I talked today with Terry Savage, Emmy-winning CNN commentator and bestselling author of The Savage Number and The Savage Truth on Money. She said something fascinating: “The baby boomers are the first generation who are completely responsible for their own retirement planning. The reality has changed, and we’re the first generation to go through it.”

In The World Is Flat (2005), Thomas L. Friedman made the point that for the first time in history, an individual can conduct business globally. In the past, that was a capacity reserved for kingdoms, armies or corporations. Today, a teenager from Piscataway can manage a global empire from his desktop, laptop or phonetop.

In The Third Wave (1980), Alvin Toffler coined the term “prosumer” and made the point that the roles of consumer and producer were beginning to blur. (Toffler later claimed that his book was the #2 best-selling book of all time in China, coming only after The Sayings of Chairman Mao.) His latest, the 2006 book Revolutionary Wealth, chronicled just how far that prediction has come true.

Hmm. Put those three converging trends together, and what do you have? A compelling convergence of trends supporting this thing called network marketing.

Update: according to 2006 data, network marketing is a $109 billion industry, making it an economic bloc roughly the size of Egypt or Hungary, with a worldwide force numbering about 59 million, equivalent to the population of Italy or the United Kingdom. Looks like we are becoming a decent-sized country.