Rich Dad Poor Dad - A Book Review

Rich Dad Poor Dad is written by Robert Kiyosaki, a well-known and best-selling author of many a books regarding personal finance. I happened to pick up a copy of Rich Dad Poor Dad over the weekend thanks to its catchy tagline or maybe I though it could help my ever dwindling bank balance! This book has been on the New York Times best-selling list for many years and it has numerous other credits to its name.

Rich Dad Poor Dad deals with many a theme such as the fact that it is wise to practice financial literacy by avoiding debt and starting business and real estate. Robert's book tells us to gain more and more knowledge about financial markets and finance related terms because most of the people lose money not because they are foolish, rather they tend to lose because of lack of knowledge.

According to the book, Rich Dad Poor Dad, financial literacy should be treated like learning another language and one must be apt at it. As one learns more and more about basic financial terms and practices to become more financially literate, one begins to pay more attention to details such as financial statements, assets, liabilities, credit and debt and other components of the financial world. These terms would either have been ignored earlier or one just simply did not know anything about them.

In the book, Rich Dad Poor Dad, Robert refers to his real dad as "poor dad" as a symbol to all those people who are always running the Rat Race, helplessly trapped in a vicious cycle of needing more but never able to satisfy their dreams all because of one glaring lack: financial literacy. On the other hand, the man referred to as "Rich Dad" is his neighborhood friend's father who has never finished eighth grade yet owns warehouses, a company and a chain of three restaurants.

His "Rich Dad" represents those independent and wealthy people of the world who consciously and deliberately take advantage of their personal knowledge of tax and accounting and manipulate it to their advantage to enjoy huge success in this world.

Rich Dad Poor Dad is a good book for people who have just started the journey to becoming financially literate. Although there is a lack of actionable items that the reader must do, it sets a foundation for people to get started. It is available at all leading bookstores although it is better to buy it through some online retailers because of the large discounts they offer.

To read a detailed and in-depth review of Rich Dad Poor Dad, simply visit my site which specializes in Book Reviews and learn how you can get an amazing discount on Rich Dad Poor Dad combined with Free Shipping!

Book Review - The Economic Institutions Of Capitalism By Oliver Williamson

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In this book, Williamson presents a refined and elaborated version of his transaction cost theory that he had first outlined in his 1975 book Markets and Hierarchies: Analysis and Anti-trust Implications. His book attempts to systematically examine those economic issues that classical economic theory simply assumes away. The classical economics believes that markets are perfect, and if they are not then the action to remove market failures needs to be initiated. Williamson, on the other hand, focuses on these economic issues that are acknowledged to be widely prevalent in any economic system. "If complexity is deep in the nature of things economic then that ought to be acknowledged rather than suppressed. An equilibrium approach to economics is thus preliminary to the study of main issues (Hayek on P8)." This book, then, is a scrutiny of such economic phenomenon as market structures, monopolies, anti-trust policies, labor policies, public utility regulation, vertical integration and other economic institutions that have traditionally been neglected by the economic theory.

His basic proposition that most of us are familiar with by now is that the transaction costs should be treated as a fundamental unit of analysis for understanding such issues. Drawing on three streams of research- economics, organization theory and contract law, he repeatedly highlights the need to consider the governance (or transaction) costs. "Rather than characterize the firm as a production function, transaction cost economics maintains that the firm is more usefully regarded as a governance structure (P13)." While his basic argument appeared sound and plausible, I got an impression that Williamson attributed more to transaction costs than it deserved. Why should we regard only governance costs? Why should we think that the firm is only a governance structure? In other words, in my view, instead of correcting an existing flaw in the theory, he seems to be, to borrow the stock market jargon, proposing an over-correction. The field would be better off considering a cost function that combines both production and governance costs or at least choosing the concept based on the specific requirements of the situation or problem at hand.

Having said that, let's now delve into the foundations of the transaction cost economics which is first three chapters in the book. Until this book, Williamson considered opportunism, bounded rationality, frequency and uncertainty to be the building blocks of TCE. However, in this book, he rightly puts forth asset specificity alongside opportunism and bounded rationality as the three legs of TCE. "Any attempt to deal seriously with the study of economic organization must come to terms with the combined ramifications of bounded rationality and opportunism in conjunction with a condition of asset specificity" (P42), which is assumed to be the most critical dimension of TCE (P30). Without asset specificity, markets are believed to be in a competitive world even if people are opportunistic and rationally bounded. This is because buyers and sellers can freely move between market players.

In contrast, uncertainty and frequency drop down a tad bit in the scheme of things. Now, they are supposed to be meaningful in presence of first three elements only. Conceptually, this makes a lot of sense. Take for example, if market players are uncertain about the outcomes, but they believe in the fairness of the parties to contract, the market mechanism would be adequate to deal with all the contingencies since the players would share equitably in the profits. However, we understand that such a behavioral assumption would be wrong since opportunism and bounded rationality are common behavioral traits. What intrigues me, albeit, is that if they are such common traits, then why they should even be made variables in the model. After all, a variable that doesn't vary is no variable at all. It is not surprisingly, therefore, to see most literature to refer only to asset specificity, uncertainty and frequency as the three pillars of TCE. Williamson himself seems to acknowledge this in a subsequent chapter when he mentions that "principal dimensions for describing transactions are frequency, uncertainty and asset specificity (P242)."

After outlaying his conception of economic fundamentals, Williamson proceeds on to explain the boundaries of firm, which is to say what transactions will take place in market and what within the hierarchically organized structures. In his opinion, if the expected costs or risk of transacting in a marketplace are higher than the cost of organizing the functions internally, then such transactions will take place within the firm. If we ignore his exaggerated claims, this is indeed novel and useful approach at looking the firm size and boundaries. No longer is the size of firm held irrelevant as is the case in classical economics. No longer is it believed that the firms will operate at marginal cost whether they produce internally or buy externally. It opens up a can of worms that classical economics under its perfect market and equilibrium economics assumptions puts aside as aberrations. This is a welcome change in the approach to the study of industrial economics.

Next, Williamson moves on to the main theme of the book: providing alternative explanations vertical integration, mergers and monopolies, and joining issues with anti-trust enforcements. He believes that vertical integration results not because of technological determinism or a desire for monopolistic power but from a pragmatic desire to economize on transaction costs. In the similar vein, he contends that non-standard contracting practices such as long-term contracts are not monopolistic practices, but perfectly justifiable attempts at minimizing transaction costs. Further, he attributes such decisions "to a condition of asset specificity (P86)" since asset specificity in conjunction with uncertainty "makes it more imperative to organize transactions within the governance structure that have the capacity to work things out (P79)." The author makes a persuasive case for five out of six hypotheses on the boundaries of firm. However, his fifth hypothesis that claims that "firms will never integrate for production reasons alone" seems a little far-stretched. The fact that some firms organize for efficiency reasons doesn't and can't automatically preclude the fact that some firms organize for monopolistic or technological reasons. Once again, the author's case would have been better served by refraining from such overstatements.

Next, Williamson turns his attention to analysis of such arrangements as can neither be classified as market contracts nor as hierarchical structures, but fall somewhere in between. Also known as hybrid structures, these include credible commitments, joint ventures, relational contracting, hostage models, reciprocal arrangements, and network relationships. His main claim is that even when such arrangements appear to be exercise of monopolistic power, they may be justifiable from transaction cost perspective. "A comparative institutional assessment of contractual alternatives discloses that efficiency purposes are often served by hostages and it is in the mutual interest of the parties to achieve that result. Not only can producers be induced to invest in the mutual interest of the parties to invest in the most efficient technology, but buyers can be induced to take delivery whenever demand realizations exceed marginal cost." Interesting proposition, but it doesn't explain the impact on the hostage (e.g. P&G) if the monopoly (e.g. Wal-Mart) decides to dump it! His second main claim derives from Coase's 1960 article on problem of social cost. Recall Coase's claim that when people are left to bargain among themselves, most economic externalities can be better resolved than when courts or other non-market interventions take place. Williamson develops on this proposition and claims that parties to a contract don't normally take recourse to courts, but try to use "private ordering" to resolve their disputes. I would presume this would chiefly be out of concern for future business relations.

Let's wrap up this review with a summary of strengths and weaknesses. For the strengths, I will let the Williamson speak for himself. To quote him,
"As compared with other approaches to the study of economic organizations, transaction cost economics (1) is more micro-analytic (2) is more self-conscious about its behavioral assumptions (3) introduces and develops the economic importance of asset specificity (4) relies more on comparative institutional analysis (5) regards the business firm as a governance structure rather than as a production function and (6) places greater weight on the ex-post institutions of the contract, with special emphasis on private ordering as compared with court ordering."
-Williamson, P387

While the theory is conceptually persuasive and logically sound, a principal weakness of transaction cost analysis lies in its post-facto nature of analysis. Notwithstanding Williamson's superb efforts, it has been rather difficult to define it in a way that it can be measured and tested. The theory in its current formulation continues to be plagued with a criticism that it's tautological in nature, after all ex-post facto any system can be shown to be economizing on transaction cost or at least that it will be eventually replaced if it doesn't. Therefore, transaction cost economics needs to find variables with predictive powers.

Williamson mentions three limitations of his work- its crude form, instrumentalism, and incompleteness. To me, these appeared more to be challenges for future research rather than any weaknesses in the theory. Besides occasional excessive enthusiasm and exaggerations and the difficulty in operationalization of the concept, a major challenge in reading this book is to be prepared to learn a new language! Williamson's choice of words lives a reader with no less an impression.

Overall, Williamson does a superb job in developing the transaction cost economics that had first appeared in Coase's 1937 article 'nature of firm', but had been left untouched until this work because of difficulties in operationalization and empirical testing. Williamson succeeded in overcoming most of these challenges and it is for the future researchers to meet the rest.

Reference:

Williamson, Oliver. The Economic Institutions of Capitalism. 1st. New York: The Free Press, 1985.

Punit Arora is a research scholar on management and public policy.

Freakonomics - A Journey on Challenging Conventional Wisdom Through Economics

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Reading a book about economics is probably good for anyone in today's business world or for myself, a small business coach. Yet, the authors, Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, of Freakonomics provided their readers a lot more than just numbers.

The first hook that I received was how the authors defined morality and economics. Not, I am not going to share those definitions with you. You need to buy the book or check the book out at the local library.

Then the authors proceeded to connect seemingly unrelated events through 6 chapters from What Do Schoolteachers and Sumo Wrestlers Have in Common? to What Makes a Perfect Parent? using the science of measurement. These are not your standard economic topics by conventional wisdom. Their efforts reminded me of the Connections television series hosted by James Burke (science historian) that debuted in the late 1970's.

What the authors accomplished for me was:

To confirm through some unique examples that we as human beings have a tendency to confuse cause and effectTo look beyond the accepted conventional wisdom with a different perspective by asking the unasked questions

In far warning, part of this book might be viewed quite negatively by some readers. The authors did their best to balance their findings against anticipated moral outrage.

Again, conventional wisdom many times has us throwing out the baby with the bath water. Levitt and Dubner are asking you to question what you truly know against what you have been told. You may not agree with their findings, but the process of open and honest questioning should be the conventional wisdom within every individual.

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Leanne Hoagland-Smith, chief customer officer, helps organizations through business training coaching services to return to the purpose of business that being building ravings fans while increasing productivity and profitability. With offices in Chicago, Indianapolis and colleagues nationwide, she can help you become the Red Jacket in the Sea of Gray Suits. Call 219.759.5601 to schedule a free business coaching consultation.

Economic Development in Israel

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Israel's economy has grown rapidly at an average rate of about ten percent annually, in spite of poor natural resources.

The modern economic growth of Israel is not a mirage in the desert. It is real and it is a product of great determination and untold sacrifices of its people in building their own nation.

This nation is now a modern, democratic, and industrial state. It is basically an urban society. This means that the phenomenal economic success of Israel has been achieved despite thousands of years of persecutions and invasions by the Assyrians, Babylonians, Romans, and Germans.

In manufacturing sector, The Tel-Aviv-Yafo area is Israel's major manufacturing center. It has over half of Israel's factories. They had to import large amounts of equipment and raw materials. As a result, the nations imports greatly exceed exports in value. Income from various sources makes up the difference. These source include grants and loans from other countries, and income from tourists.They have also chemicals, clothing and textiles, finished diamonds, machinery, metals, processed foods, transportation equipment, wood products.

In agricultural sector, Israeli farmers produce about three-fourths of their country's food. Exported foods cover the cost of importing the rest. The chief farm products include oranges and other citrus fruits, and eggs, milk, and poultry. Other important products are cotton, livestock, sugar beets, vegetables, and wheat.

The Israelites traveled in the desert for 40 years. Moses became the Prince of Egypt although he discovered that he was an Israelite.

At present, the Promise Land or Land of Israel is a great nation. God has indeed fulfilled his promise to Abraham, and later on to the children of Israel. The enemies of the Land of Israel have destroyed many time its people and achievements.

I myself as the author of this article before it will be my book later on.

Who Says No One Could Have Seen the US Housing Crash Coming - A Book Review

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Many politicians and even the media claim that no one saw the housing bubble burst coming. Well, that is so silly, it's almost ludicrous as anyone that studies real estate cycles, or economics would agree. Still, if you happen to be amongst the masses who actually believe such purported media claims, I'd sure like to recommend a very good book to you. The book is called:

"The Coming Crash in the Housing Market; 10-Things You Can Do Now to Protect Your Most Valuable Investment," by John R. Talbott; McGraw Hill, New York, NY; (2003); ISBN: 0-07-142220-X.

The first chapter is titled; "Housing Prices Certainly Look Awfully High," and to imagine that first chapter title of this book was written in 2003, long before the insanity of the bubble that took us well into 2005. Chapter 4 goes into much detail; "Why a Crash is Likely." In chapter six he gets into the regionality of the housing bubble and gets it almost exactly spot on, that chapter is titled; "Are Home Prices a Regional or National Problem?"

In the final chapter and summary he decries the policies and viability of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mack, boy was he right. So, who is John R. Talbott? Well, he was a former VP of investment banking division of Goldman Sachs, and a visiting scholar at UCLA's Anderson School of Business. So, you might say he had somewhat of an inside track, but really just about anyone who'd lived through the S&L Crisis or was a real estate agent in 1993 understood good and well, where we were headed.

The charts and graphs in the book tell it all, and predict the calamity that was allowed to build the bubble to an incredible and obviously unsustainable point. Although he called the problem much earlier, those who let it build way beyond the point of return are to blame. The continuous propping up of the status quo at Fannie and Freddie ended in disaster as we all know.

Lance Winslow is a retired Founder of a Nationwide Franchise Chain, and now runs the Online Think Tank. Lance Winslow believes that if you have diabetes you need to understand the information on the disease; diabetes info [http://type1forum.com/]

Note: All of Lance Winslow's articles are written by him, not by Automated Software, any Computer Program, or Artificially Intelligent Software. None of his articles are outsourced, PLR Content or written by ghost writers. Lance Winslow believes those who use these strategies lack integrity and mislead the reader. Indeed, those who use such cheating tools, crutches, and tricks of the trade may even be breaking the law by misleading the consumer and misrepresenting themselves in online marketing, which he finds completely unacceptable.

The Evonomist

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It is refreshing to see that someone is in recognition of the interrelatedness and intricacies inherent in most of the subject matters and natural and not so natural phenomena and come up with an explanation and a brief summary of two otherwise incongruent subject matters of evolution and economics in an interrelated and more of a cause and effect correlation. It was not a long time ago that chemistry and physics were found to be two faces of a coin at the advent of the discovery of atomic and subatomic particles and the formulation of the laws of modern physics. May be from the outset nature and natural process were all along following and obeying the same fundamental and comprehensive rule .Or we were just busy in the per suet of individual part and pieces of the general rule governing the grand universal scheme of things we neglected to look at it in generalized ways and kept at it as deep till such time we are forced to look at the confluence of it with one or the other of fields of study to get to the crux of it all.

It was not a long time ago that I wrote an article about the relationship between the material self and the conscious self and come up with a conclusion that the conscious self is all about the preservation of the material self. Economics is about the preservation of the material self and evolution is the process as the author has explained it eloquently. " According to the economist Eric D.Bienhocker who published these calculations in his revelatory work 'The origin of Wealth' (Harvard Business school Press,2006), the explanation is to be found in complexity theory , Evolution and economics are not just analogous to each other ,but they are actually two forms of a larger phenomenon called complex adaptive systems, in which individual elements, parts or agents interact , then process information and adapt their behavior to changing conditions ,immune systems, ecosystems, Language, the Law and the Internet are all examples of complex adaptive systems." Evonomics by Michael Shemer, Scientific American magazine January 2008.

Here I can't pass without emphasizing the individual's individual act in response to the unique conditions and circumstances the individual finds himself in, never mind the dynamism and state of flux of the conditions beyond account due to the infinite number of variables acting and interacting at a particular point in time. It is not without reason that I wanted to emphasize on the indeterminable, it is rather to show why central economic planning failed and continues to fail. In an economy every individual is a player according to his/her individual unique and dynamic condition, unique and changing skill and individually unique talents in a uniquely individual place in time in the grand economic entity. In other word the grand economic entity is a grand sum total of these unique individuals whose unique circumstances are beyond determination by any grand central planner. There can be no greater lie than to claim to have a central plan that will account all the dynamic and flux needs and conditions of the individual elements of the entity than to let it flow according to the governing on the ground and instantaneous changing circumstances. I again remember a communist slogan that says "We will put nature under our control" only to be proved wrong many times over. We only know a piece of the totality of what nature has for us leave alone capture nature in its totality. This I hope will be just a little foot note to the Authors eloquent exposition of a grand topic as we all are individual footnotes to the totality of human knowledge and wisdom.

Your Place in the New US And World Economy

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What is next for the economy? The economy defines the boundaries within which all businesses must operate.

Like the lines on the edges of the road, cross at your own risk. All businesses - and therefore all jobs in the private sector - must operate within ("length" and "width") of these boundaries. Business failures occur when companies fall behind the times and are too far ahead of consumer demand. Likewise, most business sectors have a relatively narrow range of successful operations. It's hard to survive if you are either the most expensive or cheapest in your market.

The 2010 book from David Wiedemer, PhD, Robert Wiedemer, and Cindy Spitzer entitled "Aftershock" examines the events that created the financial meltdown. In this book and the previous book, "America's Bubble Economy" the authors make the case that the U.S. economy was an illusion, only the interaction of "bubbles".

A bubble is created when an asset temporarily booms. The former (pre-2008) U.S. economy was comprised of bubbles in real estate, personal loans, credit card debt, the stock market, and consumer spending. On their own, each bubble can rise independently. But in combination, the bubbles accelerate and reach unnatural levels!

The financial meltdown felt around the world is the consequence of these bubbles popping, or as the authors describe it, a "Bubblequake". The first stage of the financial meltdown included the fall of the real estate bubble, private debt bubble, stock market bubble, and discretionary spending bubble. On their own, each would have been significant. Combined, these popping bubbles lead to "The Great Recession".

Amidst the economic turmoil, the U.S. government tried to intervene. Bailouts of automakers and investment banks were designed to compensate for "toxic assets". Then the government pumped billions into the economy as "stimulus" to try to offset the funds lost to "money heaven" as bubbles popped and wealth simply evaporated.

Looking back, we now know that such efforts were ineffective. The results were a dramatically inflated money supply and a devalued dollar. The aftereffect was that the government soon reached the "National Debt Limit" as a result of spending nearly twice as much as incoming revenue.

The authors label this current stage as the "Aftershock", defined as the popping of the dollar bubble and the government debt bubble. Their conclusion is that current economic conditions do not simply represent a down market cycle or a typical recession. The difference is the multi-bubble economy, with these inter-linked bubbles ALL on the descent.

The authors also conclude that inflating these bubbles again is simply not possible.

Instead, they predict what is called the "triple double-digit" economy:

Double-digit unemploymentDouble-digit inflationDouble-digit interest rates

All in all, these make up some dire predictions. So what does this mean for you? How will you earn an income in the new, post-Aftershock economy.

The "Aftershock" authors predict:

1. Decreased demand for capital goods, including cars, construction equipment, and major industrial equipment. Lower demand means fewer viable firms and fewer available jobs.

2. Decreased levels of discretionary spending. This affects fine dining, entertainment, travel, fashion, jewelry, art and so on. Less total spending means fewer stores and fewer employees.

3. A decline (just not as drastic) in the "necessities" sector including health care, education, food, and government services. Even these areas will face some pressures to downsize because they are highly dependent on tax revenues. A smaller economy simply produces lower tax revenues. Some programs will simply need to shrink, regardless of the level of "necessity". Many jobs will be retained, however the wage growth and benefits will necessarily be constrained.

Conclusion: as many as 50% of businesses in some sectors may simply disappear. This means that job losses will be staggering after the dollar and government debt bubbles pop, and there will be a mad scramble for those jobs that haven't been destroyed. For most people it will be increasingly difficult to find a job - any job - regardless of your qualifications and experience. And for those lucky enough to be employed, keeping a job will mean putting up with less desirable working conditions, benefits, hours, and pay. In fact, as competition for jobs greatly increases, most wages will surely fall. After all the bubbles pop, people will accept wage cuts in most jobs for one simple reason: if they don't, somebody else will.

By necessity, the government will be forced to live within tax revenue limits. The world economy will not allow unlimited printing of "funny money" to allow for unlimited deficit spending. The quantity of currencies injected by numerous countries will have already added to inflation on a global scale. Too many dollars, yen, euros, etc. will be chasing a declining quantity of goods and services.

The OLD economy is gone; the NEW economy is here.

In 2011 the federal government is overspending revenue by 40%. Even a 10% decrease in the size and scope of the federal government would add hundreds of thousands of additional people to the unemployment roles (including government positions and supporting private suppliers and contractors.) This does not consider the same cascading effects facing state and local governments that have never had the ability to simply print money.

So one of the defining characteristics of the post-dollar bubble economy will be a shortage of jobs. Unemployment levels will be much higher, and people will remain unemployed for much longer. At the same time, businesses will be forced to reduce wages and benefits to remain competitive. Millions of Americans will accept cuts in pay.

Especially hard hit will be younger workers and older workers. Prospective employees under 30 will find it hard to compete against older, more experienced and proven workers. Likewise, workers over 50 will also face extremely high unemployment levels.

At the same time, loss of tax revenue will force the government to tax more and tax deeper. Remaining businesses and employees will be taxed harder! Most will rationalize that 50% taxation is better than not working at all!

Different people will look at the same facts and draw different conclusions. So what do you think? Do you believe the bubbles will miraculously re-inflate and good times are on the horizon? Or do you believe (as the authors of "Aftershock" have detailed) that the old bubble economy is gone and a newer, leaner economy is what we can expect?

I concur with the conclusion that we are now experiencing the "aftershock". I always knew that an economy based on 20% appreciation in housing values, pensions exceeding 100% of wages while working, whole shopping centers selling completely unnecessary novelties and decorations, and unbridled government deficit-spending had to "pop" eventually.

And yet I am also believe 100% in the viability of the free enterprise capitalist model. So I going to make some suggestions:

First, if you are under the age of 30 or over the age of 50 you are in danger of becoming a statistic. You either need to make yourself invaluable to your current employer or prepare yourself for the high possibility of a layoff.

Second, identify some necessary service or product that you can get excited about!

You have arrived at a "fork in the road". You have two choices, plus a combination. You can take the wide road and do whatever it takes (training, cross-training, adult education, apprenticeships, etc.) to become superbly trained for the job you have or would like to have. Remember, there are going to be too many people seeking each job. You are going to need be impressive in every way and probably over-qualified to get noticed.

The second option (the "road less traveled") is to design your own occupation. Now this can be a retail, service, or skilled occupation. Each has its attractions to certain people. My personal choice is to provide a product or service on a nationwide (or even global) basis. Again, these offerings should fall in the category of "necessities" rather than novelties. Luxuries offer a much smaller but profitable niche if you can cater to the affluent.

Even in tough times, fortunes can be made by satisfying needs. The time-proven formula for success is to identify a problem and provide a solution. In the post-bubble Aftershock economy, providing alternative income opportunities is one legitimate solution!

Now owning your own business includes the hassles of regulations and structure that you completely avoid if you stay in the employee category. But your own business also provides a degree of freedom not possible as an employee. The single biggest benefit is that you have no cap imposed on your income, especially if you are selling a product or service and not your efforts by the hour. Operating a business also allows you to deduct expenses before taxes. A higher potential income and tax advantages results in a win-win.

And then there is the combination of the two options, and this may be a viable option for the majority of Americans. If you have a steady job there is added security in building a part-time business on the side. You gain income and can offset a portion of your expenses that are now cutting into your after-tax personal income (such as a home office deduction, travel expenses for errands, office supplies, etc.) You also gain the security of a income cushion if your regular job evaporates or you face a cut in wages.

Of course, many small businesses eventually grow into large businesses. You then have the choice of making your part-time business a new full-time profession, hiring some employees to manage the extra work, or selling the business outright at a profit. Again, many advantages and few disadvantages (if designed with some forethought.)

The "road less traveled" provides increased potential rewards for assuming personal responsibility. At the same time, millions of Americans have learned that "job security" is a contradiction. We have entered the new age of job insecurity in an increasingly lean and competitive global economy.

So where do you start? Here are my recommendations for the ideal business:

1. Unlimited income potential. This is only possible if you are selling a product or service. If you are selling your time, you are limited by the number of hours you can work each day, week, and month. When you stop working you stop earning, and this is true even if you can bill your time at $200 per hour. Also, you want to have at least some products or services which generate repeat sales - unless what you are providing is incredibly profitable in the initial sale. Likewise, if your business allows you to leverage the efforts of others to provide additional streams of income, so much the better!

2. Time and location freedom. The ideal business will take advantage of current technologies and allow you to be located anywhere, and sell to anyone. These technologies will also allow your sales to recorded 24 hours per day, 7 days per week. Some products or services may have limitations which restrict the sales area to one location. But many products and services - especially digital products - allow sales to be made on a worldwide basis instantaneously!

3.Small initial investment. While many downsized employees have bought franchises and other fixed location business opportunities, I can not recommend this option. For one, the start-up costs can be very high, literally hundreds of thousands of dollars with no guarantees. Then you are faced with the reality that you have assumed the job of full-time personnel director and you spend all your time either managing employees or hiring their replacements. Instead, I would recommend an opportunity with a low start-up cost. This allows you to begin

part-time. It also means you won't have to qualify for financing, which may be next to impossible for a new business in the post-bubble economy.

In my opinion, network marketing fulfills all these criteria. There are literally thousands of products and services that are marketing by networking. Combined with the power of the Internet and social media, networking has entered the mainstream and is a viable option for a full-time or part-time business.

Millions of Americans have used network marketing to produce extra income. The company provides all the support functions, from billing and credit card processing to accounting for commissions. Networking includes the creation of a downline that produces additional income. And consumable products provide residual income, often from several generations of customers that you have never even met.

There are no restrictions based on age, experience, location, or net worth to join a networking company. People from all walks of life - including unemployed - have become successful in network marketing. In fact, many thousands of networkers are literally unemployable after experiencing the freedom and income potential of network marketing.

If you decide that networking is right for you, there are countless resources (both free and low cost) that are available to shorten your learning curve and help you succeed! There are also turnkey marketing systems designed to automate the process of locating customers and claiming your slice of the Internet!

Randy Reek writes articles about making money from a base of over 30 years of business success. Randy has been a top salesman in retail and wholesale sales; consumer and business-to-business settings. He has also operated his own successful mail-order business. Visit randyreek.com for information and opinions on making money, saving money, and your place in the global economy.
For more information on specifically on income opportunities in the new world economy, see the Making Money section of the blog.