It's the Apocalypse

From the financial advice column in my local paper:

. . .it doesn't matter whether you buy Treasuries. The currency will be worthless and there will be chaos in the streets. Your only alternative is to stock up on guns, ammunition and goods that are easily tradable and will become valuable, such as sewing needles, good Scotch, etc.

Investors urged to avoid taking drastic action

Oh, I thought this was going to be about Neal Gafter moving to Microsoft.

Now?

I've always loved this proverb from the American Cree indians:

Only when the last tree has died, the last river has ... and the last fish has been caught the white man will realize that he cannot eat money.

It's probably more nutritious than dirt, because by that time dirt will be the only alternative

. I wonder what coins in the sofa taste like?

- Doug
-- Nothing is impossible if I'mPossible

Originally posted by Joe Ess:
From the financial advice column in my local paper:

Investors urged to avoid taking drastic action

That's what they were telling us about the Y2K problem, too, if you can remember that far back. And there were people who took that advice back then.

Originally posted by Paul Clapham:
That's what they were telling us about the Y2K problem, too, if you can remember that far back. And there were people who took that advice back then.

There was one commercial package that had problems with Y2K. Or at least only one that was covered by the US mainstream media. All the banks were fine, as were all the airlines, etc.

The one package was PCverify, a small business/retail store cash register that did credit card processing. The company was bought by CyberCash, and I worked for CyberCash for about three years.

PCverify was sold in retail stores, and there was no registration. So the company had no idea who bought it, was using it, etc.

And it was, to put it nicely, a poorly written program, hacked together at midnight.

Markets go up and down. The "record" 777 drop in the DOW was nothing. It fell 777 points out of 11000. In 1987, the Dow dropped 500 points starting from 1800. That was a crash.

It fell 777 points

Do they call it "jackpot" in America ?

Is this all the Large Hadron Collider's fault?

So much of the market is driven by fear. If we hadn't had our president, Sec. of Treasury, Fed Chair, and dozens of Senators and Congressmen saying "If we don't pass this, the market will tank", maybe the market WOULDN'T have tanked.

But instead, everyone thought it would tank (since that was all they heard for the past 5 days), so when the bill failed, everyone thought "I better get out NOW before it tanks even if i take a hit". Thus, causing the market to tank.

Our leaders should have been up there urging calm and stating that the market can withstand this until a bill is passed.

just my never-had-a-macro-or-micro-economics-class-in-my-life two cents.

Originally posted by Darya Akbari:
I've always loved this proverb from the American Cree indians:

Only when the last tree has died, the last river has ... and the last fish has been caught the white man will realize that he cannot eat money.

That's a real handy and practical proverb , eh?

I'll venture a guess that a lot more people have died, and will continue to die, from poverty, than those who have, or will ever, die from trying to eat money.

That fact that George Bush *strongly* endorsed and 'worked out' a bail-out plan basically destroyed any credibility that it might have been good.

That's not to say it isn't needed..it's just there is an extra burden of proof required since it's come from George Bush.

I mean..the guy hardly has a reputation for good ideas.
[ October 01, 2008: Message edited by: Jules Bach ]

I can imagine the last speech before the vote last Sunday went something like this:

"Hey, folks. If we vote down this bailout today, the market is going to tank tomorrow on herd panic. Then we can all feast on cheap stocks Tuesday morning. My little Suzie wants a pony."

Originally posted by herb slocomb:

That's a real handy and practical proverb , eh?

I'll venture a guess that a lot more people have died, and will continue to die, from poverty, than those who have, or will ever, die from trying to eat money.

you have either missed the point of the proverb or have decided to pick at it because you are having issues with the choice of words used and are taking it in a literal sense thus defeating the whole point of a proverb. A proverb is supposed to express some truth or wisdom. They are often metaphorical. This particular one is about not killing the hen that lays the golden egg to paraphrase another proverb, or in some ways about about Newton's law of action/reaction. I think it also demonstrates the native's superior understanding of conservation, which the developed world has now fully awaken to.

money is a means to an end, not the end in itself(you cannot eat money). the plunder of the means's is what the moral is here. The very existence of our planet. The key words here is 'last'. Last fish, Last river, last tree. You have brought up another argument about poverty which is irrelevant in this context as you cannot prove this proverb has attacked money, rather excessive greed and man's lack of responsibility to nature seems to be what is getting highlighted here. The moral is those who want too much will in the end lose everything if they don't care about the assets which allow them to prosper in the first place. I think in some way we all realize this now, lets just all hope it isn't too late.
[ October 01, 2008: Message edited by: Arvind Mahendra ]

Very well said Arvind

Originally posted by herb slocomb:

That's a real handy and practical proverb , eh?

I'll venture a guess that a lot more people have died, and will continue to die, from poverty, than those who have, or will ever, die from trying to eat money.

The Cree proverb is a very famous proverb, very well understood throughout the world. Very easy, my 9 years old daughter understands it too

.