Author: Brian Tracy
Publisher: Thomas Nelson
Year Published: 2004
Rating: 
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That Something for Nothing is more a conservative political discourse than Brian Tracy’s usual self-help manual for business, sales or personal development is apparent right from the start. If you don’t believe in conservative (or at least libertarian) economics, this book probably isn’t for you.
Tracy begins with a no-holds-barred premise that people are fundamentally lazy, greedy, ambitious and impatient. In other words, the basic driving factor of most humans is what he calls the “Expediency Factor” (or E-Factor):
“People continually strive to get the things they want the fastest and easiest way possible, with little or no concern for the secondary consequences of their behaviors.”
In Tracy’s view, Adam Smith had it right when he wrote The Wealth Of Nations. In a free market, people trade items of value for a negotiated price. So long as the business makes a profit (or at least covers production costs) and the buyer feels he got a good value, everyone benefits.
In Tracy’s ideal world, business should still be run this way. Specifically, entrepreneurs take on all the risks to produce a product or offer a service – and if he can’t sell his item at a price that would cover production costs, he and his investors are responsible for the losses. In such a market, businesses would be motivated to produce products of superior value because, if they didn’t, no one would buy their products at their break-even price.
Of course, our economy isn’t exactly a free market. We have lobbyists and union groups and minimum wages and government aid that impose their regulations on the market. Tracy feels this leads to a society of victims where people would rather blame others for their shortcomings and resent the successful rather than take responsibility for their lives, financial situations, relationships, etc. That’s the E-Factor in action. It’s much easier to expect donations and handouts than it is to become an indispensable worker because of your knowledge, expertise, or skill so that you can charge the wages you want.
Tracy’s philosophy generally makes sense from an entrepreneurial standpoint. Yes, entrepreneurs put in long hours to make sure they produce valuable products and services that will benefit their fellow man and will command the price they charge. In fact, Tracy spends considerable time describing entrepreneurial character, service to others, and self-discipline rather than giving in to the E-Factor and valuing short-term profits above all else. If all business owners ran their companies like this, the corporate world would have a much better reputation!
It’s about this point where the book radically shifts from entrepreneurial responsibility to Tracy’s idealistic public-policy blueprint. He tackles many of our current problems including government corruption, crime, Social Security and welfare, and other hot-button political issues. These sections are big on highlighting problems, but scanty on details about how we might go about changing policies that have been in place for several generations. In fact, Tracy is overly optimistic that if we all band together for change, we can clean things up in the next few years – something that seems virtually impossible given, I’d imagine, most Democrats would disagree on virtually all of Tracy’s idealistic suggestions.
They most certainly won’t like his last chapter, in which Tracy argues why the war in Iraq is justified and says we should stay the course. How he can argue that each individual should take responsibility for their lives – then turn around and argue that we have a responsibility to help in Iraq though they aren’t willing to take their own responsibility – is puzzling. He also questions government spending and thinks all programs should be paid in advance, yet I had to wonder: Why does our $275 million/day war budget fall outside that thinking?
To be fair, Tracy did write the book in 2004; perhaps he’s changed his mind about the war being a good use of taxpayer money since then.
While I can’t say I agreed with all of Tracy’s arguments, the book is an entertaining read. He makes a fairly good case for free market economics with plenty of historical facts to back up his case, and it’s difficult to disagree with his call for personal responsibility and accountability. That said, the book’s biggest flaw is its open-endedness. Tracy leaves it up to us to figure out what we should take from the book and how to use it to reshape government. Sure, in a perfect world, we could wipe the slate clean and design more efficient systems to tackle the world’s problems, but given our starting position, that’s incredibly idealistic thinking.
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