The Millionaire Next Door: The Surprising Secrets of America's Wealthy

by Thomas J. Stanley, Ph.D. and William D. Danko, Ph.D.
Hennepin County Library hardcover 258 pages
genre: non-fiction sociology

This book was referenced in a number of different places and I'm glad I read it. My two biggest take-aways (personally) were to live below my means and I just don't care that much about wealth. Yep. My personal takeaways.

On page 22,  the table "The top fifteen economically productive small population ancestry groups" lists people groups from primarily Caucasian countries. Perhaps it's because people from African and South American countries are larger population groups in the U.S.? Or because these people have not been able to attain great wealth?

Page 24 really caught my eye! "They are the opposite of their father, the blue-collar, successful business owner. His children have become Americanized. They are part of the high-consuming, employment-postponing generation. How many generations does it take for an ancestry group that today contains thousands of Victors to become Americanized? Only a few. Most move into the 'American normal' range within one or two generations. This is why America needs a constant flow of immigrants with the courage and tenacity of Victor. These immigrants and their immediate offspring are constantly needed to replace the Victors of America." And these authors are pretty conservative! I wonder what they think of Trump's isolationist policies . . .

I love how the parts on children of wealthy parents differentiate by career. As wealthy parents give financial gifts to their children, many just waste that money! (Easy come, easy go.) "In spite of having lower incomes than nonreceivers, gift receivers who are high school / elementary school teachers have higher net worths than nonreceivers." Yep. Because teachers know how to scrimp!

There are actually a lot of really interesting observations they have made from their research into millionaires. Despite what we see from Hollywood, there are only a very small percentage of the ultra-wealthy with the high lifestyle. Most millionaires are self-made through entrepreneurial efforts. They generally buy used cars and keep them several years, work very hard, and live below their means so they can amass wealth.

At many points in this book, I thought, "But I just don't care that much about money!" Life is short and precious and I want to store up treasures in Heaven. Eternity is more important than stuff.

Page 219 had some really interesting things to say about immigration law . . . and this was published in 1996. It would be very interesting to see a revised book. Stanley has died (his daughter wrote the forward on this 2010 publication).  If they were able to replicate the research, would their findings be the same? What about all the dot-com entrepreneurs? I think it's interesting to see that Bill and Melinda Gates do not plan to just hand their wealth to their children. This book really has a lot of sad observations about the generational impact of wealth. It's easy to spend someone else's money . . .