How to make One Million Dollars a Year

When I began my career a mentor said that you should be making a salary equal to $1,000 times your age.  I graduated at the age of 24 and was content that my first job paid me $25,000. And within 5 years I was making much more then the $1 k times my age.  I realized quickly that the old rules didn’t apply anymore. Even now there are many people earning millions of dollars each year.  How do they do it? and more important how can you and I do it to?

Cost of Healthcare

Canadians have universal healthcare, yet we still need health insurance. The US health reform debate is all about the cost of healthcare. The truth of the matter is that the aging baby boomers will demand the same healthcare in the US that citizens in Canada now enjoy. Universal healthcare will soon be the rally cry of “grey power” activists. It doesn’t mean private insurance companies will disappear, they will still be needed to cover costs that are not part of government programs.

With this knowledge, you may ask why then are the republicans in the states against the health reform bill? Of course, it’s not true that the GOP is against health reform; you doubt this? then check out Newt Gingrich’s blog and organization to promote better quality medicaid and medicare. The truth is that if President Obama and the Democrats deliver on their promise of healthcare reform the Republicans will become irrelevant to this debate for the next election cycle. And all they can run on is the negative of health reform.

Don’t Save the Planet…save yourself

There still seems to be debate about climate change. I’ve been a greenie since the 70′s. Not a fanatic environmentalist, just a regular person seeing the damage the we have created and doing what I can to change. I riled against the large gas-guzzlers Detroit built even though my father worked in the auto industry. Going to school in Windsor it is hard not to have a “car mentality”. Still I recycled before cities started recycling collection and composted before municipalities provided compost bins.

It not easy living green. I installed a tank-less water heater to eliminated our wasteful hot-water tank. We added solar panels to generate green power. Both costly endeavours with little financial return, yet environmentally friendly. I’ve always felt it is the least I can do. Everyone can do their part but it is difficult for an individual to have global impact.

Solar Panels

Today the developing countries are resisting change to combat CO2 emissions. We want to save the Amazon Rainforest and the Congo in Africa, because these represent earth’s lungs cleaning our air. Yet, in North America we deforested the largest deciduous forests when we settled Canada and the US. In Europe deforestation began with the Romans. Industrialized 1st world counties want to slow China’s growth as an industrial power because it would contribute to fuel emission and fossil fuel usage. How can we ask these nations to do what we haven’t been able to do.

Polar ice caps melting

Melting polar ice caps are as indisputable as the depletion of the ozone layer in Antarctica. We reversed ozone depletion by reducing fluorocarbons. Melting ice-caps maybe irreversible. Ice is a reflective surface, open seas absorb sunlight. As ice melts less sunlight is reflected more is absorbed leading to more melting and the cycle continues. The cascading effect is nearly impossible to reverse once it begins on a large scale. And there is no denying that it has started. The longer we wait, the faster the process. The melting of the arctic ice will raise sea levels, affect weather world wide, causing erratic shifts in temperature, hurricanes, typhoons, flooding and droughts.

Change is difficult unless there is an immediate need. We have environment problems at a time of devastating economic crisis. Why not take advantage of this to make positive change. During the Great Depression the New Deal resulted in job creation through the building of large hydro-electric plants. During this current economic upheaval we can apply knowledge and labour to create a green economy. Building wind farms and solar generation is not enough. We also need to replace coal powered plants.

Nuclear Plants help reduce CO2 emmission

The only feasible way to generate the power that developing countries and western societies need wihtout harming the environment further is to replace coal powered plants with low emission nuclear plants. This would remove large CO2 and cut fossil fuel usage.

There is disagreement about the degree of climate change and whether we are experiencing global warming or a naturally ocurring hot-house affect. However, the human impact on the planet is undeniable. Governments should use the economic crisis as an oportunity to make real change in our envirnoment by building new infrastructure that is environmentally supportive, rather than technology that damages our environment.

Wealth is Health

This past week I attended a session titled “Health is Your Wealth”, a panel discussion about health promotion. Evidence has shown that the greatest determinate of health is wealth, so this topic interested me greatly. Wealthy individuals lead healthier and longer lives. So it makes sense that if you want to live longer and healthier you should seek wealth and be wealthy.

The question is how do we keep our society healthy? Perhaps the question needs to be; how do we ensure all citizens are wealthy? I believe we need to tackle poverty the same way we treat cancer and other chronic diseases. After all, we still don’t have a successful way to prevent these chronic diseases using medical interventions and procedures, why not use social methods? We could have better results in the long run.

More poor people are apt to get diabetes due to poor diet. Too much processed sugar, white bread and junk food is known to lead to pre-diabetic conditions and can make individuals obese and susceptible to type-2 diabetes. Healthy food costs more and therefore represents an inequity for lower income families trying to feed their children and stay healthy. To improve the diets of those susceptible to diabetes and prevent the future cost on the healthcare system you need to finance a healthy diet, provide better education and assist families to make healthy choices.

We must start early to improve the health outcomes of children and families. I come from an immigrant family. As children we knew more than our parents when it came to reading English and so our parents relied on us to read complex documents and contracts. Today many of the government materials are published in many languages which is better for new Canadians. Still it is the children of these new Canadians that are immersed in the new culture and need to be supported. With their new knowledge they can help with their parents’ immersion into the culture. Eliminating poverty could be the biggest health improvements of our diverse society.

Making wealth management and healthy living part of the educational curriculum and reducing poverty will benefit society with lower costs in the future. Families with the ability to pay for services that improve the health of their families who will be less of a burden later. This will eventually lower hospital costs due to mental health and chronic diseases. It is a matter of pay now or pay later. Except that pay later is a lot more costly.

Young people need to be taught the value of wealth and health to live a long and prosperous life. By starting early to educate and improve the perception of wealth and happiness we can improve our overall well being and create a healthy and wealthy society.

Rich and un-retired

Over the years I have meet a lot of ambitious young people striving to be rich and retire. They fall into several categories; ones that will read the latest “rich daddy” book or join some multi level marketing club, and those that have there “eyes on the prize” behaviour looking for the next big thing to invest or get them what they want. Look at the richest people in the world Bill Gates, Warren Buffet and others. Even when they acquire hundreds of millions they don’t quit their jobs and retire. Why?

Because, I believe the goal is not to “get rich”, the goal is to seek happiness. The wealth is only a result of the hard work and enjoyment of everyday life. If you love what you do and enjoy the work, you will be happy and wealthy. Whether you are a bus driver, welder, banker, tailor or spy; whatever gets you up in the morning and keeps you going forward, will bring you happiness will also bring you wealth.

There are two books that have shaped my views on wealth. The Richest Man in Babylon by George S. Clason was orginally written in 1926 before the Great Depression and has as much to teach us now as it did then. The second book is the Wealth Barber written by a fellow Canadian David Chilton. Both give sound wealth management advice that should be taught in grade school, but now seems to be beyond the grasp of some grad students. In a nutshell both these books give a person the tools to manage their money. They don’t preach or give a get rich quick approach. Following the advice wouldn’t make you a millionaire in a month or a year, they will make you think and help you to understand the correlation between wealth and happiness.