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Three Strategies To Make Your Life Easier As Times Get Harder
Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith of OfTwoMinds blog,
No risk, no gain. But risk can deliver staggering, crushing losses if it isn't limited or hedged.
Times are going to get harder going forward, for all the reasons that are already visible in today's headlines. So what can we do to make our own lives easier as times get tougher? Here are three suggested strategies:
1. Don't get enmeshed with dysfunctional people, families or businesses. When we're young, we're adept at making excuses for people in dysfunctional families and enterprises. We expect them to work their way out of their dysfunctions. We think we can help in this process.
Alas, we can't. People usually can't rid themselves of dysfunction without an extraordinary effort. Getting enmeshed with a dysfunctional person/family/business can only drag you down. The only way to avoid the mess is to avoid the dysfunctional person/family/business in the first place. Wish them well and get out.
2. Be fanatical about reducing fixed costs. This sounds so obvious, but it's really the key to surviving hard times and building productive wealth, i.e. the kind that yields income, rain or shine.
Remarkably, people may acknowledge this in an abstract fashion but few actually live by it. The vast majority let their fixed costs rise with their income. Businesses move to pricier digs once they start feeling flush, and people move up to costlier vehicles, homes, clothing, vacations, etc.
The ideal business has been stripped of fixed costs. For example: rent on home office: zero. Labor overhead: zero, if you hire only other free-lancers-contractors.
Management guru Peter Drucker made the point about reducing fixed costs another way. He famously noted that "businesses don't have profits, all they have is costs." (a paraphrase)
In other words, there's no guarantee of additional revenues/sales or profits; all we know for sure is our fixed costs, i.e. what we have to pay monthly even if our revenues are zero.
Some fixed costs rise despite our fanatic focus. Healthcare costs rise until we qualify for Medicare. That's a given. Our only way to reduce healthcare costs is be fanatical about being healthy.
Servicing debt is a fixed cost. You have to service the debt whether you're making money or not. So eliminating debt is one critical way to reduce fixed costs.
Frugality is exceedingly useful, but frugality is not quite the same as being fanatical about reducing fixed costs. Understanding the difference is an important part of this strategy.
3. Learn how to calculate and manage risk. Risk is the ultimate yin/yang. If you don't take any risks, you're limited to a salary: the employer takes the risk and rewards, you get the salary and no upside.
But if you take a risk, you can lose the gamble: the investment, the job, the house, the enterprise.
You want to score a ten-bagger (ten-fold increase) in the stock market? Well, belly up to the roulette wheel, because most of the bets that pay off that big are extraordinarily risky.
There is no way to eliminate risk. Life is risk. Doing great things requires taking risks. The "safe way" offloads risk and reward to others. You want the big reward, you have to take the big risk.
When the tide is raising all boats, it's remarkably easy to rank yourself as a genius who manages risk effortlessly. Rising tides are not a good test. Its the ebb tide, when every investment is crashing in value, that tests risk management.
It boils dowm to this: understand the risks you're taking (especially when your mutual fund manager assures you everything in your fund is low-risk) and set limits on the risks you're taking on.
No risk, no gain. But risk can deliver staggering, crushing losses if it isn't limited or hedged (and hedges have limits, too). Anything else is illusion. This will become evident to all within the next decade as all the "sure things" melt into thin air.
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Make your life easier? Get a goobermint job. Aspire to nothing rather than something useful.
That's the problem Charles. Sitting on your ass screwing up productive people pays very well.
Government is evil.
I got to experience the pinnacle of us government yesterday! flying home w/family after my virtual strip search the blue-shirted rocket surgeon stops me & asks if I'm wearing a necklace. this surprised me not merely b/c I wasn't but b/c I was wearing a tight-fitting dryfit tennis shirt though which one would have been rather obvious so I pulled my collar down a few inches & said: "do I look like I'm wearing a necklace?" to which he replied: "well, the machine detected something around your neckline so I have to pat you down there"
serious ?: in the entire ignominious history of the united states government has there ever been a bigger farce, an agency more a spoof/caricature of its very self than tsa? and think about it - that's a pretty damn high bar to clear! & what do parents/siblings of them tell their friends? lie & say they're a meth cook? think about it: what job would you be more embarrassed/ashamed to say you had at a class reunion? "hey, joey, didn't I see you in a blue shirt at hartsfield a few weeks ago?" "nah, man, I just mop up the pee off the floor under the urinals in the rest rooms! I may work around guys' members but I don't grab them! I'm not a professional grouper!"
"This will become evident to all within the next decade as all the "sure things" melt into thin air."
I personally continue to wait for the moment when JGBs and USTs reach their true value. The idea that this paper represents a positive on anyone's ledger never ceases to amaze me.
Yes, CHS ruins a good article with that moronic conclusion. NOW is the time that asset values are mis-priced and sure things are most unsure/risky.
IF and when there is a crash, there will be bargains galore and risk will be at it's most manageable/smallest. In the months after, the surviving companies will be evident. No need to waste time on watch lists now.
what is in store is israel attacking iran.
there will be instant oil cost rise, so get your house tank filled, if they dont attack on the 28th. disruptions caused by false flags and random unscrripted acts, will only contribute to the coming problem of less availability and increased costs.
buying non perishable items 6 months in advance or more is a good investment as the prices will be rising. So there is a good investment that you can do the day after israel attacks iran. We are at peak bottom of prices for stuff if that war starts,
You are soooo full of absolute shit, it is almost impossible to figure where to start on your insane bullshit.
Go Away,
Fuck off,
and Leave Us All Alone.
Thank you.
Last time I flew, I got the boobie grope and thigh rub because I had a barrette in my hair. Those ridiculous fucking TSA pervs are so stupid, I wouldn't let one walk my dog.
Logged just to say 'What an epicly succinct and accurate statement. +1. Thanks Kaiser for being me for a moment.
Almost all my troubles come from the resistance that occurs when I try doing good things (like productive things of a tremendous variety). Like the legal theives they are, they are attracted to anything productive for the purpose of crushing it out of existence.
Truthy, thats what that is.
Z
Learn to enjoy the decline.
and make money on it :)
"Learn to enjoy the decline." Bingo.
Rule #32 Enjoy the iittle things
like reading the Koran or learning to speak Spanish...
beautiful
Natural Selection, Communism & History
Empires spend all their time in communism, writing History, usually pretending to be something else. China beat America because the Chinese are far more efficient communists. America, a young empire on the margin, wasted all its resources pretending that it wasn’t a communist State, with republican and democrat gangs taking turns fleecing their followers in the actuarial Ponzi. Wall Street is just a transmission mechanism, with its own gang specializing in the process. Look at the holdings of the Roosevelts in China.
Fair treatment based upon merit in a market feedback loop is one thing; equal treatment regardless of merit with a communist feedback loop is another. Of course those who fear nature, the superstitious, are going to end up in the latter, seeing the former as the enemy. If you want to identify a communist just start talking about natural selection. The empire’s infrastructure doesn’t deliver the participants from climate-controlled box to climate-controlled box by accident, with ever cheaper juvenile toys as prizes for compliance.
If Fred produces 2X what John produces and is paid the same, the next day Fred is going to cut production. Likewise, if John is producing 2X what Paul is producing for the same pay, John is going to cut production. Communism is a race to the bottom and what you end up with is a hierarchical system of gangs, specializing in the forms of extortion required to maintain system stability, until the forces of nature blow the crystal up.
The only difference between the homeless shelter, the union hall and the executive boardroom is the gang you belong to. The corporations print revenue for each employee they can get to join the Ponzi gang, and minimize the cost of each to maximize paper profit, which they expense off in trades to each other, to avoid taxation. When you get on a plane, go play golf, and then eat a steak dinner, before going to bed at the Hilton, do you get a tax deduction? Do you get a tax credit for being stupid? Do you really think that Carly is an outsider, or an insider posing as an outsider?
The problemsolution of course is that China, Russia and America won nothing, but the opportunity to write History, for stupid to follow. For the communists, income inequality is the problem and the solution, in a rigged lottery. The continuous game of 52-card pickup is just make-work to keep the participants coming in at the bottom of the Ponzi busy and misdirected. If you give communist corporations a tax credit for hiring stupid, what is going to happen to the workforce?
It’s easy to get lost in the trees if you don’t know what the forest looks like, which is exactly what the communist leaders, who don’t know themselves, want, catching themselves in their own catch-22 every time. Bernanke had the easy part, extending Greenspan’s curve. Yellen is the deer in the headlights now, in charge of making the Fed out to be the all-powerful Oz in this little story, for the critters remaining in the Ponzi, crushing themselves.
If you think the majority, which already lives on credit, is going to rebel against NIRP, you are sadly mistaken. No one ratchets real estate inflation like Silicon Valley, its real job, mowing down people, but biotech gave it a good try, and Boeing and Qualcomm are close. Their problem is that morons having children to feed University is self-limiting, and you can always cut the cable to make-believe choices offered by the empire, the herd in the counterweight.
No; we are not all equivalent and replaceable, operating in a scale economy. Some of us even marry and have children, which are not equivalent and replaceable. Surprise. Hedging against stupid is a waste of time. Bet on yourself and learn. You are not here by accident, and the planet is not unaware of your existence. The planet itself is a scale, in scale of scales.
Yada, Yada, Yada . . .
Say something useful for once, instead
of blathering on with your usual bullshit.
Please.
4. Stay physically fit and marry a rich woman.
I had girlfriends in the past that had a very rich family and believe me, it's the way to ruin your life.
It's normal that a woman gets a rich husband but the other way arround... that family will try to ruin your life on a constant basis.
Stay fit, make sure you can walk 40 miles a day and have liquid assets so you can pick up your shit in a backpack and start over in a place where the world is still normal.
If shit gets real here, I'm not waiting it out. I'll be gone pretty damn fast.
I had some wealthy ones too...what a nightmare. We would go to Hawaii and she would charter a private helicopter for the day...boring...and a workaholic. And when I was with her at meetings it meant a suit. No thanks. You can take an independant woman and shove it. Not interested.
...ditto...independent women are striving to men, no thanks.
A gal I know works at Google, is way up in their hierarchy was bemoaning ot me "...I make $235k oer year and cannot make ends meet."
The kicker? She just stiffed me $285. Makes perfect sense.
I give American shemales a skip. Gimme kon Tai!
"I'll be gone pretty damn fast"
Well, the last place you want to be is in an urban area, but truth to tell, you can't be gone. The collapse will happen everywhere. Best place, as Chris Martensen has been saying for years, is a small community where people know each other and can help each other. Beyond that, or a large property in a rural area with a small group of people, there is nowhere to go.
That's what I did, 20 yrs ago ....
One thing though -> Happy wife = Happy life ! ! !
Don't try it the other way, don't work .......
Bullshit.
That phrase only developed in the last couple decades due to feminism and de-masulation. These days to make a wife happy you may have to give up your soul and every part of yourself (obviously depending), as I almost did before i got the F out.
Yea, fuck that shit. Whipped beta males with their balls in some bitch's purse like to say that. Feminism is already dead because there are no white countries left and non-whites do not respect women at all. Rape of white women is not even a crime that gets prosecuted in Europe at this point.
Patriarchy is returning. White men need to get on board the Patriarchy train now rather than later when Muslims conquer Europe via breeding and immigration.
If you respect women you're a beta male. Never forget that women voted for mass non-white immigration of Muslims that are raping them daily. They say they want respect and feminism but their actions say otherwise. Women are nothing and their only value lies in physical beauty and making babies. Whatever "rights" women had were privileges granted by men. Men are tired of the bitching and bullshit so we're taking away "women's rights." And there's nothing they can or ever could do about it (withholding sex is not an option when you can't leave the house without being raped, i.e. Europe and much of North America).
Yep. To have a happy wife, MAN UP AND LEAD HER. Women hate weak wussy men, who act all nice and subservient to them. The proof is they fall in love with criminals, muzzies and brown people who have a culture of male dominance.
Feminists are just self-deluded political activists who spew bullshit.
Women want to get impregnated by alphas (for alpha offspring), but want betas for raising the kids and support (who they can control)...this has been pretty well proven by research into who it is women find attractive durning ovulation (alphas) and when they are not ovulating (betas).
Probably don't agree with everything, but what I'm saying is be happy yourself. Don't expect anyone else to "make" you happy. That especially applies to women in my mind.
I have a daughter and don't condone male control (can never be 2 leaders in a family), but I do teach her to respect everyone, and make herself happy and do what she likes. No one will make her happy. She has to make herself happy and surround herself with people the same way.
BTW - in accordance to the article, my ex was part of a majorly dysfunctional family... so yes, cut the cord away from that type of person or it'll take you down too, no matter how strong you are.
How any man on the internet doesn't read Roissy, Roosh etc. is beyond me. Viva La Manosphere!
Stopped reading Roosh and his pack of faux alphas when he sold out to the Kratom sponsors and cooked up that bullshit neomasculinty and picked a fight with MGTOWs everywhere with his faggoty shaming tactics.
A lot of those guys are just degenerate sex addicts devoid of any sense of morality whatsoever. The real "red pill" isn't fucking dozens of skanks and staying childless, single, and pathetic. The real red pill is having a good wife that knows her place in the family and lots of white children. These "pick up artist" types from the "manosphere" blogs are just degenerate sex addicts that have nothing to contribute to society.
Remember, Patriarchy is about building, controlling, dominating society and shaping the future. Being some degenerate going out to night clubs every night to pick up random skanks is hardly behavior worth emulating or any way to build a society. It's really just a reaction to the degeneracy of feminism and women's liberation (easy women, easy divorce). Being proactive against the degeneracy of feminism/communism/Leftism will destroy women's liberation (whore culture) and restore the family as the core of society (1 man + 1 woman). Childless people shouldn't be allowed to vote and their opinions are irrelevant because they have no stake in the future of their society.
Dude,
You are totally sick.
Cash in your chip and just go away.
Pathetic.
ain't that the truth
anyone who "respects" women is a total faggot
Badge wearing Misogynist and Homophobe all in one.
Seems a little contradictory to me. Obviously there are no women in your life (sane ones at least) and you've dismissed the faggots too ... I'm guessing a guy like you would never admit to masturbating either - must be hauling some serious blue balls.
Life without women would be meaningless and horrible .. devoid of any real pleasure - what else is there given you can't have a family without at least one. Respecting women does not mean subverting to them. Just like respecting your right to hold any opinion you like and speak your mind does not mean we'll be associating or sharing a beer any time soon.
An unhappy wife will make every effort to ensure you are at least as unhappy, more unhappy is preferable.
You could learn a lot from this nation of Men
Simple and cannot be swayed
http://i.imgur.com/elJ0Ir6.jpg
what? like written languages?
how about, "fuck you and your fucking suits"
Today that saying is true. That might be a symptom of our problems tbh. Post collapse, ANY wife will be happy if she is protected from name-your-favorite-threat-here.
Alternatively:
No wife = Happy Life.
Much easier! And you can do whatever-the-fuck you want all the time. Why in the hell would you give up your freedom to anyone? Especially someone that is going to tell you what you're allowed to do on a daily basis.
If you don't reproduce then your life has meant nothing and you are a total failure. A wife can be a fine partner but must recognize her place as second to the man in all things. Western feminist women act like men and are mostly unfit to be wives.
I guess that all of those Free Shit Army boys, fucking them whores, and them leaving them to collect off of the state, have more value than my life.
Reproduction, fucking wantonly, means everything, right Thick Willy?
Because if you do not reproduce then your life has meant nothing...
Anybody can fuck Willy...Anybody.
But it takes a man to raise children, even if they are someone else's. I have done more than my share of that Willy....more than my share.
What a demented fuck!!!
Another FSA advocate is posting here on ZH. Yay!
When your dead, who cares?
Last I checked, Christ didn't reproduce. Neither did Mother Theresa. Those damned failures; how dare they have existed. On the other hand, my cousin in Indiana has some mighty fine illiterate spawn; now that's success! A round of Brawndo; don't stint!!!!
A lot of women seem to feel the same way. See the dropping marriage rates.
I just hope that you misogynists are at least up front with the women in your lives as to what you think of them.
I read recently that men are more butthurt long term over a breakup.
Chat here tends to support that.
Personally I've been cheated on, lied to, used and abandoned but I didn't adopt the belief that all men are pricks and assholes.
Married now (second time) over 10 years.
First husband was an aspiring artist that I supported for years. When his career was looking up he decided that he should "divorce you now so you can't take half my money when I get rich". Left me with all the bills on half the income. Far as I know he never did make it big.
And, FWIW, I don't say a damn thing to my spouse about what he is "allowed to do" unless it is some serious BS that would be damaging to the family. He is the micro manager.
So says the bad wife. Your shaming tactic of crying misogyny doesn't work anymore. You are useless to red pill men.
From a poster above:
What would you call it then?
Anyone who thinks that sentiment quoted above represents a well-balanced human whose gender happens to be male is...very, very Thick.
You take your chances in life. You minimize the hassles by doing that wisely. People change over time, both you and your woman. Like the Stoics used to say, if the smoke in the room gets to be too much for you, leave the room.
For every woman who is a man-eating, demanding bitch with nothing going for her, there are probably two men with mental issues to make her look like the epitome of sanity. So what? I can't control either, I can nudge my own destiny around a bit.
I live alone after many decades of marriage because I like silence, solitude, time to think, the abilty to have the art and decor that I am comfortable with surrounding me, my own taste in clothes and cars. I can do that better without a woman trying to steer me. But I certainly don't let that become a Cause. If women don't agree with you, there's no law that says you have to hang with them.
Well, let's look at the value of women versus the value of men from a purely objective standpoint. What life IS--all life--is a biological cycle in which the chief (and only) goal is to reproduce successfully. Meaning to produce offspring to survive and thrive and who also reproduce successfully. You can theorize that life is about something else, but there isn't a whole lot of evidence that life IS something else, such as a spiritual journey, an opportunity to learn some bullshit, to gain holiness or enlightenment, or some such.
Successful reproduction is what it's all about. Hence, producing babies and shepherding them into an adulthood in which they too reproduce successfully is the purpose to which all other purposes are merely the support structure, and are pretty much secondary.
The male of our species exists to provide the material support structure (and also act as defender when necessary), since this will promote successful reproduction. And also--as with all species--to provide the second set of DNA needed to reshuffle the genetic deck.
So I'd have to say that, from a biological standpoint (which is the only objective standpoint), the male role is secondary and supportive to the female role.
Actually, there is just as much "objective evidence" that life is all about spiritual seeking, as there is evidence that it is all about reproduction. Zilch on either side. Just because a lot more reproduction happens, it doesn't follow that that is proof that it is "what things are all about." There are a whole lot of types of beetles - does that mean that life is about beetles?
There's life, and then there's conscious, self-aware life. Most life just goes along with the flow, it lives, breeds and dies. But sometimes a species makes that extra 'jump' into the next level, like us.
I see the whole Garden of Eden story that way. The 'forbidden fruit' was that higher awareness. It is tempting to think you can be more like God, but it comes with great responsibility. Like the difference between being a child and being taken care of, and being an adult and having to figure it out yourself. Little kids envy the adults, and can't wait to grow up, until they do. Then they envy the kids their innocence, but there's no going back.
The things that seem so magical when you are a kid, like Christmas presents from Santa, turn out to be a lot of work and expense. Not so magic anymore...
After they ate the fruit, Adam and Eve suddenly realized they were naked, and made clothes. But they were always naked...it just suddenly became an issue because they became aware of it. The knowledge they sought came with a price, which was the requirement to DO something about it. Instead of gaining something like they thought, they were actually making a trade-off...the more you are given, the more responsibility and work comes with it. Everything comes with a cost.
If you want to be a grown-up and do all the 'cool' things they do, then you don't get to believe in Santa anymore. You get to agonize over the holiday bills with everybody else, which destroys the magic forever. God's power to know comes with the obligation to deal with all the minutiae that goes on behind the scenes. The little boy who loves magic from the front row becomes the man working backstage who knows all the tricks and has to help coordinate things. Now he is working his ass off, and can't even enjoy the show these days because he's too busy, and he knows how it all works anyway, so it's not fun anymore. Sometimes he envies those wide-eyed kids in the front row.
Patriarchy is not misogyny. We love women. We love women for their feminine qualities that men do NOT possess. We do NOT love women for their earning power, assertiveness, aggression, physical strength or any other masculine quality that Western feminists have told girls and women to adopt.
Stay rich and marry a physically fit woman might make certain people happier.
Leave unnecessary risks alone.
Learn to need less stuff to be risk-chasing in the first place.
Lose your ego; it usually ain't worth much anyway.
Help others, whether you want to or not. Helping them to overcome is a great way to ensure someone will be there to help you when you stumble...
...and you will.
Forget what people do. See what you do too.
And I try to remember, the only thing I'll ever really call my own is my record.
In the grand scheme of things, I really don't know that much.
m
Wasn't it Socrates who said the only thing he knew was that he truly knew nothing?
You're in very good company. Green Arrows seem to agree.
I would add a fourth strategy: Watch out for worldwide confiscation of assets.
I don't understand why people are voting this article low. This is good CHS, not bad CHS. Frankly I'm convinced he gave Kunstler his login data, and Kunstler makes the shitposts under CHS's name.
Build a garden of permanence and abundance on your property. If you can go out in the yard and get a unadulterated dinner, a lot of stress is removed.
So true. Just came in from the garden. Recently toured an 18th century village. Their entire life was about survival. Many lost skills since those days. Wish I knew more. It's always good to learn a basic skill.
Permaculture is a good area to get involved in. I've completed my permaculture design certificate course and have learned a ton. Geoff Lawton, Joel Salatin, Sepp Holzer and others are good fodder for research and learning. There are lots of videos from the above on youtube as well.
May your bees be prosperous. May your fruit trees be bountiful, your garden organic and plentiful and your families' health superb.
Making Bellows...
For now, you are correct.
You will have to work pretty hard to defend that garden in real SHTF scenario.
Don't care how much ammo you have, one day you'll lose it all.
Learn where the animals and edible plants are and learn to use a bow and a slingshot - both are quiet.
Slingshot will get you duck, goose, rabbit - Bow for bigger stuff.
Work on fitness - better to be a moving target.
Dude, I'm a former Army officer. I've done my OCOKA over and over and have shit pretty squared away from a security standpoint. A perennial garden is not something that is "lost" easily. Very little of it would even be noticed by someone who didn't know what they were looking at. Someone can drive by the edge of the property and pick some fruit with little to no impact on my permanent system. Not a problem. Take some food and be on your way.
Unless somebody comes by trying to destroy my trees, berry bushes, root crop etc. with a dozer, or an army of chainsaw wielding maniacs decides to cut everything down, my garden is not at risk of being depleted. Then again, those threats are nothing a few well-placed AP rounds couldn't mitigate.
If you're expecting to hunt and provide 24/7 security at the same time though, that could very likely become a problem. There is a reason insurgent groups and standing armies throughout history, for example, always have a logistics train (tooth to tail). There's just not enough time to hunt/forage and provide effective security. It's better to forage in a system of your own design. It's like cheating, but not.
Also, living in a community of like minded people limits the possibility of having to "un-ass the AO".
Slingshot will get you duck, goose, rabbit - Bow for bigger stuff.
Crossbow works for Daryl on zombies.
Kidding aside......just like on Walking Dead.....the advantages of bows, crossbows and slingshots ( and air rifles to a certain extent ) is that they are QUIET. And with bows and crossbows, you can fairly easily retrieve your ammo and use it again, with minor parts replacement ( arrow head, fletching ) if at all.
But not giving yourself away sometimes is the best defense of all.
Maybe you're better than me with a bow, but I seem to lose quite a few arrows in the timber practicing and hunting. They aren't exactly cheap either. I'm also limited to hunting <50 yards with a bow. I'm just not that competent with it.
It's true that they're sneaky, but there is no comparison to running a rifle. It would be far more effective to just put a can on a 30 caliber or .22. Sneaky, check. effective range, check.
Rule 1 is the best.
I only pass time with the family that can show love, friends I can call in the middel of the night and all the rest... I'll talk to them for 5 minutes but that's it.
And in return, I invest a great deal of time in these people.
And for the rest, once a year, we live on a really small budget to teach the kids how other people less fortunate live. Also, we show how hard those people have it and make sure they need to understand the importance of money vs. happyness because all that bullshit about "money doesn't buy happyness" crap... is bullshit.
you need to have it to avoid a shitload of discussions that lack of money brings. So handle it with care because making money is way more easy than holding on to it.
And remember to stock a little extra for the kinfolk that laughed at your prepping. You'll enjoy helping them out, even if just a little.
You live on a low budget because you are a poor European that loses all your income to taxes so Syrians can live in 5 bedroom houses for free.
You are truly a fucking know nothing idiot. Europeans aren't poor. Americans who live in CREDIT cards and are nigger rich, are poor.
You don't have a goddam clue.
I have much more disposable income here even with slighter higher taxes than when I lived in the USA where if you add up your nickel and dime taxes you are actually paying more taxes.
Get educated, fuckhead. Go do some travelling instead of spewing MYTHS.
Oh, you probably can't afford to travel. While even lower middle class Europeans can afford to travel and world and DO SO.
''Thick'' means STUPID in British English.
Your moniker suits you to a 'T''
I have much more disposable income here even with slighter higher taxes than when I lived in the USA where if you add up your nickel and dime taxes you are actually paying more taxes.
The statistics I usually see show that Americans pay less taxes than Europeans. But I notice that they don't include state and local taxes which are about equal to federal taxes. So you could very well be right.
Before you start giving advice to Europeans about taxes you might want to ask a Frenchman in the US how he likes the medical care costs. If they haven't read up on it before they come over here they think it's a bad dream, can't imagine how an entire advanced nation can bankrupt the middle class "insuring" against what are routinely handled in "poor Europe" for a fraction of the cost.
It's not what you make, it's what you keep. Maybe they're better off giving more in taxes and less to insurance companies that screw you when you need to collect. Maybe not. But it sure isn't obvious which is better at this point.
My life rule: hedge myrself against all inevitabilities, almost all probabilities, and as many possibilities as I can
A back up to the back up to the back up plan is the methodology which took my business to where it is. apply it to life too.
Hint: You're going about it the wrong way. Become antifragile. You can't mitigate all risks.
BTW: I didn't downvote you.
Buy good scotch.
I drank a liter of Courvoisier last night and i did stupid shit. should have just drank Bud Lime and saved the money. Yeah I puked.
Drinking Courvoisier isn't the problem, I believe. I think it may be that Cornfedbloodstool is numerologically an unhealthy screen name for you. Change it to something like Nitrofueledbloodstool and watch your life bloom.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMmTkKz60W8
S.D.
"making money is way more easy than holding on to it." Ah, yes, the money that slips thru your fingers through "rational justification"
It is amazing how little dough it takes to have a great life.
So..
1. Avoid crazy people
2. Live frugal.
3. Take calcualted risks.
I can agree with this.
If you're buying anything that has no expiration date buy two of it. And remember, honey has no expiration date.
That said, I'm reminded of the story of the guy that went to put a 50 pound bag of sugar in his attic when WWII started. He broke his leg tripping over a 50 pound bag of sugar his Dad put in the attic at the start of WWI.
Honey can be made into Mead too.
Gallons of the stuff in my closet!
I don't think mead has an expiry date either - if it does, it's well into the future.
hops is a preservative... pro tip
Fuck that, I like to hang around the most dysfuntional people on the planet. Funny assed fun times. And besides everyone is dysfuctional on some level. Other people I find borng, I enjoy living to the fullest and that goes for friends.
Each his own
Sounds like you haven't been married yet.
Lady, I have lived with 21 different women: enjoyed each and every one of them. All of them said they are not like other women but in reality, in ways they were all the same. Now if that ain't dysfunction, I kiss your butt.
I have had a blast, no regrets. I did a whole lot of that thing called living.
p.s. Im married now, 10 years, took half my life to find one to tame the wild one and put up with me and had to leave the US to find her.
"They say Im crazy but I have a good time, life's been good to me so far" Joe Walsh
You must have had a hell of a sex life. I'm a man BTW. The idea of divorce was alien to me so I spent 20 years with a bitch until I couldn't take it any more. Then spent 10 years in divorce court. It left me broke, but I would have done it again. Fortunately, the kids came out of it healthy.
The lesson it taught me, is that when you are married, you are not only married to a woman, you are married to the state. When kids are involved, she owns you if she wants to exert that power.
I like "crazy" people. They're the only ones that can understand and tolerate me. Normies are boring as fuck. Nothing in their head that wasn't planted there by the TV.
I feell the same way being around NON Smokers. Fucking boring , ANAL assholes.
I feel the same way about people who refuse to have an Iron Lung in their living room. I love people who are born tinkerers.
At some time, if you live long enough, you will,at the very least, be on oxygen due to your "enjoyment" of "smoking". Furthermore, fuck you, you American hating asshole. When shit hits fhe fan over there in your "paradise" you will be trying your best to get out of there. The long term history of "Europe" has been one of one country trying to attack another country. Not much different than the assholes that run America. Seems to be that way all over the world, so where are you going to hide next?
Putting the faces of the cronies in bizness, goobermunt, religion and media on the heads of targets in killer video games might make one feel better. Won't solve anything, but would make one feel a little better and give good incentive to improve your shooting/hatcheting/pitchforking skills...
I could think of a fourth item to add to Smith's list: make learning a lifelong process with a goal toward self-improvement. As you learn, you make fewer mistakes and more successes, you become more independent, your fears diminish, your health improves and your joy for life increases. I found that life's problems can be divided into three areas: social, financial and health. The loss of any one of them can be devastating.
IMO, the popular success of religion and politics is indicative of the static lives most people live.
If you have any tradesmen doing work in your home, watch and learn and ask questions.
Most tradesmen want to be left the fuck alone. That goes for their helper too if they have one. I used to use a 16p nail for my helper whenever possible.
<"...When the tide is raising all boats, it's remarkably easy to rank yourself as a genius who manages risk effortlessly. Rising tides are not a good test. Its the ebb tide, when every investment is crashing in value, that tests risk management…"> Truer words, never spoken.
Warren B, and damn near EVERY f***ing oligarch would be broke if not for Fed and government intervention. Most of those trillions of $$ went into their pockets. They look so damn successful, but were BAILED OUT, nothing more. During the next phase of the final collapse it will be far harder to get bailouts through congress; they are starting to fear the pitchforks. Reid and McCain voted for the banker bailouts in order to rescue their own portfolios.
The final collapse will wipe them all out. Millions will again walk away from their bubble-priced properties as they tumble in value. Millions more will lose their jobs and then the repo man takes their vehicles with upside-down 8-year loans.
Pres Trump will tell them all to f*** off when the bankers come crying for more bailouts. He will reduce the bloated government by 30%, and end many entitlements. Run it like a damn business. America’s unsustainable standard of living will return to earth, with much pain. About time, and seal the damn borders Donald!
Excuse me, but why don't you see that Trump is just like Buffett? Trump has been bailed out more times than a nine lived cat.
He just has had the TV training to pretend to be a straight talking man of the people better than mr cherry coke.
Common sense will get you farther than anything. There is damn little of it out there.
rule number 1
Keep a low profile.
And don't count on state pensions ......especially if you live in Chicago .
Avoid crazy people. stay away from ZH ;-)
Best thing ever happened to me was put on the black list with the credit bureau.
It motivated me to get high paying TAX FREE overseas job and never looked back
I bought EVERYTHING with CASH including my 200k Euro home (thanks for a 2 year stint working for Ghaddaffi govt).
Want to survive the coming storm?
1. Move to an isolated, rural area
2. Learn how to farm self-sufficiently
3. Stock up on guns
4. Stock up and bunker down
There is no where SAFE in the USA.
Move to South America. even Africa has some fantastic places like Namibia. Very modern, with terriain and climate like Arizona and very few people. (mostly Germans and Dutch pensioners). You can buy a nice home with pool for about 40k.
Most people never heard of it
Yea, whites have a long history of safe living in Africa. Rhodesia, South Africa, tourists in Egypt or Morocco or Tunisia. Super safe. Any white person dumb enough to even go to Africa deserves whatever happens to them.
Ever been to Africa?? I bet not. I have been to most countries in Africa with my job.
I bet you never heard of Namibia.
FYI, kid, You can put the entire lower 48 states in the Sahara, thats how big it is.
WE used to fly from Tripoli down to Capetown. 12 hours NON STOP. thats like 2 triips across the Atlantic.
You are clueless and have no desire to really learn anyting. Just parrot the bullshit fed you by your media
I will NEVER go to Africa. NEVER. I value my life too much. I escaped from the dindus in America to whitelandia (Europe), which is now being overrun by dindus and Mudslimes so why would I go to the dark continent and be murdered for $10?
Lets see how smart you are. What is the official langauge of Mozambique? or Equatorial Guinea?
Yeah, whites like YOU wouldn't last in Africa.
WE had an asshole American busiiness man fly with us once from Cotonou, Benin to Librevillle, Gabon. He was an arrogant fatass bastard who refused to put his seat belt on so the Captain landed in Cameroon and told him to get out.
Our whole crew was WHITE , BTW.
Yup, amen to that.
Who wants to be a white person in a brown man's country, as well, when TSHTF?
Ask McAfee how well that worked out for him.
Don't run..stay and FIGHT!
So Africa is a country now? ROFLMAO
Jesus fucking Christ you goddam Americans are some STUPID motherfuckers.
Shenkman found that 87% of American college students could not find Iraq on a map. In fact, Shenkman also found that:
You stay and fight, dipshit, with your pop gun against some A-10 Warthogs.
Meanwhile SMART PEOPLE are getting out and living FREE and the good life.
You are nother fucking idiot like ''Thick Willy'.
Too bad shitheads lilke you have NO DESIRE to LEARN ANYTHING or even travel and have your bullshit MYTHS dispelled.
Shenkman found that 87% of American college students could not find Iraq on a map. In fact, Shenkman also found that:
70 per cent cannot find New Jersey?
You say that like that's a bad thing?
wtf? Are you from New Jersey by any chance?
He neglected to say the other 30% are currently trying to leave.
While you are probably right about the statistics, you seem to want to paint with a broad brush. If your point is that the average European knows more facts about the world than the average American, I don't doubt it. What do you call someone who speaks three languages, two languages, one language? Respectively, trilingual, bilingual and American. I get it.
But while you certainly have made your point, I fail -- perhaps because I am American -- to grasp the importance of it. The average ZH reader is not the average American. Most come here to learn and discuss the meaning of economic, political and world events. I'd suggest that the masses are not interested to explore the nuance and are quite happy to think as they've been told to think by the approved mainstream authorities and institutions.
Or do you wish to convince us that the typical American ZH reader is less intelligent than the typical European ZH reader? Perhaps that also is true. But does saying it make you feel superior somehow? Is that important to you? It's not very charming...
Then by this standard the US should be the safest place,if the average person is this stupid. It would stand to reason that they would starve to death in a few weeks?
http://blogs.wsj.com/totalreturn/2014/08/30/government-fee-to-give-up-u-...
https://americansabroad.org/issues/fatca/
your post are particularly defensive. if you ever get on the offense...use it sparingly.
Risk? Who would advise anyone to, "take a risk?"
Ok, here. Catch these falling rattlesnakes. I hear one of them has a $20 stuck up it's ass.
When this baby rolls over millions are going to lose everything they have to the banksters.
Who in their right mind would take any risk right now?
best post in this thread... $20 up a rattlesnake's ass bwahahahaha man I lost it, good one...
yeah no shit, when times are tough your "risk calculations" had better be heavily weighted towards "fuck that shit, that's risky and I can't afford it"...
Only millions????
You're quite the optimist.
Pretty good advice from Charles. Reducing fixed expenses = more freedom and security.
I spend freely on tangibles, because they are one-time expenses - tools, hardwood lumber, building materials, guns, ammo, and even things like books and antique furniture. The pain passes quickly and the memory of parting with the funds fades, and I've still got the goods (and my wife doesn't mind).
#1 : Never trust any motherfuckers with a hyphenated last name.
#2 : Never take investment advice from someone with skin-in-the-game.
#3 : Never purchase mediocre bud.
#4 : If #1, #2, and #3 fail, get drunk, eat a large pizza, and call it a day.
After buying bullion in 2003-6, I made the mistake of buying miners in 2010. Wish I had better understood the risks of doing so -- reading too many doom and gloom articles didn't help.
You are batting .500 in your investment acumen, if you think about it. And you may have drawn a very important lesson from it: something tangible like PM may not have the leverage the mining stocks offered but they were not going to go to zero, be discovered as having salted the assays, cooked the books, etc.
Mining stocks were your response to trying to leverage what was a good investment in bullion. Solution is to be very mindful that you leverage risk right along with potential gain. Ratchet down your desire to make mountains of money, hold the PM personally, don't get panicked out of it and don't use it as your piggy bank.
I bought a big pile of silver at $4.80 (thank you Franklin Sanders) and just kept buying over the years. I don't even look at silver prices anymore. Not going to buy more or sell what I have so I spend my time in other ways. FWIW I think that, after food, water filtering, communications, guns/ammo, PM, the best way to spend money today is on tangible items to use both after SHTF and before if it never happens. Typical stock/bond markets are the worst risk/reward area to be in, IMHO.
You learned something important. Don't repeat the mistake and it will be a valuable lesson.
getting the dysfuctional people away from you is easier said the done.
good advice but the problem is.. ..... .gov intruding in our everyday lives.
little kids are getting arrested for selling lemonade for not having business linceses
fuck this country
"Don't get enmeshed with dysfunctional people, families or businesses."
I don't like to write this, since I do like some of his stuff, but fuck you Charles. Charles is the prototypical Bay Area boomer; if he ever had a family of origin he left it in the dust decades ago, a thousand miles away. "Whatever happened to uncle Joe? Beats me; I haven't seen him in 40 years; must be dead by now (except that Charles wouldn't ever be around anyone who would wonder about uncle Joe)." People here raise their kids w/o aunts, uncles, grandmas - none of those dysfunctionals for them, that would get in the way of their success. When Charles has his diaper changed in his dotage, he'll be freeloading off someone who has been socialized by family ties to take care of the pathetic.
My father's cousin and her daughter spend some real time keeping track of good old Judy, the schizophrenic one. Yes, it costs them some money and I guess they'd do better in life if they weren't visiting her in the hospital when she's injured herself again walking around in the snow without shoes. Oh, those dumbasses, why can't they shed those inconvenient ties. Maybe it's because for most humans, their familes (dysfunctional always) are what make life worth while.
get away from disfunctional people? guess i'll have to stop reading ZH :-D.