Many people have the desire to acquire wealth and be successful in life. A few of those people who desire that success desire it to be an overnight deal. OK, not a few, but most of them. Who hasn’t wanted to cut corners and still make the grade? Who hasn’t wanted the shortcut to millions?
This might be a big desire amongst us college students in particular. We spend so much money on our education, the books and fees that come along with that and our living situations that it can be overwhelming to think about coming out the other side of college with a mound of debt on our hands. So naturally, a get-rich-quick plan might seem like an easy way to deal with all of this.
But can one actually get rich quick? Is it possible?
The quick answer is yes, but the long answer is probably not for you. In a recent article published on MSN.com, Bloomberg Businessweek presented ways to get rich practically overnight. Every way to do so was legitimate, no illegality to it — except there was one problem. Each way was so improbable, the author shouldn’t have even bothered to write the article.
At the top of the list was winning the lottery. Another was inheriting a large business, like Walmart. The more ridiculous examples include “Divorcing a Beatle,” and “Being born as royalty of a country.” I don’t know very many people married to Paul McCartney. Do you?
These things rely on astronomical luck, something that 99 percent of the population doesn’t have. The problem with these get rich quick plans is that they don’t happen to everyone; in reality, they happen to almost no one.
And as for the get-rich-quick schemes you see in infomercials, the ones that say, “Send me $20, and you’ll get a pamphlet that tells you how to make one million dollars,” those do work, actually.
They work for the people publishing the pamphlet! This was parodied on the Foxtrot comic by Bill Amend, where the pamphlet the main character received actually said, “Make pamphlet, sell to fifty thousand people for twenty dollars each.”
This is often the strategy used by these get-rich-quick guys. The pamphlets could be full of facts and information, but in reality, they could be empty — and it wouldn’t make a bit of difference.
As college students caught in the middle of a world trying to make a quick buck, we need to keep our feet on the ground. There is no such thing as an overnight millionaire.
Money and success will take work, and that’s why most of us are here to study. We are working hard so that we can ensure a financially sound future. Don’t forget that hard, smart work does pay off and that you don’t need piles and piles of money to be happy. Often, we are happiest knowing we truly earned what we worked for, not spinning the wheel for wealth.
Ian Everett is a literature freshman and may be reached at [email protected].
