So here’s a question you don’t hear every day.  How much money do you earn in a minute?

Seriously.  How much?

I was browsing through today’s news on AOL and saw a little micro-presentation on what the world’s richest make in a minute.  Notice I said ‘make’ not ‘earn’.  See it’s the power of the Penny Principal and Leadership Impact wrapped together.  Bill Gates long ago stopped ‘earning’ what he was worth.  Now, with his estimated $3.6B in annual income, he is making money from what other people are earning from his system – as he should.  That’s the beauty of systems – to the designers and out-of-the-box thinkers and doers go the rewards.

So Bill Gates makes $6,659 per minute.  MINUTE.  In other words, after 7 minutes of work on January 1st, he has made as much as the typical American will all year long.  And America is the richest per capita income on the planet. On any given day, by the time he puts toothpaste on his toothbrush, he has earned more than most people in the world will in an entire year.

Doing the math then I can extrapolate that the average American makes $0.36 a minute.  CENTS.  To quote Mel Brooks from ‘History of the World Part I’ – “It’s good to be the king!”

By the way, Bill.  Yesterday, I installed our scanner onto the desktop and left it plugged into the computer. (Oh no!)  This morning, my computer screen was black and would not boot.  It took me about 10 minutes to sweat, panic, pull the printer cord out and reboot successfully.  During that time, you made $66,590 and I lost a year of my life in panic.  Nice system you have there!

Author | Dave Darby

Dave Darby is a husband, father of 5, son, entrepreneur, speaker and well, a renaissance man who frequently needs to dump his brain on thoughts about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.