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Whatever their motivation, the millionaires frequently pay a high price for their wealth. They work like galley slaves, have little time for recreation or exercise (Arthur Carlsberg every morning does 15 minutes of pushups, sit-ups and squats—"while I listen to stock market reports on the radio"). Usually they put in ten or twelve hours at the office, then spend their nights and weekends pondering reports or burning up the long-distance lines. Practically everything that they do is somehow devoted to building the business. Says Fletcher Jones, 34, of Los Angeles, who in 1959 saw a need for a firm to analyze and program problems for computers to solve, started his Computer Sciences Co. and is now worth $20 million: "Money allows me to do some of the things I want to do. Still, I don't have time to do most of them—travel, for example—so really the money doesn't count that much."
Typical Lament. Perhaps because they are so busy applying practical knowledge, few of the millionaires have any time for religion. Clergymen report that only the Catholics among the new millionaires remain close to their church. Says Hal Prince: "I gave up thinking about religion long ago—I couldn't dope it out." The millionaires also have an extremely high divorce rate. Typical is the lament of Del Coleman, 40, a tavernkeeper's son who bought and sold a succession of sickly companies and gained control of Chicago's Seeburg Corp. (jukeboxes and vending machines). Says Coleman, whose 14-year marriage cracked up recently: "Our worlds just grew apart. Work is a jealous mistress."
The men at the top tend to have few trusted friends, feel most comfortable in mixing with people who, like themselves, have made it big. They also have little time for their families. Arthur Carlsberg, for example, is so busy that he rarely sees his three sons; he takes off one week a year to spend with them, also leaves the office to be with them on their birthdays—and that's about it. Many millionaires say that they worry that all the money may soften their youngsters, rob them of incentive and aggressiveness. To fight that possibility, Boston Real Estate Millionaire Gerald Blakeley, 45, has a rigid rule: his four sons have to earn every penny that they spend from the time that they are twelve—"and that's every penny."
A Beginner's Guide. For all the obvious sacrifices, countless more Americans aspire to become rich. They just do not know how to go about it. No formula is pat or certain, of course, but the millionaires lay down several guidelines for daring young men who would emulate them.
They all agree that an ambitious youngster should start planning early in life. A college education may be helpful, but it is not necessary. Says James Thomas, 37, a Los Angeles real estate and manufacturing millionaire: "College prepares you to work for someone else—and you can only make a million by working for yourself." The big corporation is no place to get rich, the millionaires believe; competition for top positions is much more rugged among corporate executives than among self-bossed entrepreneurs. Hired executives rarely become millionaires; the few who do so make the grade through stock options, which they rarely get before 40.