"First, start with hundreds of trillions of dollars..."
How to Make Trillions of Dollars
21–30 of 144 posts
Re: How to Make Trillions of Dollars
#22absolutely brilliant piece. and i agree with his perspective. i've thought almost exactly the same thing for over 2 decades now. it is extremely rare to see someone say it, and say it so well.
Re: How to Make Trillions of Dollars
#23reminds me of a Carl Sagan monologue from Cosmos:
"Those worlds in space are as countless as all the grains of sand on all the beaches of the earth. Each of those worlds is as real as ours and every one of them is a succession of incidents, events, occurrences which influence its future. Countless worlds, numberless moments, an immensity of space and time. And our small planet at this moment, here we face a critical branch point in history, what we do with our world, right now, will propagate down through the centuries and powerfully affect the destiny of our descendants, it is well within our power to destroy our civilization and perhaps our species as well. If we capitulate to superstition or greed or stupidity we could plunge our world into a time of darkness deeper than the time between the collapse of classical civilisation and the Italian Renaissance. But we are also capable of using our compassion and our intelligence, our technology and our wealth to make an abundant and meaningful life for every inhabitant of this planet."
so intelligent, inspirational and full of hope, but listening to it 30 years later I can't help feeling bummed out, as it seems as though our civilization has chosen its path.
also, Idiocracy.
Re: How to Make Trillions of Dollars
#24This struck a chord with me. Recently (and more or less intuitively), I got rid of pretty much everything I own to charities, friends and relatives. A couple of graphics workstations, home entertainment system, mountain of business and philosophy books, clothes, TV's, etc. Everything bar a bed, clothes, writing material and some basic kitchenware.
The outcome is the anti of the "typical person" inventory on that page. I feel healthier, more motivated, my work life balance has shifted, I'm socializing more and getting involved in more community / business opportunities. The sudden understanding that I don't need technology, media or a mountain of knowledge / reference to succeed at my goals is completely liberating, and I feel much less resistant to change.
The additional time, clarity of thought and free cash is quite mind blowing, it's basically re-oriented my life completely. No magic bullet, but it feels like a step in the right direction.
Re: How to Make Trillions of Dollars
#25Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't fully agree with your math. Mine is potentially no better, but: A single customer, spending $500/year on whatever it is you do, wherein you make 5% compounding profit off of their $500/year, nets $100,000 in 45 years. I feel that's a bit more realistic of an approach.
I wasn't taking interest into account in my example. 5% profit of $500/year is $25/year. I'm too lazy to work out compound interest over 45 years considering that a new $25 is being added each year, however: 45 * $25 = $1125 If you invested $1125 for 45 years at an interest rate of 4%, you'd end up with $6571. (And investing $1125 over 45 years gets you more back than only adding $25 a year to the investment.) Obviou…
His math is not off, I get about the same using http://www.moneychimp.com/calculator/compound_interest_calcu...
When he said 5% profit he meant 5% interest. Result depends on the figures you put in, but if you can get people to spend hundreds of dollars on your business every year of their life, you are probably in possession of a mechanism providing interest well over 12% or 15% annually. Which makes the value per customer much higher.
IKEA is one of the companies that successfully transformed the culture of one or several nations to their own benefit and routinely creates lifetime customers from infant to the grave.
Re: How to Make Trillions of Dollars
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't fully agree with your math. Mine is potentially no better, but: A single customer, spending $500/year on whatever it is you do, wherein you make 5% compounding profit off of their $500/year, nets $100,000 in 45 years. I feel that's a bit more realistic of an approach.
I wasn't taking interest into account in my example. 5% profit of $500/year is $25/year. I'm too lazy to work out compound interest over 45 years considering that a new $25 is being added each year, however: 45 * $25 = $1125 If you invested $1125 for 45 years at an interest rate of 4%, you'd end up with $6571. (And investing $1125 over 45 years gets you more back than only adding $25 a year to the investment.) Obviou…
He would have had to assume a 15% rate of return in order to yield $100,000.
Re: How to Make Trillions of Dollars
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wasn't taking interest into account in my example. 5% profit of $500/year is $25/year. I'm too lazy to work out compound interest over 45 years considering that a new $25 is being added each year, however: 45 * $25 = $1125 If you invested $1125 for 45 years at an interest rate of 4%, you'd end up with $6571. (And investing $1125 over 45 years gets you more back than only adding $25 a year to the investment.) Obviou…
His math is not off, I get about the same using http://www.moneychimp.com/calculator/compound_interest_calcu... When he said 5% profit he meant 5% interest. Result depends on the figures you put in, but if you can get people to spend hundreds of dollars on your business every year of their life, you are probably in possession of a mechanism providing interest well over 12% or 15% annually. Which makes the value per c…
Ah, assuming a profit of $500 does make the maths make sense.
But $500 profit a year from a single customer is way above the average for the majority of businesses.
Re: How to Make Trillions of Dollars
#28This struck a chord with me. Recently (and more or less intuitively), I got rid of pretty much everything I own to charities, friends and relatives. A couple of graphics workstations, home entertainment system, mountain of business and philosophy books, clothes, TV's, etc. Everything bar a bed, clothes, writing material and some basic kitchenware. The outcome is the anti of the "typical person" inventory on that page…
> Everything bar a bed, clothes, writing material and some basic kitchenware.
And since you're posting here it seems at least one computer, unless you're writing this in an internet cafe of course.
Re: How to Make Trillions of Dollars
#29This struck a chord with me. Recently (and more or less intuitively), I got rid of pretty much everything I own to charities, friends and relatives. A couple of graphics workstations, home entertainment system, mountain of business and philosophy books, clothes, TV's, etc. Everything bar a bed, clothes, writing material and some basic kitchenware. The outcome is the anti of the "typical person" inventory on that page…
> Everything bar a bed, clothes, writing material and some basic kitchenware. And since you're posting here it seems at least one computer, unless you're writing this in an internet cafe of course.
Office PC. Realistically, job and career wise, I'll uptake a home computer again at some point, but only when the habits associated with the old ones die off.
Re: How to Make Trillions of Dollars
#30Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Everything bar a bed, clothes, writing material and some basic kitchenware. And since you're posting here it seems at least one computer, unless you're writing this in an internet cafe of course.
Office PC. Realistically, job and career wise, I'll uptake a home computer again at some point, but only when the habits associated with the old ones die off.
That's pretty brave and inspiring. I am not sure I could do that again, I've 'rebooted' a couple of times and it takes a long time to find a new path. And inevitably you always end up with lots of stuff again, it has a way of creeping up on you.
Emigrations are a good way to realize what you can do without.
And then a few years later you look around and wonder how it happened again.