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Opinion
Barry Ritholtz

A Millionaire Mindset Never Made Anyone Rich

The notion that just thinking something can make it happen is a joke. Too bad some people fall for it.
Wonder what's on his mind.

Wonder what's on his mind.

Photographer: Drew Angerer/Getty Images

The past three decades of minimal real wage growth have led some people to wonder why they haven't gotten ahead. And in much the same way that nature abhors a vacuum, con artists hate missing an opportunity to separate suckers from their money. This might explain why we see a special class of self-help gurus -- none of whom were rich until they developed this particularly odious grift -- who have dedicated themselves to convincing people that if you only believe it, it can happen. Typical of the genre are platitudes like this:

This deceptive and disingenuous nonsense is rampant in the marketing materials aimed at gullible and desperate consumers. Indeed, the quote above comes from the website “Psychology for Marketers,” which should scare us into the horrifying but inevitable realization that behavioral finance has been weaponized. “Nudge” no more; it is now full-on psychological warfare.