How the rules of getting rich in the U.S. change with every era

Below, Joseph Moore shares five key insights from his new book, How to Get Rich in American History: 300 Years of Financial Advice That Worked (& Didn’t). Moore is a historian who spent more than a decade researching and testing out what Americans were told to do with their money for the past 300 years. His previous work appeared in such outlets as The New York Times and Oxford University Press. What’s the big idea? History doesn’t give us fixed rules for getting ahead financially. The “right” way keeps changing, so your best bet is to stay flexible, try a mix of strategies, and not get too excited every time someone claims they’ve cracked the code to wealth. We have an opportunity-rich landscape, but how best to mine it changes in every era. Listen to the audio version of this Book Bite—read by Moore himself—in the Next Big Idea app, or buy the book. 1. It has never been easier to get ahead than it is today. In 1676, 100 years before the Revolution, colonists burned the capital of Virginia to the ground because they felt that average people couldn’t get ahead anymore. In the 1800s, big speeches were given saying “the rungs of the ladder to success are sawed off.” Heck, in 1980, there were headlines proclaiming that the Baby Boomers could never afford to retire. How did that turn out? The same goes for today. Of children born at the bottom, 6 in 10 rise out of poverty, and 4 in 10 become middle class, upper middle class, or rich; 1 in 10 goes all the way to the top. For the privileged born at the top, 64% fall out. Of the top 1%, 90% of their grandkids aren’t particularly wealthy. We may not have perfect mobility in America, but we have a lot more than we think. Okay, so the Boomer generation was weirdly lucky. Fun historical fact: Working one job for 40 years while saving 10% in stocks would have failed to fund retirement in almost half of historical scenarios. Boomers tend to think that what worked for them must work for everyone. That isn’t historically true. As