The Middle Class Is Bullshit
I don’t care what your parents, your teachers or the media told you while you were growing up. I’m going to give it to you straight: The middle class is no longer a safe haven or the desirable destination it once was. The middle class of the 21st century should be avoided like a death sentence.
In fact, the middle class is a bullsh*t myth. Politicians, the media and your educators refuse to tell you the truth about the middle class because they know you would revolt in the streets.
You don’t have to look very far to see people barely making it, suffering and hopeless. If you need facts beyond simply observing your surroundings, consider that in the wealthiest country in the world, 76 percent of all Americans live paycheck-to-paycheck and 29 percent of all workers have less than $1000 saved.
The median income in America has come down from $56,000 to $51,000 over the last 15 years. Graduates of the class of 2014 are the most indebted class ever.
Every week, I get calls, tweets and emails from people who are concerned about their financial futures. People tell me, “I did everything they told me to do; I went to college, invested in my 401(k), bought a home and I can still barely make ends meet.”
Millions graduate from college with huge debts, unable to land the jobs they studied to get, and some are forced to move back in with their parents.
The middle class is failing in this country because its basic premise is built on bullsh*t; it’s a lie. Regardless of your actual finances, you are considered middle class when you have a job, education, a home you never own, two cars, a smartphone and computer, and you work 35 hours a week with one vacation per year.
So, you may very well be broke, but you are still considered middle class. How crazy is that? The middle class is basically an acknowledgment that you have made it when you haven’t at all. Most can’t handle the truth, but here it is:
- You are either rich or you are poor.
- A 40-hour workweek is for slaves; you’ll work double that for freedom.
- Life isn’t fair and economies are even less so.
- Success will not depend on your education, but on your actions.
- The world doesn’t care if you succeed or fail.
- You’re owed nothing, deserve nothing and are entitled to nothing.
- You will have to learn how to sell, no matter how much you hate it.
- You won’t get what you deserve. You’ll get what you negotiate.
- You don’t get paid to do what you love; you get paid to do what others won’t.
- You will be underpaid for most of your career, until you aren’t, and then you will be paid so much you’ll know it was all worth it.
The first step to claiming financial freedom is to understand the truth. You need money and you need a lot of it. If you think “money isn’t everything,” or “not everything is about money,” you are under the spell of the middle class.
Poor people don’t talk about money as though it’s not important — the middle class does. Regardless of your purpose or mission in life, you need money, and the more philanthropic your mission, the more money you will need.
To make real progress in any area of life, you have to know the truth about where you are. Don’t get seduced into settling for some classification when the reality is the middle class earns too little, saves almost nothing and will live longer than their money.
The truth will set you free and lies keep you trapped. This is why the middle class is failing. It is based on lies, not truths. Take any situation, and when you correctly label it for what it really is, you will start to see solutions.
Get out of the middle class! Run as fast as you can and don’t stop until your financial situation no longer needs to be classified to make you feel good.
