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Name: The Last Safe Investment
Rating: 4.2 (231 reviews)
Author: Michael Ellsberg and Bryan Franklin

Michael Ellsberg and Bryan Franklin

Spending Now to Increase Your True Wealth Forever

4.2 (231 ratings)

23 mins

Topics

Investments Wealth

Table of Contents

The Last Safe Investment
Summary of 8 key ideas

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What’s in it for me? Learn how to invest in the one asset whose value is unaffected by economic changes.

Like most people, you’re aware that if you want to retire with confidence, you need a financial plan. Your plan is based on the advice of financial experts, so you make additional contributions to your pension fund, save every cent possible, generate interest through compounding accounts, and invest as much as you can.

But what happens if interest rates drop, the stock market crashes, or your portfolio becomes worthless overnight? If the bulk of your financial plan relies on circumstances you can’t control, how can you ever feel secure?

If only there were something you could invest in whose value didn’t change due to external factors. Something that had the potential to continuously generate wealth. Well, that something does exist. Not only will it revolutionize how you think about wealth, it will significantly increase how happy you are now, so you don’t need to hold off enjoying life until retirement.

What is this extraordinary asset? It’s you.

In these blinks, you’ll learn

what a urinal can teach us about innovation in the workplace;
how your sex life affects your work performance; and
why getting paid in money isn’t always the best financial option.

To safeguard your future, shift your focus from finances to earning potential.

What does financial security look like to you? Is it a huge savings fund that generates enough interest to cover your living costs? Or perhaps it’s an extensive investment portfolio. Or it might even mean having a well-paid job in a company that values you.

All these scenarios align with the advice that most financial advisers give. But they have one major flaw: they all rely on factors that are beyond your control. You could lose your job through no fault of your own. The stock market could crash. Your living costs could unexpectedly change.

But there’s something you can invest in that won’t ever lose its value, regardless of the state of the world. That something is you.

The key message here is: To safeguard your future, shift your focus from finances to earning potential.

What happens to stocks and investments is largely out of your control, which makes most financial plans risky. But if you place yourself at the center of your plan, you can start working toward true wealth. True wealth acknowledges that money alone won’t make you happy. As a human, you also need freedom, love, the potential to grow and learn, and the scope to be creative.

Based on this concept, the authors have developed an alternative financial plan called SAFE. SAFE stands for self-amplifying financial ecosystem. It's a model that creates financial safety by focusing on three disciplines that support the growth of three key assets: your savings pot; your equity; and your tribe.

Don’t be put off by the word “discipline.” SAFE isn’t one of those financial plans that’s designed to make your life miserable. It takes your happiness seriously by increasing how much you enjoy life today, rather than expecting you to defer it until you retire.

Following SAFE’s disciplines will help you develop super skills – the soundest way to maximize your earning potential. What’s more, you’ll see how the SAFE plan can give you financial security and, in the process, ensure you achieve far more than your savings target. You’ll discover a way of life that makes you feel supported, connected and free.

Investing in your happiness will help you get more out of life. It will also help you save.

How often do you find yourself spending money as a shortcut to happiness? If you add up the emotional purchases you made in the past 12 months, how much have you spent? Did those gadgets and clothes bring you lasting joy, or did you pull out the credit card again a week later?

Most people think that earning more money will make them happier. But happiness can get very expensive if we believe it comes from spending more. To increase your wealth, it’s actually far more useful to explore what’s undermining your happiness.

By investing in your interpersonal skills, you position yourself as a leader.

Raj Bandyopadhyay, an Atlanta-based software engineer, is feeling discouraged. He dreams of working in data science, but knows that thousands of his peers have the same dream. There’s only one way to get his foot in the door: Raj needs to connect with industry leaders.

He figures he can attend some local networking events but, after doing a little research, he discovers that there aren’t any. So, even though he has no experience, he decides to create his own: a weekly meetup with a guest speaker from the tech industry. Over time, attendance increases and Raj becomes well known. In just 12 months, he goes from being invisible to getting headhunted by a hot new start-up looking to appoint a chief data scientist.

Consciously developing your creativity will make your career sustainable.

In 2004, art experts named Marcel Duchamp’s The Fountain as the most influential artwork of the twentieth century. It is not, however, a magnificent painting akin to the works of Dalí or Picasso. It is a standard urinal, which the artist bought in a showroom.

How could something that Duchamp didn’t even make be so significant?

You don’t need high-level technical skills to be valuable to a tech-based company.

On his first day as president of a construction company, Lee Franklin was thrown in at the deep end. He was put in charge of building 28 cell sites for a phone company in just six months. It was an intimidating challenge. Lee had no technical knowledge about how cell sites worked, and it usually took 18 months to build just one.

But Lee possessed a super skill that made him perfect for the job. He knew how to create a mental model – a sort of schematic diagram that helped him gain an overview of the relevant technical knowledge. It meant he could work effectively on technical projects, and alongside professionals with decades of experience, without needing that know-how himself.

Investing in your well-being fosters powerful skills that generate true wealth.

Picture two coworkers – Kim and Rowan. On paper, they both have the same education and level of experience. But in practice their approach to work is vastly different. Kim typically drags himself through the day, coffee by coffee, because he surfs the net until the early hours and doesn’t get enough sleep. Rowan, on the other hand, tackles her tasks with energy and focus. She’s far more likely to get a promotion than her work buddy, Kim.

Bosses often determine an employee’s value on measurable qualities, like performance results. But how well we perform has its origins in something harder to measure – how much we prioritize taking care of ourselves physically. Being healthy enhances our charisma, confidence and longevity, adding to our workplace value.

Equity increases your earning potential and helps you form valuable connections.

When graffiti artist David Choe was commissioned to paint murals for a new tech start-up, he turned down the $60,000 fee. To many people, this would seem foolish. Sixty-thousand dollars isn’t pocket change. But Choe took a calculated risk. He asked to be paid in equity instead. That equity is now worth about half-a-billion dollars. The start-up Choe spray painted was Facebook.

Equity is partial ownership in a company, normally in the form of shares. It defies the notion that we must work longer and harder to earn more, making it a valuable asset. Getting equity at the right stage in a company’s development can lead to huge rewards later on. This is why so many secretaries and parking attendants in Silicon Valley end up as millionaires.

Belonging to a tribe that shares your values will significantly increase your sense of security.

On a rainy Californian night in 2007, author Bryan Franklin’s car was rear-ended in a tunnel. He was rushed to the hospital for tests to see how serious his head injury was. Waiting for the results took a few scary hours, but in that time Franklin received over 60 text messages from worried friends.

Many of these messages came from a community of people living in a cohousing facility, in San Francisco. Franklin had only known them a few months, but in the weeks after he was discharged from the hospital, they brought him meals, offered massages to treat his whiplash, and helped with his insurance claims. Franklin was astounded by the support. When he asked a friend why everyone was being so generous, she said it was because they were a tribe.

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What is The Last Safe Investment about?

The Last Safe Investment (2016) flips financial planning on its head by focusing on the one thing you have full control of: yourself. Its model will teach you three disciplines that support three areas of wealth, to shore-up your earning potential and increase your daily happiness.

Best quote from The Last Safe Investment

The more you love the seedlings that sprout in your mind, the more fertile the mind itself becomes.

—Michael Ellsberg and Bryan Franklin

Who should read The Last Safe Investment?

Anxious savers seeking greater financial security
Professionals wanting to expand their earning potential
Investors looking for new ways to build assets

About the Author

Michael Ellsberg is a freelance copywriter and activist for civil liberties. He has authored and co-authored several books, including The Education of Millionaires: Everything You Don’t Learn in College About How to be Successful.

Bryan Franklin is a business strategist who works with VPs and CEOs to enhance their leadership skills. He has been an entrepreneur since high school, where he sold his friends shares in his experimental theater company.

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