Page 46 - Rich Dad's Increase Your Financial IQ: Get Smarter with Your Money

Chapter 3

Financial IQ #1: Making More Money

After four years at the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point, New

York, I graduated in 1969 and got my first job with Standard Oil of
California sailing on their oil tankers. I was a third mate sailing between
California, Hawaii, Alaska, and Tahiti. It was a great job with a great

company. I only worked for seven months and then had five months off, got
to see the world, and the pay was pretty good at approximately $47,000 a
year—that’s the equivalent of $140,000 today.
A salary of $47,000 was considered a lot of money for a kid right out of
college in 1969. It still is. Yet when compared to some of my classmates,

my pay was low. Some of my classmates were starting their careers at
$70,000 to $150,000 a year as third mates. Today that would be the
equivalent of $250,000 to $500,000 a year as starting pay. Not bad for

twenty-two-year-olds fresh out of school.
The reason my pay was lower was because Standard Oil was a non-
union shipping company. My classmates in the higher pay scales were
working for union wages.
After only four months as a third mate, I resigned from my high-paying

job with Standard Oil and joined the Marine Corps to fight in the Vietnam
War. I felt an obligation to serve my country. At the time, many of my
friends were doing everything they could to avoid the draft. Many were

going on to graduate school; one ran and hid in Canada. Others were
coming up with strange diseases and hoping to be classified 4-F, medically
unable to be drafted.
I was draft-exempt because I was in a Non-Defense Vital Industry
classification. Because oil is essential for war, and I worked for an oil