Who's Rich?

The guy who's rich has quite a story to tell.  He's likely been through many years of blood, sweat and tears.  He's been through hell.  You've experienced this yourself to one degree or another.  You've accomplished a lot but not without your share of challenges.

The way money is made is:  some guy has an idea.  But instead of sitting around dreaming about it, he springs into action and makes it happen.  After years of toil and pain and failure and trial and error, he "suddenly" finds himself with a service or product so great, so in demand, he needs help getting it to everyone who wants it.  So, he has to hire people to help him.  He then becomes "rich" or, to be more accurate, richer, since everything is relative.

At this point, the phrase the rest of us, whether rich or poor, ought to be searching for is, "thank you."  Thanks for the great service or product. Thanks for the job.  Instead, we denigrate and enslave him.

The thing he's done isn't easy to do, as each of us knows well, based on our own attempts at success.  We have so much more in common with "the rich" than we have to fear from them or than we have reason to knock them down a peg or two.  For one thing, we share a desire for, and are engaged in diligent effort for the kind of success we see them realizing.  To hurt them is to hurt our own chances at success.

A great example of this is Hank Reardon, a character in Ayn Rand's book, "Atlas Shrugged."  Hank started at a tender age, working in mines and mills.  He worked his way up and eventually owned his own mills and mines.  Not all of us have his energy and ambition, but why should we jealously try and hamper his progress?  Anyway, he worked for ten years, trying to invent an alloy better and cheaper than steel.  After ten years, he finally did it!  And yes, he was rich.  Eventually, the government took his metal away from him.  That's why it's called Atlas Shrugged.  Hank is one Atlas, with the weight of the world  resting on his shoulders.  His metal is extremely useful and valuable to everyone.  But he didn't do it for everyone else.  He did it for the joy of accomplishment; because he wanted to show himself he could.  Profit, too, is a motive; but more-so, he just enjoyed shaping the elements of the earth to his will, he loved making something wonderful, of expressing the keen agility of his mind.  His riches extend far beyond just dollars.