book. One lesson from the book is that, when starting out, he and other startups mutually helped each other out and grew their businesses together througout the years.

Why would I risk throwing away what wealth I have accumulated for a small chance of growing my wealth multiplicatively? I see your attitude a lot in friends I’ve made since college who are almost all from at least upper middle class families. It’s much easier to take risks when you have a wealth safety net.

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