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I know I am late to the game on this. I see a playstation as a poor investment and a great way to take your cash. If it were just buying the game deck that would be one thing. How many games do you need to buy? My brother in law has maybe 5 game systems and I couldn't count how many games he has. Figure the cost of those games and I bet he could fund his retirement. He also spends money on CD's, DVD's, and all the electronic toys imaginable. By the way those things are made in China where all those jobs that we don't have here ended up.
How is it possible to complain about jobs being sent to China and say that the 401K's owners financed them without saying that those that purchase items from China are not also financing those jobs? The truth is that I could care less where something is made if some other nation can do it more efficiently than we can. That is how the market works. The truth is we are not in the same market anymore. The US has switched to a knoweldge based economy. People that use their brain make the money now. We produce and sell content. We produce and sell assets that are not manufactiured. Look at Silicon Valley. Our greatest asset their is knowledge and not manufacturing. The speed at which information travels and how it is transfered from one source to another is what we do now. Jobs that pay the most and where people are making the most money does not come from manufacturing.
I know I am late to the game on this. I see a playstation as a poor investment and a great way to take your cash. If it were just buying the game deck that would be one thing. How many games do you need to buy? My brother in law has maybe 5 game systems and I couldn't count how many games he has. Figure the cost of those games and I bet he could fund his retirement. He also spends money on CD's, DVD's, and all the electronic toys imaginable. By the way those things are made in China where all those jobs that we don't have here ended up.
How is it possible to complain about jobs being sent to China and say that the 401K's owners financed them without saying that those that purchase items from China are not also financing those jobs? The truth is that I could care less where something is made if some other nation can do it more efficiently than we can. That is how the market works. The truth is we are not in the same market anymore. The US has switched to a knoweldge based economy. People that use their brain make the money now. We produce and sell content. We produce and sell assets that are not manufactiured. Look at Silicon Valley. Our greatest asset their is knowledge and not manufacturing. The speed at which information travels and how it is transfered from one source to another is what we do now. Jobs that pay the most and where people are making the most money does not come from manufacturing.
Information transfer technology is NOT inherently valuable. Look at facebook, none of that information has instrinsic value. It's advertisement fodder for what? That's right, REAL chit. Just like trying to prop up an economy on housing, so is basing the wealth of a labor force by their willingness to pay for the recreational transfer of information (the bulk of telecommunications/broadband and internet usage). Bunch of people running around texting each other FAIL-pics and LOLing ad nauseam can't possibly sustain an economy. Knowledge based economy is a bogus as the service economy. Someone has to make a wrench and/or turn a wrench up in here in order for that level of discretionary economic activity to exist. I'm afraid the chicken came before the egg on this one. Housing,facebook, texting and knowledge jobs are derivatives of real prodcuction, NOT enablers and precursors of real production.
America is such a cartoon. 305 million people up here and everybody got told the way to make a living is to steer the boat and no one is willing (or able) to row it. A country of self-declared Chiefs and no indians.... pff.
America is such a cartoon. 305 million people up here and everybody got told the way to make a living is to steer the boat and no one is willing (or able) to row it. A country of self-declared Chiefs and no indians.... pff.
I'm thinking in similar terms, except the "indians" (no pun intended) live in third world countries and we're the supposed "chiefs".. at least that's how the global economy is "supposed" to work for us. Whether it'll function we'll find out in a few years...
Microsoft is a company that transfers information. They create a program and can sell that information millions of times. The companies that build things run on Microsoft bases products.
Cisco Systems is a company that transfers information. They do a similar thing that Microsoft does. The business model is the same for many many more companies. The product that is produced is a viable product that many want. The product is also virtual in nature but it still is information that is bought and sold.
People are making a lot of money creating things that people want to buy. The thing is that those things are called apps. People are willing to shell out real money for apps that they can use. Someone created those apps and sells them to those that want to buy them. who cares if the product is something that you can't hold in your hand.
I know I am late to the game on this. I see a playstation as a poor investment and a great way to take your cash. If it were just buying the game deck that would be one thing. How many games do you need to buy? My brother in law has maybe 5 game systems and I couldn't count how many games he has. Figure the cost of those games and I bet he could fund his retirement. He also spends money on CD's, DVD's, and all the electronic toys imaginable. By the way those things are made in China where all those jobs that we don't have here ended up.
How is it possible to complain about jobs being sent to China and say that the 401K's owners financed them without saying that those that purchase items from China are not also financing those jobs? The truth is that I could care less where something is made if some other nation can do it more efficiently than we can. That is how the market works. The truth is we are not in the same market anymore. The US has switched to a knoweldge based economy. People that use their brain make the money now. We produce and sell content. We produce and sell assets that are not manufactiured. Look at Silicon Valley. Our greatest asset their is knowledge and not manufacturing. The speed at which information travels and how it is transfered from one source to another is what we do now. Jobs that pay the most and where people are making the most money does not come from manufacturing.
For some people entertainment is a big thing and what they live for, for others it is a waist of time. Myself I don't have much of any budget at all and so I just play go. The money that went into the stock market didn't go into banks. Putting money into banks tends to push towards more exports and less imports. Back in the 1080’s you were at the start of a big run in the Dow. It did a 15X to one run. Stocks were a very tempting thing to invest it. Putting the same amount of money into CD’s in banks would get you less return monetarily but far bigger return in the long term health of the economy. Getting everyone to put money into the Dow pushed the Dow higher. http://blogs.reuters.com/rolfe-winkl...ow-vs-gold.jpg See where the Dow started its run up? Someone won a Noble prize for proving that it doesn’t matter where the money comes from for investment. That borrowing works as well as saving. I disagree with this assessment. Capital that comes from savings has different emotions attached to it. Possessiveness and longer-term thinking. If you borrow money to get the start up capital and they borrowed it from someone else then you need fast quick profits. Selling stuff is fast and quick. If you save then you have a bigger stake in the outcome, particularly if you save and don’t lever up. If you have a cash position in a company you can look at how it is going to do when you retire not what it is doing this quarter. That is what is wrong with saying that it doesn’t matter if you borrow or save for the start up money for a venture.
Making stuff is what most people need to be doing. Who does the service economy service?
Just because a company makes something that is not manufactured like a car or TV doesn't mean that it is a bad product. If a company can sell information and makes a profit then that is a great company. We do make stuff just not the same stuff that we used to make. The idea that we the people need to sit in a factory pounding some item out is an idea that has seen its time. Others can do that for far less than we can. Today information is power. We are not talking about the service economy as you are correct that is something that people spend money on and doesn't produce something of value.
Here is an example. Health care cost are very high. So what would you do about that? Let me explain what is happening with that to keep cost down. Today all of your medical information is online. Your xrays are online. We don't process that stuff like they used to. It hits the computer the time it is taken and your Doctor can access that information anywhere in the world. When you are admitted to the hospital your medical staff enters everything that happens to you as it happens. It is entered on an electronic charting system. Some have iPads, computers in the room, and many other sources of transfering your medical care information to those who need it in real time. The bed that you lay in also sends information on weight, body movement, temperature, and many other things. When a lab tech takes your blood or some other kind of sample that information is placed on a machine that takes it to differant systems that find out what is needed and transfers that data back to the virtual chart that your caregivers can access in real time.
If surgery is needed a Surgeon can access a machine called a Davinci Surgical Robot and with as few people as 3 in the surgical room they can do what is needed to complete the surgery and the Doctor can be anywhere on the planet when that surgery is taking place. Everything I mentioned is happening today. All these things are information based and the people that create them and work for the companies that build them are part of the information economy that is growing at an amazing rate.
I know you will say that the cost of healtcare is still high. Guess what? If these information based systems weren't developed hospitals would have to hire even more people than they do now. As it is many departments within the hospitals have been able to scale back employment figures in deparments that don't have as strong a need for employees while other departments such as IS have quadrupled in size.
Another point, if stocks are bad why is it that the wealthy hold onto them? Why is it that people like Warren Buffett have large positions in companies? Don't you think that if he could make more he would place the majority of his funds in the bond market?
There are still lot of rich people but the value has gone down because of the real estate and the stock market.
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Originally Posted by Chango
There seems to be more and more of it as time goes on. It's seriously amazing to see how things changed so fast.
I work for the Government and regularly dealt with "do you know who I am?" folks... you know the type, the "supersize my life" McMansion and chromed Hummer crowd that has virtually disappeared in the last three years. No one has used that line with me since 2008; seriously.
These days, if you are wealthy you are scorned and shamed and demonized and joked about like never before in this country. It's as if everyone with a positive bank account suddenly became a ridicule-worthy clown like this:
I don't consider myself to be rich, but I come from a family that is. Their crowd seems to have switched their Mercedes and Cadillacs for Toyotas and Chevys, their vacations are now to Colorado or California instead of Europe or Bali, even though they really aren't any poorer than they were back in the glory days of conspicuous consumption. They seem to try very hard to not stand out anymore.
So am I just imagining this? Is being rich bad for your health these days? It's just amazing to me that we went from "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous" to the French Revolution mentality in only a couple of years... and the trend seems to show no signs of slowing. Maybe it isn't a bad thing, but then again, maybe it is... whatdayathink?
government retirees. cops, teachers and social workers, most hated and coveted people in america.
those that didnt die from a heart attack or get murdered got the pension and the people that they served 30 years hate them just hate them for it.
many envy what i have, none what i had to do to get it.
when you have slain the dragon,
the village does not in fact turn out to cheer
and the beautiful princess does not in fact fall in love with you
Rich people also keep a low profile so no one would know how much he/she has.
Funny you should say that. We have a friend that owns a chain of resteraunts. His places are in California, Hawaii, Nevada, Florida, and he is putting one in Washington D.C. The guy has done well for himself, has homes in Hawaii, California, and in Las Vegas. When he goes out he never tells people what he has. My brother and him will hit up a club and things are fine till my brother starts drinking. When he gets lit up he tells everyone that his friend is paying because he is has more money than all of them. we were at this party one time talking about this. Our friend says he hates it when my brother starts doing that. My brother has his own money so he should pay. LOL
Another thing is he had to move because his family would hit up one of his places and say hay cousin your going to take care of the tab right? Just because someone has built their wealth why should they have to take care of every little family member and friend all the time?
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