Rich Dad, Middle Class Dad
Two Different Worlds
There was a meme before there were memes that went something like this.
I’m spending my child’s inheritance.
Bumper stickers were just beginning to be the rage at the time. Internet didn’t exist in homes. The Greatest Generation had morphed into the Silent Generation. America was experiencing a HUGE rise in the standard of living from those who went to college on the GI Bill. The biggest housing boom of all times was flourishing.
A middle class was finally firmly planted amidst the evolving culture and the American Dream was coveted.
Alas, people squandered that beautiful era as humans are apt to do. If you give them cake, apparently, they’ll eat until they’re fat. Why? Because they want to be rich.
We’re all infatuated with the rich.
I’ve always been perplexed by the sheer number of people that have kids, sometimes lots of kids, without a means to support them. Forget about a realistic plan to leave them an inheritance. The gold standard for parenthood hasn’t evolved at the same speed as our technological standards. Not a lot of planning goes into this undertaking.
I gave you life, fed you, and clothed you.
That’s another great meme from bygone days that persists. It’s built entirely on the premise that life’s a gift not an accident without a road map and that everyone should be grateful to be alive even if they suffer.
It’s also grounded in the belief that a parent has accomplished something great if after a kid is born, they feed them and clothe them until they’re old enough to get a job of their own.
Gee, thanks mom and dad, but I thought that was what you were supposed to do since I couldn’t earn money when I was three.
Then, there was the expansion of consumerism. Suddenly, our new economy was dependent upon the middle class going deeply in debt to live like they were rich in order to make the rich richer.
Less and less people were saving money and more and more people were living above their means.
Yet, the middle class continued to tout the lifestyles of the rich even while spending their child’s inheritance. Oh, goody, mom and dad are living it up, as they should. That’s their money after all. If you want to have what mom and dad have, you’ll need to build your wealth starting the day you graduate from high school.
Now get out of the house and prove yourself.
Sigh …
We wanted to be the rich, but most people never became the rich. They spent most of their working lives carrying debt. Saving money got harder and harder. They’re biggest asset was that they owned a home by the time they died, finally no more mortgage payments. But even that trend is on the decline as more and more retirees are going into retirement with a hefty mortgage.
I’ve often said that middle-class parents are the toughest parents to please.
They can be hard on their offspring. Unwilling to sacrifice frivolous pursuits to save money, they struggle to balance their own desires for rewards with the responsibility to save. They believe in tough measures when it comes to their own kids but completely overlook how the rich generally treat their offspring.
In fact, they glorify the rich even though most rich people are not self-made. A few are, of course, but many either inherit money or their parents invest in their lives while they’re alive or both.
It’s common knowledge that rich kids get admitted to elite universities whether they’re stellar students or not.
Their parents see to that. If your grandfather has a building on campus named after him, chances are you’ll get admitted over someone who has no parental support even if they’re a lot smarter than you.
The rich build legacies.
They have power and they use it to help their kids succeed. Trust me, the average rich kid does not go into the helping professions. That’s not where their parents see them headed. They don’t become nurses, or doctors, or teachers and dedicate their lives to serving Americans. They don’t tend to join the military either. Middle class kids grow up to train for these professions, often incurring loads of debt in the process because their parents can’t pay today’s enormous college bills.
Yet middle-class kids are told to get out there and make their way without a dime in their pocket.
If a rich family produces a budding entrepreneur, then they don’t expect their kid to join Indiegogo, a crowdsourcing website seeking donations and support for innovative ideas. Nope! Rich dad gives his son a chunk of the family money so he can chase his dreams.
Middle-class kids must raise the money while developing the idea and running the risk of losing everything if it fails.
Their parents may or may not even stand on the sideline clapping their hands, because they often fear new ideas. They certainly don’t have money to invest in bringing the dream to fruition.
Yet, they drool over the rich tycoon’s son who makes big claims that he built an empire all on his own.
They don’t even recognize the lie. Instead, they promote a great big fat American lie that anyone who works hard enough can make it. They manage to convince themselves that they’ve made it because they earn enough to borrow money to portray a successful lifestyle. The emperor has no clothes but everyone is afraid to admit it.
By the way, did I mention that it also helps to know the right people?
Trust me, these rich parents aren’t introducing their children to people like you and me. They know the chancellor of the university, key real estate people, the mayor, governor, and a long list of wealthy influencers. They travel in tight circles where favors are granted and favors returned. It’s a win/win situation for everybody involved. Too bad the middle class beat down their kids rather than lift them up, isn’t it?
And what about when middle-class children become old people themselves?
Well, some of them learned a thing or two along the way. They have smaller families and try to reign in their spending habits during boom times. Most, however, carry the ridiculously high standards for their own kids that their parents had for them.
They still want to be rich, but they are often deeply in debt like their parents.
Maybe you haven’t noticed, but the rich view wealth differently. They want to be remembered. So, they consider their wealth to be family wealth not just their personal bag of change. They want their kids to continue their legacy and inherit their mansions. They want their children’s names to replace their names in the board rooms. They expect them to marry well.
The children are carrying on the family name. They’re keeping the memories of old dad alive in the community.
Now, if only I’d had that kind of support where might I be today? Right? It’s a shame the middle class isn’t very good at banding together. There is a surprising lack of unity even though we outnumber the rich. At least for the time being we do.
The middle class is dwindling but why wouldn’t it be. Most propaganda is aimed at the middle class.
The middle class takes care of everybody. Either our sons and daughters grow up to become doctors, dentists, teachers, and nurses or our taxes go to help the community thrive. We can’t hide behind the castle walls. We’re out there every day working and struggling to do our part.
Like the rich, we should be fighting harder for our kids.
We should be pushing to have free college or encouraging our kids to live at home while attending community college. Middle class parents should be saving money instead of propping up the consumer economy with frivolous spending. We should be fighting for unions and affordable health care for our kids.
We should be paying off our houses and living well below our means to save money rather than taking on more and more debt.
We should be marrying later in life and having fewer if any children these days. We need to understand that feeding and clothing a kid isn’t really an accomplishment. It’s the bare minimum duty.
There’s so much more we can do.
We must prepare our kids for responsibility not by shoving them out of the house as soon as they turn eighteen and allowing them to sink or swim. We need to give them lots of good information, sex education, birth control, and discussions about money and debt.
We can help them make plans for their lives long before they have children of their own.
Oh, and by the way, middle class kids can’t afford to make big mistakes like rich kids. There’s no money for recovery. If they have a baby before their truly prepared, it dramatically sets them back. If they drop out of college, chances are they’ll never be able to return.
Rich kids have much greater leeway. Their parents can help them recover from one business venture after another until they get it right.
One last thing. The middle-class American culture of kicking your kid out of the house as soon as possible is not the way most cultures view their offspring. It’s a very middle-class American expectation for young people. Many countries see the family unit as a tiny subculture where everyone contributes to the well-being of the family. If that means they live with one another, so be it. That’s what families do.
We don’t need to leave everything up to chance.
We can be better role models. If the middle class would join forces and unite for the sake of their children’s future, we could accomplish a lot.
Forget the double standards that are entrenched in our culture.
One for the rich and another for the middle class. Screw the rich. Our kids need middle-class parents with rich parents’ sense of responsibility to their own offspring. We need to view our wealth as family wealth and build on it from one generation to the next.
If we insist on having children, then we need to accept that it’s a lifelong job to support them in any way possible.
Teresa is a retired educator, author, world traveler, and professional muth buster. You can find her books on Amazon.
