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Email this3:45 pm
April 6, 2013
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An interesting essay about focusing on things that don't change. Mentioned by Globe & Mail market strategist Scott Barlow:
5:46 pm
March 17, 2018
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Norman1 said
An interesting essay about focusing on things that don't change. Mentioned by Globe & Mail market strategist Scott Barlow:
Thanks for the link! Interesting !
@Peter why can't you enable linking so one can paste a link and then others can click on a link and the page opens in a new tab ?
5:58 pm
April 6, 2013
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I prefer the current treatment of links.
If one wishes to open in a new tab or a new window, then one can either hold the control key or the shift key down when clicking the link.
6:01 pm
October 27, 2013
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Or right click on the mouse and select what you want, e.g. new tab, new window, etc.
Works perfectly fine.
Article is mentioned in the G&M as well
5:30 am
September 11, 2013
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Not sure I share the reassuring message, seems like a promo for buying stocks. Crazy to me to equate the last 100 years or so of western civilization with universal truths about incredible diversity of ways people have lived in countless non-capitalism societies (plus Rome, indigenous, countless other "kingdoms" have fallen + life changed for the worse for sometimes very long periods of time for most people in those situations), but I do acknowledge it's a bit reassuring that the American salesman optimistic selling hope spirit expressed is still out there these days.
9:07 pm
April 6, 2013
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One of the points of the essay is to look beyond the diversity of situations and find the things that don't change.
Amazon founder Jeff Bezos pointed out that trying to determine how Amazon would develop and evolve its business in the coming decades is not as productive as spending the same effort on something that would not be changing any time soon: Online customers wanting low prices and fast delivery.
People worried about the end of the world in the 1970's just as they do now. Back then, it was nuclear annihilation and a resulting nuclear winter. Now, it is global warming from our carbon footprints. In between, I think the world was supposed to end when the Mayan calendar rolled over. 
5:51 am
September 11, 2013
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True, Buffet invests partly based on just looking around him and observing what people are buying, what are the constants in our lives.
World is not ending, humanity in some form will always prevail. What is VERY different from a few decades ago is the general agreement that capitalism has been bad for the world and thus is being dismantled, perhaps with the entire civilization that spawned it. Ask on here if large corporations are to be supported and promoted. VERY different attitude from what people thought in, say, 1950s. And, VERY bad news for stock market investors, in my view. And some younger folks who might not be as aware of this recent societal shift in attitude are listening to older folks for investment advice, so all I'm saying is I don't see the future for Wall Street, etc at all resembling the last 7 decades.
But, no , humanity is far from done. As long as we have weapons we rule.
2:49 pm
April 6, 2013
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Large successful corporations don't need to be supported by corporate welfare. They do just fine on their own.
The world is not that different. Ideology is an indulgence that one quickly loses once one gets to a point in life that one faces the day-to-day impact of that indulgence.
Those noisy anti-corporate protests against Walmart and the big banks, for example, won't resonate much when Walmart decides to close its local store or when the last "evil" Big 5 Bank branch closes in town.
It is similar with the credit union hype. I mentioned one person's epiphany that he had after reaching a point in his life where he needed loans for his family and for his business. Faith and ideology doesn't qualify one for a loan, mortgage, or line of credit.
I asked one family member why he continues to bank with the Royal Bank with the high account service fees. Apparently, way back, Royal Bank was the one that gave him the line of credit for his small business after other financial institutions in town declined. Decades later, he hasn't forgotten that.
As well, none of the criticisms have any impact on the relationship between equity returns and fixed income returns. Smart businesses won't issue bonds or borrow from a bank at 3% per annum unless it can earn at least 2X that or 6% on that money. The choice for the investor has always been whether to fund the loan for 3% per annum or buy an interest in the business for 6%+.
7:02 am
December 12, 2009
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Briguy said
Thanks for the link! Interesting !
@Peter why can't you enable linking so one can paste a link and then others can click on a link and the page opens in a new tab ?
What do you mean? If you paste a link and don't use the "link" button, it's automatically linked, as far as I know? I use it all the time.
As far as the latter, that's not a situation unique to HighInterestSavings.ca. Peter could make the default link handling that, when left-clicked, all links on the forum open in a new tab, but others may not like that. Anyone can make their links open in a new tab, though, on posts they create by adding target="_blank" to the end of your HTML link code.
I have had to train myself to automatically open all external links by right-clicking on them and selecting "open link in a new web browser tab" as most websites, indeed, open them in the current tab. It was a bit annoying the first couple weeks, but it is old hat now. 
Cheers,
Doug
10:11 am
September 11, 2013
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Norman1, I agree aging has an impact on one's views, for most anyway.
And I wasn't talking about corporate welfare, I agree it's not needed, but what corporations, and business in general, absolutely cannot survive without is stability and security. A general atmosphere of unrest changes the risk-reward calculation, and other options begin to looker rosier.
Just one little example: When protesters begin to tear down statues or blockade national railways (this stuff didn't happen decades ago), and (this is really the more important part) they are supported by the general population and the law enforcement folks do not or cannot prevent them, that location automatically becomes less desirable for businesses, corporations. That's what I'm referring to, the relatively recent but constant general "activism" supported by the general population which regurgitates mantras like "systemic change is needed". All well and good, we are wonderful, enlightened, modern people, but it's a development over the last few years that makes me not as assured as I used to be that I want to be part-owner of any businesses (i.e. be in the stock market) located there. I'm assuming I'm not the only one who feels that way, so that's why I'm not at all sure the market success of the past 70 years should be considered a blueprint for its future. The whole society has shifted a lot over my lifetime, and it would be foolhardy for a young investor to ignore that change in social atmosphere, in my view. Royal Bank et al do not operate in a bubble, separate from what's going on in society.
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