Jay-Z: Drug dealing taught me the art of making millions

Forget The Apprentice, Jay-Z says he leaed all he needed to know about being an entrepreneur during his drug-dealing days.

The rapper revealed his do-or-die deals on the streets allowed him to master the art of a quick-exit strategy. However, the star now admits his conscience has crept up on him after fuelling addicts to make ends meet.

‘I know about budgets. I was a drug dealer,’ said the hip hop mogul after he doled out the drugs on the streets of Brooklyn in the 80s.

‘To be in a drug deal, you need to know what you can spend, what you need to re-up,’ said the 43-year-old, who admitted he toyed with the idea of becoming a barber or working in a carwash before the lure of dealing snared him.

‘You have to have an exit strategy, because your window [for dealing drugs] is very small. You’re going to get locked up or you’re going to die.’

Estimated to be worth an estimated $486 million today, the 99 Problems singer admitted he didn’t care at the time about whose life he ruined as he started out making his fortune by selling on the streets.

‘Not until later, when I realised the effects on the community, I started looking at the community on the whole. But in the beginning, no,’ he told Vanity Fair.

‘I was thinking about surviving. I was thinking about improving my situation. I was thinking about buying clothes.’