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Why the Richest People in the World Want Low Income and High Expenses
Written by Robert Kiyosaki | Tuesday, January 15, 2019
Read time: 4 min

Taxing the Rich Will Never Work for the Government

An in ux of new, far-left congress men and women took their oaths of o ce just a couple weeks ago, and many are
already making waves. But none more so than the young and social media-savvy Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Ocasio-Cortez, who is a self-described “radical” has grand plans to change the country through what she labels as the
“Green New Deal,” which Fox News describes (https://www.foxnews.com/politics/what-is-the-green-new-deal-a-look-at-
the-economic-and-climate-concept-pushed-by-progressives), “The Green New Deal is an economic stimulus concept
designed to tackle income inequality and climate change. It’s modeled after President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal
package of public works programs and projects created to help the economy during the Great Depression.”

To help fund this Green New Deal, Ocasio-Cortez of course needs a log of green-backs, so she’s proposing some radical
changes to the tax code in order to fund it. As Politico reports (https://www.foxnews.com/politics/what-is-the-green-new-
deal-a-look-at-the-economic-and-climate-concept-pushed-by-progressives), she “is oating an income tax rate as high as
60 to 70 percent on the highest-earning Americans to combat carbon emissions.”

How much would taxing the super wealthy raise?

There is a lot of opinion out there about how much this radical change to the tax code would raise. “The Washington
Post,” shares three possible scenarios:

1. $720 billion over a decade by doubling taxes on people making over $10 million per year
2. $3 trillion over a decade by instituting a wealth tax of 1.5 percent on the wealthiest 1% of Americans
3. $3 trillion over a decade by doubling the income tax on the wealthiest 1%

As the Post points out, each of these has a lot of assumptions behind them that most likely in ate the numbers. And the
reality is that if any were to be put in effect, no doubt the riches people in the country would nd new ways to protect their
money from such taxes.

The rich don’t “make” a lot of money

Perhaps the naivest thing behind the idea of funding something like the “Green New Deal” through taxes is that it is a
proposal that simply doesn’t understand how the rich think about money. Speci cally, those who are rich and have a high
nancial intelligence do everything they can to make sure they have low income and high expenses. In short, they don’t
“make” a lot of money compared to their overall wealth, and they don’t keep their wealth in their name but rather keep it
distributed in trusts and entities like LLCs.

For most people, the idea of a high income is a good thing. For the rich, it is bad. For most people, the idea of low
expenses is a good thing. For the rich, again, it is bad. In fact, it’s only the nancially unintelligent who think that “making a
lot of money” in the form of earned income is a good thing. These are usually high paid employees like C-suite holders.
They may seem rich, but they think like the poor.

As rich dad said, “Money is just an idea.”

Once you understand the idea that low income and high expenses are good, you will understand one of the most pivotal
realities of this idea called money. Not understanding this fundamental concept is why many rich people go broke.

How money really works

As I’ve studied the idea of money throughout my life, I discovered the 90/10 rule: 90 percent of people earn 10 percent of
the money in the world. How do they do this? By positioning themselves to have low income and high expenses. These, of
course, are the same 10% that Ocasio-Cortez thinks she can increase taxes on and fund her political plans.

If you do not understand money or how it works, it will seem like a strange statement that the ultra-rich position
themselves to have low income and high expenses.

You may be asking the question, “How can low income and high expenses make you rich?” The answer is found in how
the sophisticated investor utilizes the tax and corporate laws to bring those expenses back into the income column of
their nancial statement.

The nancial statement of a rich person

For example, this is a diagram of what a sophisticated investor is working to do:
When you start to understand what is happening in this diagram, you will begin to see a world of greater and greater
nancial abundance.
Essentially, what this diagram shows is that the rich use their income to purchase assets (and expense) that then create
more income for them in the form of cash ow. The reason for this is that the income these assets create is not earned
income but rather passive income, the lowest taxed income. Additionally, these assets can be kept in entities that provide
substantial tax bene ts. In short, though they may be very rich, they do not have high income like a high-paid employee
will.

The nancial statement of a poor person

Compare the above diagram with that of the traditional way of thinking about the idea of money:
This is the nancial diagram of most of the world’s population. In other words, the money comes in the income column
and goes out the expense column. It never comes back. That is why so many people try to create a budget to live below
their means, to save money, be frugal, and cut back on expenses.

This is why most people will say, “My house is an asset,” even though the money goes out the expense column and does
not return, at least not immediately. It also explains why people say, “I’m losing money each month, but the government
gives me a tax break to lose money.” They say that rather than, “I’m making money on my investment, and the government
gives me a tax break to make money.”

Seeing the other side of the coin

Rich dad said, “One of the most important controls you can have is found in this question: What percentage of the money
going out your expense column winds up back in your income column in the same month?”

By understanding the side of the coin that rich dad was speaking from, I saw a completely different world that most
people who work hard, earn a lot of money, and keep their expenses down never see. I could see a world of ever-
increasing wealth rather than one of diminishing returns.

Today, ask yourself the same question. What percentage of your wealth goes from your expense column back to your
income column in the same month?

If you can understand how this is done, you too will nd a world of ever-increasing wealth.

If you can’t see this, nd someone you trust and discuss how it might be possible. You can start by talking about a post I
wrote a few years ago, “4 Tips on Budgeting to Become Rich (/Resources/Rich-Dad-Financial-Education-Blog/June-
2012/4-Tips-on-Budgeting-to-Become-Rich.aspx)”.

Once you crack the code, you will move from a world of “not enough money” to one of “too much money.” And your life
will never be the same again.
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