To paraphrase Steve Martin, it is easy to earn a billion dollars tax free. All you have to do is get yourself a billion dollars and then dont pay the tax. How will anyone ever know?

Now I dont want to speak out against paying taxes but we can talk about getting yourself a billion dollars. The first thing you need to know is that it is a darned near impossible dream. There are over six billion people on Earth and about seven hundred of them are billionaires. True, the odds increase if you count their spouses and children, but still it is clearly not an easy thing to achieve.

When thinking about just how extreme a task this is think about the easiest way to make money. Stealing. That is, after all, what the joke implies. Now think about where you could possibly steal a billion dollars from. What could you steal and sell for a billion dollars? Not a heck of a lot comes to mind. Really, its that much money.

But it has been done and therefore can be done. The key is to find your niche and make it work for you as best as it can. Further more, you need to find something that is no one elses niche. The more people who want to achieve billionaire status the way you want to achieve it, the less likely it would happen.

Take software for instance. A decade ago that was the key. Microsoft made some billionaires as did Google. The market is still very vast but it is also flooded and the chances of finding something unique enough to capture that much of the market is no longer very likely.

The same is true for the retail world. When Walmart started up it was a relatively unique way of shopping. Its business plan was solid and consumers were very much into the attitude of the store so much so that it is still growing. Stores that have copied that format may have done well, but they havent churned out many billionaire owners.

If youre like me and are finding it discouraging to come up with that killer original idea you can always keep your eyes open for other peoples. There have been a lot of successful investors over the years who have latched on to the right idea and took it for a ride to billionaire status. Some are able to spot something before it becomes a shooting trend while others make fortunes by investing in secure, non trendy, traditional stocks that go up, though slower.

I think the best idea for most of us is to aim to be multi millionaires first. Achieve this through a good selection of ever growing solid investments on the stock market and in real estate. Once you have secured yourself a hundred million or so then turning it in to a billion shouldnt be much trouble at all.