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One economic model that many people carry in their minds is that of wealth as a pie. There’s even an old cliché about everyone wanting their “piece of the pie” in life. This image brings to mind the idea of scarcity – a lot of people are in line for the pie, and there’s only so much to go around.
The very idea of limitation and scarcity makes people impatient and a tad stingy about getting their piece.
Garrett Gunderson challenges this notion and suggests that we look at things differently: As the economy grows, the pie gets bigger and bigger – this is not a zero-sum situation! There is plenty of pie to go around.
Garrett Gunderson talked with Money Revealed about his philosophy and approach to wealth. Pie metaphors aside, Gunderson asserts that there is enough to go around… and that wealth should not be seen as a game with winners and losers.
When we think in terms of winners and losers, it sets us up for a mindset of jealousy, stinginess, and fearful self-protection. Retirement is seen as a crisis that we need to hedge against, a looming danger that requires us to sacrifice and deny ourselves in order to prepare for.
Gunderson paints a different and more optimistic picture, and sees this “scarcity mindset” as a roadblock to success.
Instead, he endorses a mindset of value creation in which we focus on something valuable to others and leverage it. In order to do this, we must cultivate an approach of personal growth and learning throughout our lives. He adds, “Money is a byproduct of value, and that value is a place where we store our energy… and I want people to be able to be productive and abundant rather than scarce and destructive.”
Gunderson challenges us to look at financial freedom in a different light, as reaching a point “when money is not the primary reason or excuse why we do or don’t do something.”
Indenturing ourselves to retirement by focusing on scarcity and saving is the opposite of this mindset, in his opinion.
He points to three factors that enslave retirees: interest rates, taxes, and inflation. It’s simple math. If interest rates go down, your investments yield less. Inflation causes your money to lose value. Rising taxes cut away at your bottom line.
Gunderson describes the growth of personal wealth as the continual exchange of money, and asserts that exchange is what truly creates wealth.
He also suggests that we look at economic opportunities as problems we can solve in the world and value we can add to the world… instead of simply an opportunity to get paid.
Gunderson elaborates on his ideas in Money Revealed and in his books, Killing the Sacred Cows and The Great 401(k) Hoax. These books address what he considers to be myths about economics and wealth, and why he believes that retirement plans are not the best way to save for the future.
His goal, he says, is to help people discover that money isn’t as complicated as they think it is. In fact, the problems we are facing now have real solutions that are solvable if people are able to follow their hearts and fulfill their soul purpose…but being caught in the scarcity mindset traps them into a constant, fearful pursuit of money.
What would happen if people were freed from that mindset and able to concentrate on solving problems and serving others instead?
The world might be a much happier, safer, and more creative place.