Gordon Gekko has often been misquoted as saying “greed is good.” He did technically say “greed . . . is good,” but that snippet leaves a lot of the meaning out. Let’s look at what he really said:

“The new law of evolution in corporate America seems to be survival of the unfittest. Well, in my book you either do it right or you get eliminated…The point is, ladies and gentleman, that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right, greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of its forms; greed for life, for money, for love, knowledge has marked the upward surge of mankind.”

Greed isn’t the right word because it’s an extreme version of what he’s really talking about. The opposite extreme is apathy, and both extremes are bad.

I’m not sure what a better word would be. Desire? Ambition? Drive? Mojo? Life force? Evolutionists call it selective advantage. Academics call it a thirst for knowledge. Economists call it rational self-interest.

Whatever you call it, it’s not bad. Surely there’s plenty of room between one extreme of preying on innocent people, and the other extreme of being a spineless jellyfish.

I’m bringing this up now because I just saw Michael Moore’s new movie, “Capitalism: A Love Story.” While I liked it, I thought it was far weaker than “Sicko” and “Fahrenheit 9/11.” I totally agree with him about all the corruption at the top, but I disagree with him about what’s happening at the bottom.

We see several people in the movie being evicted from their homes. Is it sad? Yes. Being poor is awful, no question about it.

But while I saw people who weren’t happy about their situation, I didn’t see anyone taking personal responsibility for it, or coming up with a plan for how they’re going to fix it. They just think they deserve to stay in their house whether they’re making the payments or not.

Their logic seems to be “I’m poor, therefore someone should give me a free house.” If it were me, I’d be thinking “I’m poor, therefore I better make more money so I can pay for this house.”

One family looked out the window as several police cars pulled up to their house to evict them. But they refused to open the door for them. Instead, one family member called the Sheriff and said they weren’t going to resist, but the cops were going to have to break the door down.

I actually found this guy more offensive than the “condo vulture.” He thinks he’s Gandhi in a noble fight of nonviolent resistance? No, he’s just a jerk who’s wasting the cops’ time and causing someone else’s property to be damaged.

To be fair, we didn’t get any information about how all these people ended up like that. There could have been tragedies that put them in that situation through no fault of their own. (Though minor economic fluctuations such as this recession are far from being tragedies.)

But there were hints that they became homeless only through absence of greed, for lack of a better word. Thinking that money is evil isn’t going to help. If you’re not making enough to pay the bills, then you have to either reduce your bills or make more money.

Are there no jobs where you live? You might have to move. Does your occupation no longer pay well? You might have to change fields. Do you not have any skills that employers want? You might have to develop some. This might not be fair or convenient or what you wanted, but it’s sometimes necessary.

When I got laid off in the dot com bust, I had to move to where the jobs were, learn new skills, and take a big pay cut. Did I want to do that? No, but it was a lot more constructive than sitting around in an area with no jobs, waiting for Michael Moore to put me in a movie.

And if I had stayed, I certainly wouldn’t have claimed the right to live there without paying for it. I would have sooner starved to death than default on my mortgage.

One person in the movie says there are only two kinds of people: the ones who have nothing, and the ones who have everything, with no one in between. Where is he getting that from?

I’d guess that almost everyone who’s reading this post is in between. The ones who have nothing sometimes truly lack the ability to move up, but usually they just refuse to evolve.

If someone doesn’t want to have moderate greed, I think that’s their right. But they have to accept the consequences of the path they’ve chosen.

Michael Moore says capitalism is the enemy of democracy. But the problem isn’t capitalism itself, just the kind we have.

Most people are outraged that the top 1% makes as much money as the bottom 95%, but that’s not the problem per se. If they create that much value, they should make that much money. Why should the people who don’t create any value make as much money as the ones who create a lot?

However, the problem is that the broken system allows some of the top 1% to make that much money without creating that much value. In fact, some of them destroy value.

And some of them have gone to jail for it, but many more are still out there and up to their old tricks. Why wouldn’t they keep doing it, if they have no sense of ethics and no one’s going to stop them?

Moore says the top 1% fear the bottom 95%, because they have 95% of the votes. But he says they won’t take back the country with their votes, because they believe that if they keep working hard, they’ll be in that 1% someday.

I don’t know where he’s getting that from. Why would anyone think they’ll magically jump up like that? No, the problem is that there’s no one to vote for. No one stands for eliminating corruption because being a politician requires being all caught up in it.

True capitalism doesn’t guarantee that everyone is equally good at the game, just that we all get to play by the same rules. And while there should be a safety net to help people stay in the game when they’re down on their luck, we don’t want a system that fixes everyone at the same level. Eliminate greed, and you eliminate progress.

Moore unwittingly gives us an example of the good kind of greed: Jonas Salk, inventor of the polio vaccine. He did a great thing and didn’t patent it for personal gain, because he didn’t need the money.

But while he wasn’t greedy for money, his greed for a cure is what made him work hard enough to find it. He wasn’t the kind of guy to sit back and wait for someone to hand him a cure, or buy him a house.

Evil people are often obsessed with money, but that doesn’t mean that money is evil. It’s just a resource, and it works for its owner.

When good people refuse to play the game, that just means that only the evil people will have it. Isn’t it better to see it in the hands of people who will use it well? That’s why we need a healthy dose of the good kind of greed.

So at last I get around to reviewing Napoleon Hill’s classic, Think and Grow Rich. It was first published in 1937. People had lost their money as well as their spirit in the Great Depression, and needed a reminder that financial success was still possible for people who would create their own opportunities. That’s not so different from today, is it?

“You have ABSOLUTE CONTROL over but one thing, and that is your thoughts. This is the most significant and inspiring of all facts known to man! It reflects man’s Divine nature. This divine prerogative is the sole means by which you may control your own destiny. If you fail to control your own mind, you may be sure you will control nothing else.

If you must be careless with your possessions, let it be in connection with material things. Your mind is your spiritual estate! Protect it and use it with the care to which Divine Royalty is entitled.

You were given a WILL-POWER for this purpose.

…

Doubting Thomases scoffed scornfully when Henry Ford tried out his first crudely built automobile on the streets of Detroit. Some said the thing never would become practical. Others said no one would pay money for such a contraption.

FORD SAID, “I’LL BELT THE EARTH WITH DEPENDABLE MOTOR CARS,” AND HE DID!

His decision to trust his own judgment has already piled up a fortune far greater than the next five generations of his descendants can squander. For the benefit of those seeking vast riches, let it be remembered that practically the sole difference between Henry Ford and a majority of the more than one hundred thousand men who work for him, is this-FORD HAS A MIND AND CONTROLS IT, THE OTHERS HAVE MINDS WHICH THEY DO NOT TRY TO CONTROL.”

This gives a taste of his writing, which is a bit old fashioned and peppered with glaring typos, creative punctuation, and RANDOM ALL CAPS. It also requires a good amount of patience to read it, because he’s very wordy, sometimes going on and on about things that are completely out of date.

But Think and Grow Rich is worthy of being a classic. While the wording is dated, the ideas are timeless. It’s also incredibly optimistic without being too cheesy.

And it’s practical. It’s about controlling your thoughts, but in a down to earth way instead of being all about “thought vibrations” (although there is some of that). If you find yourself making excuses instead of money, Napoleon Hill will whip you into shape.

Actually, it’s not really specific to money. At one point he says that “riches” means “financial, spiritual, mental, and material estates.” Think of it as a guide for keeping your mind from getting in the way of your success, whatever it is you’re working towards.

He alludes to Andrew Carnegie’s secret, which he says is the key to all great financial success. He doesn’t state it directly, but he hints at it in every chapter, and says the secret will appear to you when you’re ready. I’ll revisit the Carnegie Secret at a later time. (Update: now you can learn The Hidden Secret in Think and Grow Rich!)

Meanwhile, Think and Grow Rich is freely available from this link.

Table of Contents:

Author’s Preface
Chapter 1 – Introduction
Chapter 2 – Desire: The Turning Point of All Achievement
Chapter 3 – Faith Visualization of, and Belief in Attainment of Desire
Chapter 4 – Auto-Suggestion: the Medium for Influencing the Subconscious Mind
Chapter 5 – Specialized Knowledge, Personal Experiences or Observations
Chapter 6 – Imagination: the Workshop of the Mind
Chapter 7 – Organized Planning, the Crystallization of Desire into Action
Chapter 8 – Decision: the Mastery of Procrastination
Chapter 9 – Persistence: the Sustained Effort Necessary to Induce Faith
Chapter 10 – Power of the Master Mind: the Driving Force
Chapter 11 – The Mystery of Sex Transmutation
Chapter 12 – The Subconscious Mind: The Connecting Link
Chapter 13 – The Brain: A Broadcasting and Receiving Station for Thought
Chapter 14 – The Sixth Sense: The Door to the Temple of Wisdom
Chapter 15 – How to Outwit the Six Ghosts of Fear

Are ebooks worth the money?

About three months ago I recommended an ebook called Learn More, Study Less by Scott Young, priced at $39.95.

A lot of people complained about the price, but this is by no means the most expensive ebook out there. One that comes to mind is Desperate Buyers Only (which I haven’t read) by Alexis Dawes, priced at $77. And there are yet more expensive ebooks out there, some well over $100.

But this is the internet age. With so much free stuff out there, can an ebook ever be worth the money? Absolutely!

What Is Money Really Worth?

First, I think we need to look at some conflicting beliefs people have about money.

Whenever someone writes a post about how money isn’t that important, almost everyone jumps on board and says “Yeah! That’s right! All that matters is [choose from family, health, happiness, etc].” But when it comes time for them to buy something, they do a complete 180 and attach far too much importance to their money, being unwilling to part with just a few dollars for something that can be worth much more.

It’s not a good idea to waste money, but it’s also not a good idea to hoard it. Money is meant to be spent on things that improve your life. What kind of a world do we live in where people will drop $20 for a pair of tickets to Sex and the City, yet balk at the cost of a $20 ebook?

Many people who read blogs think they’re getting such a good deal…all this information for free. But nothing is free. What is your time worth? $5 an hour? $50 an hour? How many thousands of dollars do you spend each year by using your time to read “free” information?

The Value of an Ebook

The reason ebooks cost money while blog posts are free is simply because ebooks are much better. Not every ebook is going to be for you, but if a particular ebook is what you need, it should have a lot of useful, insightful, original information, perfectly targeted for its niche, impeccably presented, and instantly delivered. Not to mention that it’s probably from someone you know.

No spending countless hours combing the web for free information that may or may not be out there somewhere. No getting in your car and burning gas to get to the bookstore, only to pick up something that will clutter your home for the rest of your life. No buying a book from an author you know nothing about, only to find out you don’t like their style.

Of course, not every ebook delivers. I just read an ebook that normally costs $19, but I got it for free. It’s fine as a free ebook, but it’s sure not worth $19. That’s why it’s important to know the author or get a referral from someone you know. You can do this by reading blogs (yes, even though our time is precious, there are lots of blogs worth reading).

So why do I think that one ebook is overpriced at $19, while I think “Learn More, Study Less” is worth $39.95? Simply because ebooks are not a commodity. The difference in prices is miniscule compared to the difference in value. While double the price of the $19 ebook, the $39.95 ebook has a free preview, a money-back guarantee, and a 50% affiliate program (so the ebook is free if you refer two people). It’s also by an author who has acquired thousands of readers with his unique ideas. It’s also well presented and beautifully laid out and illustrated. And now having read it, I can say that the information it contains just doesn’t exist anywhere else, as far as I know.

What about p-books? (By p-books, I mean “paper books.” As e-books become more popular, it becomes more important to make a distinction.) Why are p-books often cheaper than e-books? It’s because the p-book publishers know they’ll sell millions of copies, so they can afford to sell them dirt cheap and still make millions of dollars. Bloggers don’t have nearly as large a market, so they’d be crazy to sell their ebooks for pennies above cost like the big book publishers do.

Support Your Favorite Bloggers

In fact, many people severely overestimate the income of bloggers. Did you know that only 1 blog in 1,000 makes $20 a month? Even Scott Young, author of “Learn More, Study Less,” who is in the Technorati top 4,000 blogs out of 2 million, only expects his blog to earn roughly $15,000 – $25,000 in 2008. An impressive accomplishment for sure, but hardly a princely sum.

A lot of bloggers have a donate button where you can send them a little money to support their efforts, which is perfectly reasonable, seeing as how their earnings almost always work out to be less than minimum wage. I like to support my favorite bloggers, but instead of just making a donation, I prefer to buy their e-books (or p-books if they have them). That way, it’s mutually beneficial.

Yesterday I bought Randy’s Pausch’s p-book The Last Lecture and Darren Rowse’s p-book ProBlogger: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income. Do they need the money? No, not really. Darren supposedly makes over $20,000 a month just from his two blogs, plus he has his book proceeds and his income as VP of Blogger Training for b5media. Randy’s a smart guy and I’m sure he has enough life insurance, plus Hyperion paid $6.7 million for the right to publish his book (I don’t know what Randy’s cut was). They don’t need the money, but I like supporting them because of the work they’ve done. Besides, my blog is mentioned in The Last Lecture, page 184!

I think that buying an ebook can very well be a good investment. You have to do your homework and buy wisely, but an ebook can give you instant access to the latest information that may not exist anywhere else, presented in a style that resonates with you (or you wouldn’t read their blog), in a format that doesn’t take up space, while letting you support a deserving blogger. Isn’t that worth a few dollars?