Wall Street bonuses are up, up up! 34% this year compared to last.
{crickets}
Why isn’t anybody here cheering?
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I don’t want to make any noise and be sent to El Salvador.
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There is an image that wall street bankers make money at the expense of retail investors, but it is hardly the truth. The forex, DCM (debt capital markets), the investment banking (IPO’s, secondary, M&A advisory), wealth advisory all do not touch the retail or even the stock market. They are making money because economy was doing good, and the deals took place.
It is healthy to cheer for others success and have mild, very mild, envy, just like inflation, so that it motivates you to work hard.
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Correction, they made money because the markets did well. The markets are not the economy.
Even if they were, seems wrong to cheer on people in finance making so much money when 1 in 5 children live in poverty. We’re the wealthiest country in the history of the world, yet we can’t take care of the most vulnerable. Wealth inequality will be our doom.
Hooray!
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Sorry, it is my bad, that I posted here.
Goodbye
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No, it’s my bad. I gave Bernie my login credentials. Sometimes he posts under my account.
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I agree with Charlie Munger, envy is the only sin you can’t have fun with. Though, if it motivates you maybe that’s good.
I’m happy to see people successful and I have no envy if they are. All I want is for them to not destroy things the rest of us enjoy and share some of their good fortune in the form of taxes.
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The full quote…
The first thing, to truly avoid is envy. Envy is the feeling of lacking whatever another person has, may that be looks, possessions, character qualities etc. There are different forms of envy, basically good, which can motivate, and bad, which destroyes so to speak (simplified). We will focus on the bad side of envy.
“The world is not driven by greed: it’s driven by envy.”- Charlie Munger
This is narrow and incomplete.
Asset managers (eg Fidelity, Capital Group, very long list, and pension funds, another long list) are large and important customers of Wall Street. A huge portion of the monies invested by these institutional investors has regular working people as the ultimate beneficial owners.
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It depends on if they earned it. Wall Street takes 1% of the GDP for a few people. That is not earned.
If you say they took risks…gambling with everyone else’s money is not earned income. It is gambling.
I am not at all happy for them. I’d be happy if they were more honest, a lot more honest. I put their honesty above their wallets. They don’t.
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Well, I wasn’t really looking for the full quote, but there it is, and I don’t think I agree with the esteemed Mr, Munger.
I think, instead, the world is driven by selfishness, which can become cooperativeness, generosity, and even love for some people.
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And your point is???
In America, a person enters a store and the clerk is an absolute liar.
The culture says aren’t you happy they make good money.
This is a dumb conversation to be having.
That I, personally, don’t see envy as a good motivator.
If it works for you, fine, that’s your game. But I, personally, would rather be inspired by others to do something than be driven by envy.
And, while I agree with Mr. Munger that envy is to be avoided, because it’s no fun, I don’t agree that the world runs on envy. That’s cynical. There are other more productive motivators to temper base envy.
I think Mr. Munger’s statement was driven by selfishness, ‘I got mine, go get yours, and quit envying me.’
Maybe some people envied him, which is their game, but I suspect more were saying, ‘The rich should pay a larger share of taxes.’
But please understand, I am not criticizing you for any successes you may have for using envy to motivate yourself. That’s your game.
God, now I’m afraid I’ll be sent to El Salvador for speaking up about taxing ‘the man.’
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