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Josh Knox

Just Joshin' #214 (Wealth)

Published about 1 month ago • 6 min read

Family Photo:
Wealth

Luana got us a fancy new toaster.

It works much better than our old toaster. Our old toaster was just me throwing bread into the oven, forgetting about it, and walking away until somebody finally said, "Hey, what's that burning smell?"

The new toaster has illuminated touchscreen icons for selecting the item to be toasted (Bread, Bagel, Waffle, Pastry, English Muffin), as well as its desired level of toasted-ness (ranging from 'Warmed-Up-Bread' to 'Smoldering-Pile-Of-Ash').

We haven't tested that final level of toasted-ness yet. I wonder how the toaster-makers decide how far to push the final level of toasted-ness, and icon should represent it.

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These simple kitchen appliances help me marvel at how our modern wealth exceeds that of kings and queens past.

This is no exaggeration.

When King Charles was born (1948) there were no personal computers. When his mother, Queen Elizabeth, was born (1926) Buckingham Palace didn't have a television. Her father, King George VI, was born (1895) before public radio broadcasting. And when his father, King George V, was born (1865) Buckingham Palace didn't have electricity.

And when George V's great-great-granddaddy, George III—from whom America wrested its independence—was born (1738), he couldn't have had a toasted sandwich, even one you toast in the oven, because the sandwich itself hadn't yet been invented (Earl of Sandwich; 1762).

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My new favorite site, Ordinary Abundance, documents the wealth contained in a single, contemporary apartment. It focuses on each piece of technology and pairs it with historical reactions when that technology first arrived.

There's so much room for wonder in everyday life.

For a more global perspective, there is Any Human Ever, which imagines what it would be like to be born at different times in different parts of the world, by creating a narrative story based using the statistics of a selected time and place. There was never a time of more wealth, in almost every part of the world, than the present.

May we always be so fortunate.

Dad Jokes:
Gary Gulman

Gary Gulman Has Thoughts on Wealth (and Toasters)

video preview​
video preview​
video preview​

Source: Gary Gulman​

Highlights:
What is Wealth?

​What is wealth? by Jack Krone​

[A] quote I once heard about wealth. It goes something like this: "Wealth is not about how much money you have. It's about how you spend it."

​The Rich and the Wealthy by Morgan Housel​

Cornelius Vanderbilt left his heirs the inflation-adjusted equivalent of something like $300 billion. Within 50 years it was gone. In between sat three generations whose primary purpose was to compete on who could build the largest house and marry the bluest blood. The first heirs had some entrepreneurial sense of running the family business; over time the “family business” became insecurity and resentment. In 1875 an op-ed said socialites “devote themselves to pleasure regardless of expense.” A Vanderbilt responded that actually they “devote themselves to expense regardless of pleasure.” It was a game that couldn’t be won, so everyone lost.

​What I Learned About Wealthy People as a Private Banker by Elizabeth George​

One couple had several hundred million dollars with us. The wife was an executive at a company that went public, but they kept the amount of the windfall a secret from their kids while living a relatively normal upper middle class lifestyle. When their daughter turned 35, the terms of her trust required her to be informed and start receiving statements. She wasn’t ungrateful, but she did not take the news of her $25 million dollar windfall well. She’d chosen a modest university, turned down the opportunity to move to New York in her 20s, and become a public school teacher - all choices she might have made differently if she’d known about her resources. She felt immediately unmoored and isolated from her middle class peers.
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Money doesn’t really change people. It magnifies what’s already there. Anxious people become more anxious. Generous people become philanthropists. Spenders ramp up spending on a never-ending hedonic treadmill of delights. Sibling disputes become expensive multi-year legal battles.

​A Billion Dollars by Kevin Kelly​

Imagine I am a wizard with a magic wand. I wave it over you and now you have a billion dollars. What would you do with your life? The price of things is no longer material. What do you use the money for?
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The answers are wild and vary. They first buy a house, and maybe one for family members. Maybe even a second home at the lakeside. They get a car they always wanted. Travel some. Support an artist friend.
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I tell them, that is all good, but after all that you will still have a billion dollars. You’ve only spent millions and you’ll make that back in a day or two. And you still have the problem of what you are going to do with your precious time.
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Here the answers get interesting. Some would start their own business, or open a bakery. Work with doctors serving the poor. Go pro with their band. Become a YouTube creator. None of this requires anything close to a billion dollars.
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I am reminded of a scene in the movie Wall Street where Bud, the protagonist, is working in a high-paying finance job he hates so that he can make a million dollars, retire and ride a motorcycle across China. The inside joke is that you don’t need to work on Wall Street, or to make a million dollars, to buy a motorcycle to cross China. You could easily do that whole trip for $2,000 dollars, saved from a short summer stint working at Costco.
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The point of my exercise is that most people’s dreams are not gated by money. Sure you need some money, but you probably don’t need as much as you might imagine. You most likely don’t need multi-million dollars to start your dream.
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The bottleneck for most dreams is not financial. It’s a lack of confidence, willingness to take a risk, and face failure, or a lack of imagination of what is possible with current resources. If you want to write a novel you don’t need capital — you need discipline and 1,000 words a day. If you want to start a consultancy you need expertise and a first client, not a war chest. A lack of money is a convenient thing to blame because it feels concrete, but it’s rarely the actual blocker for achievements.
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I am not suggesting money is not necessary, or that you should go into debt to pursue your desires. This exercise assumes you’re not choosing between your dream and your next meal. If you are, I would use my wizard’s wand to first grant you a safety net — everything after that is what this essay is about. Money is the fuel you need for a trip – but it is not the goal of the trip. You most likely don’t need more money to accomplish your dream. You need time, skill, relationships, courage, and perseverance.
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I’ve had the privilege of hanging around a dozen actual billionaires. Despite the myth, they are not unhappy. But here’s the thing: they are still trying to figure out what they want to do next, and who they want to become. And their billions of dollars don’t help them in that. In fact, their billions of dollars are almost a prison. Their previous success hemmed them in, set unhealthy expectations, and will never go away (it is hard to get rid of a billion dollars). The hurdles they have in achieving their new dreams are exactly the same as yours: the need for will power, perseverance, ingenuity and imagination. None of these cost a billion dollars; all of them are available to anyone anywhere.
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The goal is not to acquire, but to become. At your funeral people will remember what kind of person you were, not what kind of stuff you had. Your everyday life will need money, and no matter what you do, a fair measure of it will flow through your days. But beyond some minimal amount (way less than a billion) money is not important to who you become. Other assets like your character, your ethics, your work, your relationships, your word, your spirit, your drive – these are your real treasures. Use them to achieve your dreams.
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The wizard’s wand is a magic trick. You already have everything the wand would have given you — everything except the billion dollars — which, it turns out, you didn’t need. Nor do you need a magic wand to materialize these powerful assets. They are in your hand right now.

iamJoshKnox:
EncycEELopedia!
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Josh Knox

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