Let's Get Rich! Let's go Work in the Mines!

The new year is coming up, with new year resolutions and time for reflection and discussion. I guess there will be a good many Australians considering that a career change into the mining industry might be a fast-track to financial security. My experience tells me otherwise. I have a very limited social circle, but amongst it are no less than three people who have all spent the better part of their working lives working in remote locations in the Australian mining industry. They all have little or nothing to show for it financially. None of them are comfortably retired. Between them they have produced only one child, one is divorced, one married late in life, and one has apparently had bad relationship experiences.

So is there any fast-track to riches? I know of two pathways - inherit a stack of loot, or marry it. That's life!