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How Do The Very Wealthy Choose To Spend Their Time?

  • Focusing on goals is related to building wealth, regardless of age and income. The decisions we make, particularly related to the allocation of our time, energy, and money, impact our ability to become financially independent.
  • Billionaires occupy their minds and time can influence how much wealth they build. Successful individuals are keenly aware of how they spend their resources, including their time, emotional and cognitive resources.
  • While it may be true that money can't buy happiness, scientific research generally finds a positive association between wealth and life satisfaction. In other words, the wealthier you are, the more likely you are to be satisfied with your life.
  • But why does this association exist? Is it because millionaires have more money to buy the things they want, or does it have to do with the reduction in stress that comes with financial security?
  • Or, perhaps it is due to something else altogether?
  • The answer may have a lot to do how wealthy people choose to spend their time. It turns out that even though millionaires spend their time in many of the same ways as the general population (for example, both millionaires and non-millionaires work about the same amount), there are some key differences between the groups that might contribute to the wealth-happiness association.
  • To study this issue, researchers at Maastricht University, Harvard Business School, and Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam distributed an online survey to 863 high net worth individuals and 1,232 non-high net worth individuals (all living in the Netherlands). In the survey, the researchers first asked participants to report their life satisfaction. Next, the researchers asked participants how they spent their time over the last 24 hours. Specifically, participants were asked to indicate, in minutes, how long they spent engaging in activities such as cooking, relaxing, commuting, hobbies, and volunteering.

  • Armed with this information, the researchers looked for points of similarity and difference in the way high net worth individuals and non-high net worth individuals spent their time. Interestingly, they found fewer differences than they expected. For example, both groups spent approximately the same amount of time engaging in leisure activities, working and commuting, and using their phone and computer.

  • A survey shows that both wealthy and non-wealthy people spent similar time between work and leisure, however, some key differences. For one, although millionaires and non-millionaires enjoyed approximately the same amount of leisure time, millionaires engaged in more active leisure activities (e.g., praying, socializing, exercising, hobbies, and volunteering) while non-millionaires engaged in more passive leisure activities (for example, kitty parties, watching TV, gossiping, playing games on other people, wasting time by being busy in non value activities assuming that keeping busy means work done, not reading and being dependent on others advice thinking that is smart work, napping and resting, foolish networking without context or purpose and doing nothing).

  • The authors suspect that engaging in active leisure pursuits might do more to promote life satisfaction. They state, "More time spent on active leisure is positively related to the life satisfaction of millionaires, while passive leisure is negatively related to life satisfaction. Interestingly, similar results can be observed for the general population, for whom active leisure is also positively related and passive leisure negatively related to life satisfaction."

bill gates reading
Bill Gates and other superrich people love to read.

  • Wealthy people occupy their minds and time differently than the average American.
  • Millionaires and billionaires typically read, exercise, and work more, but spend less time on social media and fewer hours sleeping.
  • From Tim Cook to Bill Gates, the habits of well-known rich people align with these findings.
  • Millionaires and billionaires  aren't your everyday people. To reach their seven-figure status, they occupy their minds and time a little differently.
  • A person's daily activities can influence how much wealth they build.
  • Focusing on goals is related to building wealth, regardless of age and income.
  • The decisions we make, particularly related to the allocation of our time, energy, and money, impact our ability to become financially independent.
  • Millionaires and billionaires  spend their time differently when it comes to reading, exercising, perusing geo political awareness, socio-economic news, sleeping, and working.
  • Even the habits of America's well-known millionaires, and billionaires, align.
  • Below, see how the superrich spend their time.

How many sources of income does a billionaire have

Forget about a regular salary and a singular source of income; millionaires and billionaires usually have several streams of income, including:

  • Earned income – This is the income earned by doing something. It is usually a regular job where you are working for someone else. This is how most billionaires start out, but over time many of them do away with earned income and focus on other sources.
  • Profit income – Profit income is where you sell something for more than what it originally cost you. Profit income comes from businesses large and small and requires a degree of entrepreneurship. Most billionaires will always maintain some form of profit income because when done correctly, it can earn you huge amounts.
  • Interest income – Interest is the money earned on lending money, usually to the bank, and allows you to earn a passive income with basically zero effort from your end. Most billionaires will have multiple streams of interest income coming in each month.
  • Dividend income – Dividend income is the money you make by being a shareholder in certain companies. It is also passive, and you’ll get a return on your shares and investments. Most billionaires are very business savvy and have expert financial advisors who can accurately advise them about which businesses to invest in.
  • Rental income – Rental income comes from buying property and renting it out. While buying a property can require quite a large amount of money upfront, over time, you’ll be able to make your investment back and start profiting off your rentals. There are numerous billionaires involved in the property and rental market.
  • Capital Gains – This is the money you receive for any assets you own that increase in value. Billionaires are likely to own many such assets.
  • Royalty Income – Royalties are paid out for allowing someone to use your idea, design or product. A good example is JK Rowling earning royalties for every copy of her books being sold. As these books will continue to sell for years to come, she’s likely to enjoy a healthy royalty income.

The thing is that most of these income sources are only really worthwhile if you already have a significant amount of money, and in this way, it is often easier for the mega-rich to become even richer. Almost all of the income streams listed above are very difficult for the average person to get into.

Billionaires & millionaires occupy their minds and time can influence how much wealth they build.

wealthy rich people

Successful individuals are keenly aware of how they spend their resources, including their emotional and cognitive resources.

rich woman

Billionaires &  millionaires spend their time differently from the average American in five areas: reading, exercising, perusing geo-political-socio economic areas, sleeping, and working.

rich people

Millionaires spend roughly 5 1/2 hours a week reading for pleasure, compared to the average American's 2 hours.

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Consider celebrity Melissa McCarthy, who begins her morning reading The Los Angeles Times, National Geographic, and The New York Times.

melissa mccarthy

Even billionaires spend a lot of time reading. Bill Gates is an avid reader and has quite the book collection.

And investor Warren Buffett, who spends 80% of his days reading, has said he has a "disgusting pile" of books by his chair.

In 2015, Mark Zuckerberg vowed to read one book every other week "with an emphasis on learning about different cultures, beliefs, histories and technologies," he wrote in a Facebook post.

Businessman and investor Mark Cuban often reads for 3 hours a day to learn more about the industries he's working in.

But reading isn't the only hobby among the rich. Millionaires also spend more time exercising — nearly 6 hours a week compared to the average American's weekly 2 1/2 hours.

Apple CEO Tim Cook wakes up about 4:30 a.m. every day to get to the gym.

Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour also rises early to get her exercise in, waking up every morning at 5:45 a.m. to play tennis.

Billionaire Richard Branson also exercises before breakfast and is a fan of playing tennis. He stays active by kite-surfing, swimming, and cycling.

Oprah Winfrey's workouts include "45 minutes of cardio six mornings a week, four to five strength-training sessions a week, incline crunches, and stretching," according to her trainer.

Mark Wahlberg is an overachiever; he works out twice a day, from 3:40 a.m. to 5:15 a.m. and at 4 p.m.

Millionaires may have more time to exercise because they spend less time on social media. The average American spends 14 hours a week on social media compared to the average millionaires' 2 1/2 hours a week.

Model and Kode with Klossie founder Karlie Kloss takes a weekly digital detox. "I will totally shut off and not post Instagrams or answer my emails," she told the Mirror.

McCarthy also takes digital detoxes, putting her phone away and disconnecting from technology on weekends.

Some don't have social media at all. Jennifer Lawrence previously told BBC Radio 1 that social media baffles her. She said she "will never get Twitter."

George Clooney has vocally opposed Facebook and Twitter. "I'd rather have a rectal examination on live TV by a fellow with cold hands than have a Facebook page," he once said.

And Buffett still uses a flip phone.

But millionaires make a few sacrifices to make the most of their time. They sleep nearly eight hours less a week than the average American.

Meanwhile, PepsiCo chairwoman Indra Nooyi wakes up as early as 4 a.m. She told Fortune: "They say sleep is a gift that God gives you ... that's one gift I was never given."

Fashion designer Tom Ford attributes his success not to talent but to his energy: He's awake 21 hours a day, getting only three hours' sleep.

But he's not the only one: Martha Stewart is so busy running her business that she reportedly gets less than four hours' sleep a night.

Likewise, life coach Tony Robbins typically gets about three to five hours of sleep.

That's probably because he's busy working 16-hour workdays, sometimes to the point of exhaustion.

Robbins' work hustle exemplifies another trait common among millionaires. They often work more than the average American — a difference of six hours a week.

Former GE CEO Jeff Immelt has said he worked 100-hour weeks 24 years in a row.

And Musk is known for his tireless work ethic and puts in 80- to 100-hour workweeks.

While Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg leaves work at 5:30 p.m. to have dinner with her kids, she gets back to work online after putting them to bed.

And former Yahoo CEO Marissa Meyer used to put in 130-hour weeks while working at Google, which she managed by sleeping under her desk.

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