A job can be an important part of life, as it allows you to contribute to society and get paid for it—not to mention spending time with friends and family. However, if you want to achieve true wealth, having just a job is not enough; you have to also create value through your own products or services. This guide will help you understand why your job alone won't make you rich, and how you can begin generating your own wealth instead.
There's more to creating wealth than simply working
The job creation rate is the number of jobs created in a given period, usually one year, divided by the average population during that same time period. Generally, the measure tracks how many new jobs are created each year and looks at long-term trends to predict future job creation rates and help measure economic growth for countries. In other words, it tells us how many people are entering into employment each year.
Inflation eats away at wages over time
Wages are rising faster than inflation, but that doesn't mean workers are getting ahead. The job growth rate has slowed and the number of jobs lost to layoffs and automation has grown, so people without work see their standard of living decline over time because their wages have to stretch over a longer period of time as inflation continues to make prices rise faster than their income can keep up with. In many cases, young professionals looking for a better quality of life often have to move out of cities where the cost of living is high, meaning they might take on long commutes or side hustles like driving for Uber on nights and weekends in order to afford housing closer to where they work.
All about investing
Investing is about creating something for the future, for your retirement, or to build a passive income that pays on average 10% annually without any additional input from you.
The best way to do this is by opening up an IRA or Roth IRA and start investing $5-10,000 per year in a diverse portfolio of stocks, bonds, and index funds. You could also invest in equity crowdfunding companies where you can earn anywhere from 8-20% returns depending on how well your investments perform over the course of 12 months. I know what you're thinking – stocks go up and down all the time – but investing through equity crowdfunding allows you to invest in more startups than just publicly traded companies which helps reduce the risk of making risky investments into only one company's success or failure.
Job creation is something politicians, corporations, and entrepreneurs love to talk about. It's a topic that has so many advocates for job growth and change (especially with globalization) but at the same time there are still plenty of reasons not to rely on jobs as your sole form of income or wealth. Jobs will always be created in some capacity but it doesn't mean we should solely rely on them as sources of income or measure them in any way other than how they relate to the job market at the moment and the growth rate, which is likely not indicative of anything long-term because the job growth rates can fluctuate based on the economy. The less emotional you can be when it comes to discussing jobs then maybe you'll be able to make more sense out of this complex issue.
The Money Diary Method – How to track your investments
Since the financial crisis of 2008, Americans have been focused on job creation and unemployment. it easy to track your day-to-day spending habits—no matter how boring it sounds! My philosophy is that, in order to make more money and create wealth, you need to take stock of what you're already spending every day! It's pretty funny when you see how far a couple dollars can go when invested over time. It also gives me great satisfaction watching my net worth grow with every transaction.
Look for value
What happens when the job you loved so much one day becomes the very job that has taken you away from your loved ones? What happens when work became something to hate?
In America, unemployment rates are high, and over half of the nation's workforce has been displaced by technology or globalization. The answer is not to hope for more jobs but to change what jobs do. Rather than creating jobs out of thin air, we need more people who will seek out career paths with higher earning potential and value for society -- not just low paying work that lacks meaning in their lives.
Compare risks and rewards
If you invest in the market and make a profit, you might say that job creation helped your money grow. But that doesn't mean that investing is the same as having a job; investing requires more risk, discipline, and time than working does. Plus, if you don't know how to invest your money wisely, then it's unlikely that you'll ever become rich from job creation.
A job does not create wealth, but it does provide you with income to support yourself and a family during hard times. For some people, that is enough and many in my generation are finding themselves stuck in an endless cycle of bad jobs with no real opportunities for advancement or growth. The reason for this is that employers know there will always be someone available to fill the vacancy because of the low job creation index.
It's tough to avoid getting caught up in this cycle--especially if you don't have an emergency fund built up yet--but it's worth doing whatever you can to get yourself into a position where your work pays off at least somewhat proportionally to.
You're giving up a lot by staying in a job you don't love
People assume that by working a job, you're creating wealth and moving up the corporate ladder. This couldn't be farther from the truth as jobs are temporary and in constant flux, especially now with so many new technology-based startups coming out every day. Jobs won't give you a long-term future because they can be terminated at any moment which often creates job losses. On top of that, while your salary may seem high in the beginning, with taxation it may actually net out to $30k or less per year after all expenses have been factored in (i.e., car loan, groceries).
best chance at creating real long-term wealth
Job creation is often touted as the way to make our country's economy great again and while jobs are an important part of a healthy economy, they don't guarantee wealth-building opportunities or reduce poverty.
Job creation helps create an economy with more jobs and a better distribution of income and assets. But if you want to live the Dream, you'll need more than just a job to get ahead financially -- at least if that job is low paying and insecure, like most of the jobs in this country are. The only way for middle-class to get ahead these days is through wealth creation -- owning their own businesses or investing their hard-earned money so it can work for them rather than someone else
