Robert Kiyosaki
The author presents himself as a character in the book by speaking in the first person and relating personal stories for the purpose of making an analogy and situating the lessons he learned as knowledge to be shared. He discusses financial advice through the literary conceit of having a rich father and a poor father.
The Rich Dad
This man influenced the author from the age of 9 to 39 and is actually the father of his childhood friend, Mike. Mike’s dad owns a chain of superettes, which was the mid-century precursor to the convenience stores of today. Though he never even finished 8th grade in school, Mike's father would become one of the richest men in the state of Hawaii, bequeathing a vast fortune at his death. His financial advice is starkly different from the poor dad and was highly influential on the author.
The Poor Dad
Kiyosaki’s actual biological father is his “poor dad” despite being highly educated with a doctorate and advanced studies conducted as such prestigious institutions as Stanford and the University of Chicago. Eventually, he became Hawaii’s Superintendent of Education, but in contrast to the “rich dad” would leave behind outstanding debts at his death.
Mike
Mike is an important character as well—especially in the first half of the book—as the author details his youth growing up among two conflicting economic ideologies. Mike is the beneficiary of his father’s financial lessons as well as the author and in a way the book is a narrative of how they each carried out the lessons of the “rich dad.”
Mrs. Martin
Mrs. Martin is the kind, but tough taskmaster who works for Mike’s dad and offers a position to the author for ten cents an hour. The experience is brief, but informative and illuminating, and this first lesson in what it means to actually work for a living and become one of the exploited masses gets is set in tone. As things turn out, the low wage was part of a grander scheme by Mike’s dad to teach the author such a valuable lesson in real-world economics, and the experience will resonate throughout the rest of the text.
