Stanley wrote this book after extensive study of the American wealthy. At first, he thought he would be studying America’s upper class, but starting with his very first set of interviews, he realized that the truly wealthy do not live the lifestyle that one might imagine. This book works its way through many aspects of the lifestyle of the wealthy and contrasts it with the lifestyle of the high consumer. Private schools, car shopping, inheritance, neighborhoods, and marriage are all discussed. Everything is backed by data and/or interesting anecdotes.

Where I found it:
It is a little silly how long it took me to get around to this book. I became an avid consumer of everything financial literature in 2016, yet here I am in 2019, finally reading the book that so many have been shaped by. I found it while browsing the “for purchase” section of my local library and picked up the hardback book for $1.

My takeaways:
Stanley makes an interesting point about how people acquire wealth. He uses a formula as a ballpark estimator of how much wealth people usually have in life based on age and current income. Age x income x 10% = how much an average person would have accumulated. For example, if I were 30 and made $100,000 annually, I should have $300,000 in assets (30*$100,000*0.1). If I have twice that amount, than I am a “Prodigious accumulator of wealth” or PAW. If I have half, than I am an “Under Accumulator of Wealth” or UAW. Using this method, it is much easier to see who has learned to grow wealth. Of course, there are some major flaws. For example, if someone lost their job and had to settle for a lower salary, they would look very good on this continuum when compared to someone who just got promoted to a fat salary.

I was surprised by some of the stories in this book. I expected the usual, earn a good salary, but live like you don’t. This book portrayed something more extreme. It had horror stories about how assistance from rich parents trapped their children in a desperate lifestyle. It had a boss gently refuse his employee’s gift of a custom Rolls Royce because it would only cause him expenses and he couldn’t throw his fish in the backseat. This book boils all finances into two very simple statements: do what makes your net worth grow and teach your kids to stand on their own.

Recommendations:
I’m not going to lie. Much of this book is tedious. There’s lots of tables of data and lots of redundant points. My impression was that it read like someone’s research report, but they stuck a bunch of stories in it to make it into a proper book. There were nuggets on most pages, but the read felt tedious, and that's coming from a numbers person.

I recommend this book to someone who is ready to start taking a big picture look at their net worth and see if they are growing it properly. I recommend this book to someone who is wealthy or a high income earner and is thinking about how to support their children. I recommend this book to people whose dream is to buy a status item such as a Ferrari. You’re going to have to be committed to reading though or you’ll have a hard time getting through it.

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