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Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

latimes.com

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Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#351

Post by pbh101 »

bluecheese452 wrote: post #345
pbh101 wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m familiar with this neighborhood. If this were my commute I’d probably walk often. But: It’s 42 minutes by foot one way, which is on the longer end for most people. About half of it is pleasantly walkable, the rest looking like no trees and along a busy street. … For probably six months out of the year, the rest being too uncomfortably hot or windy/cold for most people. And he’s probably wearing a suit and leather…

He is extremely rich. All of these problems are easily solvable with the resources he has.

And yet he chose his choices.

Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#352

Post by BrenBarn »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #223
BrenBarn wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those numbers are a pittance relative to his wealth. He could have established a foundation and given it hundreds of millions of dollars specifically to push for a more equitable taxation system. He did not do that.

> He could have established a foundation and given it hundreds of millions of dollars specifically to push for a more equitable taxation system You want another billionaire to create a super PAC?

Seems to be the only way anything gets done around here. :-)

Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#353

Post by applesauce2 »

jimnotgym wrote: post #13

I read somewhere that Bershire Hathaway had sort of finished it's mission. 40 years ago there were lots of large companies who were very 'inefficient' and BH would come along, invest a lot, and start demanding changes. Company performance would improve and BH would make big $$$$. Now there are few of these and it is hard to do. I don't know enough to know whether it is right or wrong. but I think that is what I read.

Seems inaccurate to me. What I've heard is that BRK is famous for being hands-off. Their management team is too small anyway to have done much micromanaging.

Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#354

Post by joquarky »

ronbenton wrote: post #285
rhubarbtree wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree. The last one is important. You can buy a bigger and bigger house car tv stereo whatever, but it will not make you happy.

>You can buy a bigger and bigger house car tv stereo whatever, but it will not make you happy. Well that seems like an assumption! Plenty of people are happier with nicer things. I don't think we need to tell people what should make them happy.

That happy feeling only lasts about six weeks.

Happiness is unsustainable. However, contentment is an attainable goal.

Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#355

Post by toomanyrichies »

ronbenton wrote: post #285
rhubarbtree wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disagree. The last one is important. You can buy a bigger and bigger house car tv stereo whatever, but it will not make you happy.

>You can buy a bigger and bigger house car tv stereo whatever, but it will not make you happy. Well that seems like an assumption! Plenty of people are happier with nicer things. I don't think we need to tell people what should make them happy.

> Plenty of people are happier with nicer things.

Are they truly happier, in the sense of being more content? Or are they just deriving more temporary pleasure from the hedonic treadmill they're on?

You can probably tell which one it is, by how long their happiness with their house / car / TV / fill-in-the-blank lasts, before they start thinking about trading up to an even nicer fill-in-the-blank.

Buddhist monk Matthieu Ricard wrote a great book on happiness, here's an excerpt I enjoy which talks about the difference between pleasure and happiness, in two parts. [1] [2]

1. https://www.matthieuricard.org/en/pleasure-and-happiness-the...

2. https://www.matthieuricard.org/en/pleasure-and-happiness-the...

Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#356

Post by bdangubic »

jodrellblank wrote: post #225
bdangubic wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if one is to make a fake persona, fast food and coke (the drink) probably won’t make top-100 list

Berkshire Hathaway holds over 9% of Coca Cola's shares, worth $28 billion and returning over $800 million a year in dividend payments. Isn't that worth being seen visibly supporting Coca Cola products? https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-xXwAtQqkN6c/XM3Brj-ZkuI/AAAAAAAAv...

one thing is being visible, everyone is visible that is sponsoring a product in some way, e.g. athletes with gatorade. it is a whole other thing to accuse someone of creating a “fake persona” if he just wanted to “promote” coke there are many other ways this could be done (especially with virtually unlimited money for PR etc)

Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#357

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

TehCorwiz wrote: post #255
sethev wrote: post #205

We should never idolize a person (in my opinion). Here are some things Buffet has done that I admire (notice that phrasing): - He consistently communicated with shareholders of Berkshire in a straight-forward and transparent way in his letters and annual reports. If you read these documents, I believe that you will have a solid understanding of how he built Berkshire. - He maintained a disciplined approach to investi…

The house he bought at 28 is 3500 square feet in a very very nice neighborhood and was worth $1.2 million a few years ago. It's humble by billionaire standards, not by average person standards. He never needed to size-up because of children, or size-down because of a bad economy, he was already set for both space and finances. Let's not create a moralistic myth out of his lack of need.

You say "it's humble by billionaire standards" - I think it's relatively humble by ~$300k a year standards. The thing I love about this house is that I think it represents just about the maximum real utility one can get from a home.

He had 3 kids, and a 3500 sq ft house is, IMO, an extremely average size for any decently paid professional where I live with a family that size. It basically looks like something that had everything he needed, and anything beyond that that you so often see in rich people houses is just for show and bling.

Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#358

Post by weird-eye-issue »

strken wrote: post #303
bsder wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Poor people should properly budget and cook at home to avoid staying poor You can't budget your way out of being poor. Most actually poor people (as opposed to people who have a substance abuse problem) I know have a very good grasp of their budget as they are constantly shifting money around figuring out which bills they have to pay and which bills they can put off. You get out of being poor by getting more money.…

You can't budget your way out of a genuine lowest-quintile income without going to ridiculous lengths that are more difficult than getting a higher-paid job. You can absolutely reconsolidate and budget your way out of debt, though. Or budget your way to having a savings account when you're earning the median income.

Yes and can avoid debt in the first place so that when you are making more money it's not just going to interest payments

Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#359

Post by weird-eye-issue »

shagmin wrote: post #344
weird-eye-issue wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you have a negative net worth then I consider you poor no matter how much money you make But yes obviously there are levels to it however regardless if you are buying overpriced fast food when you could be cooking at home for much cheaper that's not good for anybody especially if you don't make a lot of money... So what's your point other than trying to argue over the definition of poor? If you don't have an emerg…

I guess that distinction in poor matters some to me, because when I read your original comment (budgeting to avoid staying poor) the first thing that came to mind was someone I know who often says things like poor people should just work harder and variations of that. And then I'm thinking like food deserts or people dealing with more pressing issues where there's probably a general inability to do any long term plan…

Even if you live in a food desert you could make cheap unhealthy food at home and it will always be cheaper than McDonalds and with even just a little bit of creativity it will be much healthier too

Re: Warren Buffett steps down as Berkshire Hathaway CEO after six decades

#360

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

kamaal wrote: post #286
sethev wrote: post #205

We should never idolize a person (in my opinion). Here are some things Buffet has done that I admire (notice that phrasing): - He consistently communicated with shareholders of Berkshire in a straight-forward and transparent way in his letters and annual reports. If you read these documents, I believe that you will have a solid understanding of how he built Berkshire. - He maintained a disciplined approach to investi…

>>Here are some things Buffet has done that I admire (notice that phrasing): Perhaps the best thing Buffet has managed to do is to live long. Most of compounding magic begins at ages 60-65, a time where most investors start to die out. Second best thing he did was to start/acquire a insurance firm. The 'float' helps them to run a kind of in house index fund on other peoples money, without having to pay TERs/Fees. Tha…

> Most of compounding magic begins at ages 60-65, a time where most investors start to die out.

Percentage-wise, few wealthy investors are dying out at ages of 60-65. In the US, males that make it to age 60 have a life expectancy of 81-82. But that's across all men - life expectancy is strongly correlated with wealth in the US, so a man in the top 1% could very reasonably expect to live to very late 80s/90s.

Nevermind that Buffet was still fabulously rich when he was 60, so none of your logic makes any sense to me.

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