The poor weather this week caught me slightly off-guard and put a stop to my original plans of tidying up the back garden. Instead; I felt it had been an adequate time since having read The Millionaire Next Door and so with the rain lashing outside and the knowledge that my garage was slowly flooding.. I settled down on the sofa for a re-read of this absolute classic.

Although almost 2 decades old now; the research, stories and information given throughout this excellent book continue to hold value better than London property prices. For years it has been seen as one of the ‘founding fathers’ of the reducing expenses to boost savings rate mindset that so many personal finance strategies rely on. If you haven’t read it yet, I strongly recommend you obtain a copy through entirely legitimate methods and take a look.

The Prodigious Accumulators of Wealth

Hailed as the heros of the study and seen as inspiration for others, the PAWs are an extremely self disciplined and successful bunch who continually live below their means in order to accumulate surprisingly levels of wealth relative to actual incomes. While I initially aspired to become this grouping myself after first read-through.. I found myself beginning to question it this time round.

Here we have a group of successful individuals who by their own admission have already way surpassed the financial independence break-even point and yet seek to continue accumulating. Despite having enough to easily support their lifestyles and families.. they still dedicate their lives to the workplace and increasing their personal wealth. Don’t get me wrong, it is a fantastic achievement and gives credit to their hard work and ambition.. but is it right?

In the same way that many consumers today identify themselves and their self-worth with material possessions.. the Prodigious Accumulators of Wealth seem to identify themselves with the size of their net wealth and continue their desires to increase it far beyond a lifestyle sustaining level. Whilst on first read through I was in awe of the 55year old multi-millionaire who still drove his banged up old car to the office everyday.. This time I began to question why he continues to do so. Is it that work has become such an important aspect of his life and his self-worth measurement through wealth accumulation that to retire would seem a failure?

Do you want to be rich, or do you want to be free?

There’s an old saying that you either work to live or live to work. The general idea being that some people see work as an endurance test needed to be passed each day in order to sustain themselves, whereas others view it as a big part of their lives and may even enjoy heading to the office each day. These polar opposites perhaps neglect that many of us may actually enjoy our jobs whilst still seeking to leave the workplace. I personally find myself falling firmly into this middle ground despite the occasional complaints!

People who live to work will almost certainly find themselves more successful and wealthy than those who might fall into the middle ground. If someone enjoys their jobs, loves their colleagues and lives for the challenges their work presents them everyday.. are they going to care that their lifestyle could be sustained from their accumulated wealth already? Unlikely. These people, much like the PAWs, work for reasons other than sustaining a lifestyle and so perhaps it is harder for them to quantify the ‘exit point’ for themselves?

If those who work to live are generalised as being trapped in the workplace, having to endure a hated job just to pay the mortgage and feed the children… perhaps these who live to work are equally trapped by their own desires to continue working and accumulating?

And so whilst reading the tales of the ever-accumulating PAWs I began to feel sorry for them, trapped in their own version of the workplace survival cycle. They may well be rich… but are they really free?