The 4-Hour Workweek

This book is mainly geared towards those who are interested in starting a business like Ferriss did: consumer products costing $50-$200 a pop, run by outsourcing the production, shipping, billing, and customer service. He calls this kind of company a Muse.

A Muse requires you to invent a great, sellable idea, and probably a new one every year. If you have a great invention, you might want to copy his business model. He has excellent tips on how to use EBay and Google AdWords to test market demand and pricing.

However, if you look at the math, there is no way that everybody can follow his model. His work week is 4 hours, because he delegates it to 300 people all working 40 hours. Seriously, what's stopping the worker's revolt? Why don't his employees simply outsource him? If his outsourcing companies were smart, they'd get together and keep the 50% profit margins for themselves. This is especially a problem if you outsource to China, or another country with loose intellectual property rights.

Its a good racket for the time being, but I guarantee that it won't work for much longer... which is probably why he's happy to share yesterday's secrets.

On the plus side, he covers several time-management techniques and lifehacks that will be useful for just about anybody... such as hiring a remote personal assistant to do your research, or only checking email at noon and 4pm.

He also has a compelling argument against retirement. Gone are the days when you would hope to stay with your company for 40 years, or even 10! Work from home, and you'll probably be more productive. That lets you work fewer hours, or from a location with a better currency exchange rate. This gives you the luxury to travel, and learn incredible new things.

Once you do this, you can quit your job every few years and take a mini-retirement. The rat race will be there when you get back, or you can just start your own company. As long as you have an amazing life experience under your belt -- travel to Africa, learn Chinese, or study in Europe -- recruiters will probably overlook the employment gap. And such experiences are nowhere near

Mini-retirements are more difficult in the US, where we are without universal health care... but if you're young, in good health, and shop around, its not a problem.