Tony Robbins' tips on achieving your financial peak
From President Clinton to Serena Williams, some of the world's most successful people have turned to life and business strategist Tony Robbins for advice for more than three decades.
Robbins' 2006 TED Talk on finding fulfillment and maximizing potential has racked up more than 15 million views online. The New York Times best-selling author says he was inspired to help others achieve their peak in finance when he saw the toll of the 2008 economic crisis.
"When I saw so many people losing half of all they developed for a lifetime -- their retirement or their homes -- it wasn't statistics to me because I grew up in a tough environment," Robbins said on "CBS This Morning" Thursday. "I got mad, and I said, 'I have access, so I've got to find solutions.'"
He sought out the "50 most successful financial people on earth," he said, finding out how they built up from having nothing, which became the inspiration for his book, "Money: Master The Game," published by Simon & Schuster, a division of CBS.
Robbins revealed some common financial misconceptions, including one about the $4.4 trillion 401(k) industry, which he said has profited from hidden costs over a period of 30 years.
According to the National Association of Retirement Plan Participants, 58 percent of Americans don't know they pay fees and only 26 percent understand how fees are calculated.
"Only three years ago, the Department of Labor changed the rules and said you've got to tell people what you charge," said Robbins. "Now they do that by giving a 35- or 50-page disclosure document that if you have a Ph.D. in finance maybe you can figure out the hidden fees."
Citing the startling statistic that 1 in 3 Americans have a thousand dollars saved for retirement, Robbins said that "one little change" could have a gigantic difference -- even something as simple as choosing pizza delivery over restaurants.
"If you -- one night a week, instead of going out -- had pizza instead, saved yourself $40, doesn't look like much, but you do that for a month, you do that for a year, that's $2,000," he said.
Robbins -- who has interviewed top financial experts such as Warren Buffett and David Swenson -- also said the world's most successful individuals have one thing in common: hunger.
"People are hungry to lose weight, they're hungry for stuff for a moment," he said. "But people that haven't lost their hunger, they're always driven, they want to learn more, they want to give more, they want to do more. There's no greater gift than hunger, and if you don't have it, you want to reignite it."