We've all heard stories of lottery winners, rock stars, heirs and heiresses, and professional athletes becoming millionaire morons who wake up rich but are broke by nightfall.

As a bull market turns into a bear market, the new pros turn into optimists, hoping and praying the bear market will become a bull and save them. But as the market remains bearish, the optimists become pessimists, quit the profession, and return to their day jobs. This is when the real professional investors re-enter the market.

The rich continue to get rich the same way they always have - by understanding how money works and making their money work for them.

I want parents to teach that academic intelligence is essential, but so is financial intelligence.

The fact that rich people get free stuff and poor people have to pay, it's backwards.

The financial sector has so distorted salaries that physicists are getting drawn into the financial sector. All that has led to an undersupply of people committed to the public sector.

Now is not the time to compromise on the economy. Instead, we should be doing everything in our power to support long-term economic growth. Permanent repeal of the death tax will mean more high-quality, high-paying jobs for Americans.

I had five brothers and sisters. Four of them older, and some of them played instruments, and we would get together and have family recitals and raise money for the church. I belonged to a wonderful church community that encouraged me to sing.