To be honest, like all of you, I used to be confused by questions like “how to accumulate wealth” for a long time. That was until I came across a “magic formula” about “how to become a billionaire” not long ago, and today I want to share this idea with you.
This “magic formula” makes an assumption: if a young person starts saving a fixed 14,000 yuan every year from now, with an average annual interest rate of 5%, after 40 years of persistence, the wealth he can accumulate is simply calculated as 14,000 yuan × (1 + 5%) × 40 = 1.69 million yuan. But if he changes his approach—investing all the money he should save each year in the stock or real estate market, assuming an average annual return on investment of 20%, how much wealth will he have after 40 years? Most people might guess it’s between 2 million and 8 million yuan. However, according to the “magic formula” for annuity calculation in finance, the answer is 102.81 million yuan! The specific calculation method is 14,000 yuan × (1 + 20%) × 40 = 102.81 million yuan. Comparing this figure with the return from fixed deposits with an annual interest rate of 5%, you’ll find that the gap between the two is as high as more than 70 times, which is astonishing.
Nevertheless, although this “magic formula” sounds tempting—for example, a 25-year-old office worker who invests in this way could become a billionaire by the time he retires at 65—it’s hard to imagine a scenario where “billionaires are everywhere in the world” in reality. After all, over the long 40 years, too many unforeseen changes will occur, and few people can persist in this way without interruption.
Obviously, the true value of the “magic formula” is not to teach people to “get rich quickly”, but to convey a core concept: there are no complicated skills in financial management; the key lies in developing correct habits and thinking. Those who get rich through financial management have just persisted in things that most people are unwilling to try or find hard to do—that is, improving their ability to manage investments and finances. In this way, there is a “basic answer” to the “wealth gap” problem that troubles many people: how much wealth a person can accumulate in a lifetime does not depend on how much he earns, nor is it just about “increasing income and reducing expenditure”; the more crucial factor is how to make wealth appreciate through financial management. This is the core logic of getting rich.
Master the Philosophy of Rising from Poverty to Wealth and Join the Ranks of the Rich
Do you consider yourself a “poor person”? If so, have you ever thought about changing your current situation, starting to accumulate wealth now, and joining the ranks of the rich? The following financial philosophies may bring you inspiration.
A. Turn Living Expenses into “the First Sum of Capital”
There were two people, each with 100 yuan: one used it to buy 50 pairs of slippers and sold them at a stall for 3 yuan per pair, finally earning 150 yuan—this 100 yuan realized value appreciation through operation and became “capital”; the other, due to poverty, spent the 100 yuan monthly living subsidy entirely on rice, cooking oil, and salt—this 100 yuan remained “living expenses” and saw no improvement in value.
The dilemma of poor people often lies in this: it is difficult for their money to turn from “living expenses” into “capital”, and they even lack “capital awareness” as well as the experience and skills to manage capital. In the end, they fall into a cycle of “the poorer you are, the harder it is to accumulate capital; the harder it is to accumulate capital, the poorer you become”.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: The desire for wealth is an important driving force in life. Only when you truly desire wealth and can enjoy the pleasure of making money in the investment process can you possibly turn living expenses into “the first sum of capital”; at the same time, accumulating capital awareness and management skills in this process makes it possible to finally achieve a breakthrough in wealth.
B. For Those Starting from Scratch, the Hardest Part Is the First Few Years
The experience of Zuckerberg, one of the richest post-80s people in the world, also confirms the rule that “the start is the hardest”. In fact, the biggest challenge for poor people to rise up and become rich is in the first few years. There is a “wealth law” in the field of financial wisdom: for people who start from scratch, it may take 10 years to earn the first 1 million yuan; but accumulating from 1 million yuan to 10 million yuan may only take 5 years; and then from 10 million yuan to 100 million yuan, it may take only 3 years.
The logic behind this law is: when you have the experience and start-up capital accumulated in the early stage, it is like a car that has already started and accelerated; you just need to step on the accelerator gently, and the car will move forward rapidly. The first 5 years may be the hardest “climbing period”, but after getting through it, you will find that financial management becomes more and more enjoyable, and wealth accumulation becomes easier and easier.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: Poor people not only lack capital, but more sadly, they lack “capital awareness”—they don’t know how to make money generate money, nor do they have the experience to manage capital. If money is always just “living expenses for spending” rather than “capital for appreciation”, it will be difficult to get out of the circle of poverty.
C. The Most Precious Resource of Poor People Is Their “Brain”
The difference in intelligence and physical strength between people is far less than imagined. Most people can do the same thing, but the final effect varies, and it is often details and ways of thinking that determine the quality.
For example, if a talented but arrogant employee is not appreciated by his boss, it is too one-sided to attribute the reason only to “not knowing how to curry favor with the leader”—what the boss values more is the value that the employee can create; another example, if you quarrel with the staff when applying for a business license for the first time, it is hard to imagine that the small shop you open will ever grow bigger with such a mindset, let alone investment and entrepreneurship—even daily financial management will be difficult to do well.
In essence, many investments are a “bet on the future”, betting that future returns will cover current investments. However, investment is extremely risky, and once money is invested, it is no longer fully under your control.
As a disadvantaged group, poor people often can’t even fully control their own lives, let alone influence others or the situation. What they lack in investment is not just money, but also the courage to act, the wisdom to think, and the awareness to take the initiative in financial management.
So, what is the most precious resource of poor people? It is not the limited savings, nor a strong body, but the “brain”. In the past, we said that “thoughts are a precious spiritual wealth”, but in the current era, thoughts are not only spiritual wealth, but can also be transformed into tangible material wealth—a good idea may give birth to a new industry, or completely change a business model.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: The most essential difference between people is not appearance or physical strength, but what is in their brains—whether it is business knowledge, financial thinking, or cognition of “capital appreciation”.
D. Investing in One’s Own Abilities Is the Most Fundamental Investment
A great person once said that the value of a person does not lie in how much he takes from society, but in how much he contributes. Corresponding to wealth accumulation, the core of “distribution according to work” is not “distribution according to working hours”, but “distribution according to the value created by labor”. As long as you are willing, the stronger your ability and the more value you create, the more likely you are to obtain a high income. The key to “more pay for more work” lies in “quality” rather than “quantity”. For poor people, the most fundamental investment is to improve their own abilities.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: When it comes to “capitalists”, many poor people may associate them with “exploiting surplus value” and thus feel resistance. But in fact, the capital market is open to everyone—as long as you have the ability and thinking, you can also become a “person who makes capital work for yourself”, and there are opportunities for you in this field.
E. Education Is the “Long-Term Investment” with the Highest Cost-Effectiveness
Academic qualifications are only a “proof of completing basic education”. What is learned in school is mostly comprehensive basic knowledge, and people need “continuous learning” throughout their lives. According to reports, in 2003, the average annual income of people with a bachelor’s degree or above in Jiangsu Province exceeded 110,000 yuan, while that of people with a primary school education was only 3,708 yuan, a gap of nearly 30 times. The disparity in economic income has long led to “class differences” in real life. In today’s society, to live a relatively decent life, a high academic qualification is often a “basic threshold”.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: For many poor people, education is the most important investment to change their destiny—their life path is often highly related to their level of education. Poverty itself is not a fault, but the limitations brought by poverty need to be broken through through education.
F. Don’t Use “Luck” as an Excuse for Poverty
We have heard many stories about “getting rich through capital”: for example, an elderly American woman bought 100 shares of Coca-Cola stock and became a multimillionaire after holding them for decades; an elderly Chinese woman held the original shares of Shenzhen Development Bank for 10 years and also became a super wealthy woman. The protagonists of these stories seem “simple-minded”, but they “easily picked up a golden opportunity”.
Theoretically speaking, the investments of these two elderly women were indeed successful, but for most people, such cases have almost no “replicability”. The reason why they could persist in “long-term stock holding” was not based on rational analysis or firm confidence, but more on “unintentional forgetting” or pure “luck”. Many poor people are used to attributing their failures to “bad luck”—because “luck” is the safest excuse, which can justify their inaction. But in fact, “bad luck” is just a “psychological comfort” for losers.
G. “Knowledge Capital” Must Align with “Financial Capital” to Achieve a Breakthrough
There is a story about a king who wanted to thank a minister and asked him to make a request. The minister said, “I just want 1 grain of rice in the first grid of the chessboard, 2 grains in the second grid, 4 grains in the third grid, 8 grains in the fourth grid, and so on, until all 64 grids are filled.” The king thought the request was too trivial and immediately agreed. But soon, the chessboard couldn’t hold the rice, so they switched to sacks; the sacks couldn’t hold it either, so they used carts; finally, the granaries were empty, countless people who counted the rice collapsed from exhaustion, but the grids were like a bottomless pit—the king finally realized he had been tricked and would end up as a poor man with not a single grain of rice left. This story tells us: even if the initial base is very small, as long as it grows at a “geometric rate”, the final result will be extremely amazing.
The path of development for poor people is difficult at the start, and even more difficult to persist in. The initial “a few grains of rice” may make people feel “hopeless”, but success often depends on the “last step”. When the base accumulates to a certain extent, you only need to “jump one grid” to achieve a qualitative breakthrough. All efforts before that are “foreshadowing”—without the first grain of rice, there would be no subsequent carts or granaries. This process is long and difficult, but the reality is: there are many smart people, and there are also countless people with knowledge, but very few can truly make a fortune. The reason is: to turn “knowledge” into “knowledge capital that can make money”, it must be combined with “financial capital”.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: The rich make money from financial capital, while poor people can get rich through “knowledge capital”—transforming knowledge into “capital that can create value” and starting from scratch to build a career. This may be the most brilliant path for contemporary poor people to rise. Unfortunately, people at the bottom often lack “the vision to overlook the overall situation” and “the confidence to believe in themselves”, and this confidence is precisely the key to breaking through poverty.
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From Saving to Investing: The Long-Term Power of Compounding
2025-09-02T15:11:42
To be honest, like all of you, I used to be confused by questions like “how to accumulate wealth” for a long time. That was until I came across a “magic formula” about “how to become a billionaire” not long ago, and today I want to share this idea with you.
This “magic formula” makes an assumption: if a young person starts saving a fixed 14,000 yuan every year from now, with an average annual interest rate of 5%, after 40 years of persistence, the wealth he can accumulate is simply calculated as 14,000 yuan × (1 + 5%) × 40 = 1.69 million yuan. But if he changes his approach—investing all the money he should save each year in the stock or real estate market, assuming an average annual return on investment of 20%, how much wealth will he have after 40 years? Most people might guess it’s between 2 million and 8 million yuan. However, according to the “magic formula” for annuity calculation in finance, the answer is 102.81 million yuan! The specific calculation method is 14,000 yuan × (1 + 20%) × 40 = 102.81 million yuan. Comparing this figure with the return from fixed deposits with an annual interest rate of 5%, you’ll find that the gap between the two is as high as more than 70 times, which is astonishing.
Nevertheless, although this “magic formula” sounds tempting—for example, a 25-year-old office worker who invests in this way could become a billionaire by the time he retires at 65—it’s hard to imagine a scenario where “billionaires are everywhere in the world” in reality. After all, over the long 40 years, too many unforeseen changes will occur, and few people can persist in this way without interruption.
Obviously, the true value of the “magic formula” is not to teach people to “get rich quickly”, but to convey a core concept: there are no complicated skills in financial management; the key lies in developing correct habits and thinking. Those who get rich through financial management have just persisted in things that most people are unwilling to try or find hard to do—that is, improving their ability to manage investments and finances. In this way, there is a “basic answer” to the “wealth gap” problem that troubles many people: how much wealth a person can accumulate in a lifetime does not depend on how much he earns, nor is it just about “increasing income and reducing expenditure”; the more crucial factor is how to make wealth appreciate through financial management. This is the core logic of getting rich.
Master the Philosophy of Rising from Poverty to Wealth and Join the Ranks of the Rich
Do you consider yourself a “poor person”? If so, have you ever thought about changing your current situation, starting to accumulate wealth now, and joining the ranks of the rich? The following financial philosophies may bring you inspiration.
A. Turn Living Expenses into “the First Sum of Capital”
There were two people, each with 100 yuan: one used it to buy 50 pairs of slippers and sold them at a stall for 3 yuan per pair, finally earning 150 yuan—this 100 yuan realized value appreciation through operation and became “capital”; the other, due to poverty, spent the 100 yuan monthly living subsidy entirely on rice, cooking oil, and salt—this 100 yuan remained “living expenses” and saw no improvement in value.
The dilemma of poor people often lies in this: it is difficult for their money to turn from “living expenses” into “capital”, and they even lack “capital awareness” as well as the experience and skills to manage capital. In the end, they fall into a cycle of “the poorer you are, the harder it is to accumulate capital; the harder it is to accumulate capital, the poorer you become”.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: The desire for wealth is an important driving force in life. Only when you truly desire wealth and can enjoy the pleasure of making money in the investment process can you possibly turn living expenses into “the first sum of capital”; at the same time, accumulating capital awareness and management skills in this process makes it possible to finally achieve a breakthrough in wealth.
B. For Those Starting from Scratch, the Hardest Part Is the First Few Years
The experience of Zuckerberg, one of the richest post-80s people in the world, also confirms the rule that “the start is the hardest”. In fact, the biggest challenge for poor people to rise up and become rich is in the first few years. There is a “wealth law” in the field of financial wisdom: for people who start from scratch, it may take 10 years to earn the first 1 million yuan; but accumulating from 1 million yuan to 10 million yuan may only take 5 years; and then from 10 million yuan to 100 million yuan, it may take only 3 years.
The logic behind this law is: when you have the experience and start-up capital accumulated in the early stage, it is like a car that has already started and accelerated; you just need to step on the accelerator gently, and the car will move forward rapidly. The first 5 years may be the hardest “climbing period”, but after getting through it, you will find that financial management becomes more and more enjoyable, and wealth accumulation becomes easier and easier.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: Poor people not only lack capital, but more sadly, they lack “capital awareness”—they don’t know how to make money generate money, nor do they have the experience to manage capital. If money is always just “living expenses for spending” rather than “capital for appreciation”, it will be difficult to get out of the circle of poverty.
C. The Most Precious Resource of Poor People Is Their “Brain”
The difference in intelligence and physical strength between people is far less than imagined. Most people can do the same thing, but the final effect varies, and it is often details and ways of thinking that determine the quality.
For example, if a talented but arrogant employee is not appreciated by his boss, it is too one-sided to attribute the reason only to “not knowing how to curry favor with the leader”—what the boss values more is the value that the employee can create; another example, if you quarrel with the staff when applying for a business license for the first time, it is hard to imagine that the small shop you open will ever grow bigger with such a mindset, let alone investment and entrepreneurship—even daily financial management will be difficult to do well.
In essence, many investments are a “bet on the future”, betting that future returns will cover current investments. However, investment is extremely risky, and once money is invested, it is no longer fully under your control.
As a disadvantaged group, poor people often can’t even fully control their own lives, let alone influence others or the situation. What they lack in investment is not just money, but also the courage to act, the wisdom to think, and the awareness to take the initiative in financial management.
So, what is the most precious resource of poor people? It is not the limited savings, nor a strong body, but the “brain”. In the past, we said that “thoughts are a precious spiritual wealth”, but in the current era, thoughts are not only spiritual wealth, but can also be transformed into tangible material wealth—a good idea may give birth to a new industry, or completely change a business model.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: The most essential difference between people is not appearance or physical strength, but what is in their brains—whether it is business knowledge, financial thinking, or cognition of “capital appreciation”.
D. Investing in One’s Own Abilities Is the Most Fundamental Investment
A great person once said that the value of a person does not lie in how much he takes from society, but in how much he contributes. Corresponding to wealth accumulation, the core of “distribution according to work” is not “distribution according to working hours”, but “distribution according to the value created by labor”. As long as you are willing, the stronger your ability and the more value you create, the more likely you are to obtain a high income. The key to “more pay for more work” lies in “quality” rather than “quantity”. For poor people, the most fundamental investment is to improve their own abilities.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: When it comes to “capitalists”, many poor people may associate them with “exploiting surplus value” and thus feel resistance. But in fact, the capital market is open to everyone—as long as you have the ability and thinking, you can also become a “person who makes capital work for yourself”, and there are opportunities for you in this field.
E. Education Is the “Long-Term Investment” with the Highest Cost-Effectiveness
Academic qualifications are only a “proof of completing basic education”. What is learned in school is mostly comprehensive basic knowledge, and people need “continuous learning” throughout their lives. According to reports, in 2003, the average annual income of people with a bachelor’s degree or above in Jiangsu Province exceeded 110,000 yuan, while that of people with a primary school education was only 3,708 yuan, a gap of nearly 30 times. The disparity in economic income has long led to “class differences” in real life. In today’s society, to live a relatively decent life, a high academic qualification is often a “basic threshold”.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: For many poor people, education is the most important investment to change their destiny—their life path is often highly related to their level of education. Poverty itself is not a fault, but the limitations brought by poverty need to be broken through through education.
F. Don’t Use “Luck” as an Excuse for Poverty
We have heard many stories about “getting rich through capital”: for example, an elderly American woman bought 100 shares of Coca-Cola stock and became a multimillionaire after holding them for decades; an elderly Chinese woman held the original shares of Shenzhen Development Bank for 10 years and also became a super wealthy woman. The protagonists of these stories seem “simple-minded”, but they “easily picked up a golden opportunity”.
Theoretically speaking, the investments of these two elderly women were indeed successful, but for most people, such cases have almost no “replicability”. The reason why they could persist in “long-term stock holding” was not based on rational analysis or firm confidence, but more on “unintentional forgetting” or pure “luck”. Many poor people are used to attributing their failures to “bad luck”—because “luck” is the safest excuse, which can justify their inaction. But in fact, “bad luck” is just a “psychological comfort” for losers.
G. “Knowledge Capital” Must Align with “Financial Capital” to Achieve a Breakthrough
There is a story about a king who wanted to thank a minister and asked him to make a request. The minister said, “I just want 1 grain of rice in the first grid of the chessboard, 2 grains in the second grid, 4 grains in the third grid, 8 grains in the fourth grid, and so on, until all 64 grids are filled.” The king thought the request was too trivial and immediately agreed. But soon, the chessboard couldn’t hold the rice, so they switched to sacks; the sacks couldn’t hold it either, so they used carts; finally, the granaries were empty, countless people who counted the rice collapsed from exhaustion, but the grids were like a bottomless pit—the king finally realized he had been tricked and would end up as a poor man with not a single grain of rice left. This story tells us: even if the initial base is very small, as long as it grows at a “geometric rate”, the final result will be extremely amazing.
The path of development for poor people is difficult at the start, and even more difficult to persist in. The initial “a few grains of rice” may make people feel “hopeless”, but success often depends on the “last step”. When the base accumulates to a certain extent, you only need to “jump one grid” to achieve a qualitative breakthrough. All efforts before that are “foreshadowing”—without the first grain of rice, there would be no subsequent carts or granaries. This process is long and difficult, but the reality is: there are many smart people, and there are also countless people with knowledge, but very few can truly make a fortune. The reason is: to turn “knowledge” into “knowledge capital that can make money”, it must be combined with “financial capital”.
Financial Wisdom Philosophy: The rich make money from financial capital, while poor people can get rich through “knowledge capital”—transforming knowledge into “capital that can create value” and starting from scratch to build a career. This may be the most brilliant path for contemporary poor people to rise. Unfortunately, people at the bottom often lack “the vision to overlook the overall situation” and “the confidence to believe in themselves”, and this confidence is precisely the key to breaking through poverty.
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