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December 7, 2024 Is income inequality a blessing in disguise?   There are about 800 billionaires based in the United States with a combined wealth totaling about $7 trillion. If you take away all their money and hand it over in equal amounts to every American citizen, each one of us would receive about $20,000. We would quickly spend it and be equally poor in a heartbeat.   If distributed equally, the fortunes of our billionaires will be reduced to almost a one time payment slightly above the annual poverty line income per citizen, which is $15,000. There would not be any billionaires and we would all have an extra $20k that would not last long. That is. after achieving the radical equality "dream" of getting rid of billionaires in furtherance of achieving income equality, we will all be equally poor.  After getting rid of billionaires, millionaires would come next on the crazy income equality agenda.  There are approximately 8 million millionaires in the U...

December 6, 2024 Is it time to short TESLA stock (Ticker: TSLA): Tesla's stock has been on fire since Donald Trump won the elections. The financial markets are betting that Elon Musk and Tesla will profit greatly during the Second Coming of Trump. Most professionals believe (or are selling the belief) that Tesla's stock will continue rising forever. While it may be a little too to begin shoring Tesla, brave contrarian speculators may benefit from putting Tesla on their radars for shorting opportunities. Nothing lasts forever. What goes up, comes down. Neither Trump nor Musk are gods. Both Trump and Musk are simple primates and mortals. Both men are up today for sure, and both will come down eventually. Gravity is a bitch. Trump Mania Won't Last Forever What we are seeing is crazy and perhaps unprecedented in our history. The U.S. economy is doing amazingly well in all regards. Part of the reason is that our economy is a fully diversified and completely globalized economy wi...

November 4, 2026 Is it an urban legend that most businesses fail?  Urban legends are types of myth that most people believe to be true when they in fact are not. When it comes to whether or not most businesses fail, although it appears to be an urban legend, apparently it is a fact. ently not. According to most experts the fact is that most businesses fail. Regardless of their size or potential at any given point in time, most business ventures fail or wrap up sooner than expected. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), only 25% of new businesses make it past 15 years. Out of the 75% that fail within 15 years or less, about 50% fail within the first five years.  Why do businesses fail?  Understanding the common reasons behind business failures can help all stakeholders (entrepreneurs, managers, employees, lenders, creditors, suppliers, investors, regulators, consumers, competitors, etc.) prepare for reality and implement risk mitigation strategies. Main R...

December 3, 2024 Is buying gold the golden rule of investing? Has gold outperformed the S&P 500 in the last 28 years?  Surprisingly, over the past 28 years, from 1997 to 2024, gold and the S&P 500 have produced very similar returns. A dollar invested in the S&P 500 in January 1997 would be worth today about $8. The same $1 invested in gold in the same month would also be worth today about $8. Meanwhile that same $1 if left uninvested (under the mattress) would have lost about half of its value due to inflation (2.55% annual average).  Isn't that super interesting?  The S&P 500 is a sophisticatedly curated index comprised of what are considered to be the best 500 publicly traded companies in the United States. Gold is a piece of metal. The S&P is led by the fanciest technology companies and the top economic players on every segment of the economy. Gold is a piece of metal. The S&P 500 relies on the expertise of thousands of financial experts, sophis...

December 1, 2024 Which NFL city has the most affordable Big Mac? Which one has the most expensive one? The most expensive NFL city or metropolitan area is Boston (Foxborough, MA, home of the New England Patriots) where a Big Mac dents your card by $7.09. The least expensive is Charlotte, NC, home of the Carolina Panthers where you can buy a Big Mac for only $4.19. Here's a list of the 30 cities hosting the 32 NFL teams (LA and NY have two teams each), ranked using the Big Mac Index. Boston, MA (New England Patriots): $7.09 Chicago, IL (Chicago Bears): $6.09 Los Angeles, CA (Los Angeles Rams, Los Angeles Chargers): $5.89 San Francisco, CA (San Francisco 49ers): $5.89 Denver, CO (Denver Broncos): $5.69 Kansas City, MO (Kansas City Chiefs): $5.69 Phoenix, AZ (Arizona Cardinals): $5.59 Houston, TX (Houston Texans): $5.36 Dallas, TX (Dallas Cowboys): $5.36 New York, NY (New York Giants, New York Jets): $5.29 Buffalo, NY (Buffalo Bills): $5.29 Baltimore, MD (Baltimore Ravens): $5.19 Wash...

November 29, 2024 Happy Black Friday. We hope you find some good deals in stores and online. Remember that Cyber Monday is coming up next. Hint: most retailers have expanded "black Friday" sales to the entire holiday season. No need to rush. No need to overspend. Was this year the most expensive Thanksgiving in U.S. history?  No. Although it felt expensive, this year's average Thanksgiving dinner was about 5% less than last year according to the economists keeping track. Reportedly, the average meal for 10 people was $58 this year ($5.80) per person. Supposedly, last year was about 5% more, mainly because turkeys were 6% more expensive last year.  For most Americans, food prices seem and feel very expensive. They seem to increase overall year by year. In fact, with the exception of the 1930s after the Great Depression, and between 2007 and 2008 after the Great Recession, food prices have gone up almost every year since economists have been tracking.  Moderate inflation is...

November 28, 2024 Happy Thanksgiving. We hope you had a wonderful day with your relatives or friends. In this post, we go off topic to write a little about travel influencers.  There are many wonderful travel YouTube channels out there. There are solo travelers, couples, families, young, senior, LGBTQ, etc. Most content is published in English, but you can also find travel vlogs (video blogs) in almost every major language. Actually, the most popular channel based on total subscriptions and views is in Spanish, and the second one is is in Brazilian Portuguese.  Below is a list of the Top 40 Travel Youtubers follow by a list of a few historical figures that documented their travels centuries before the internet and social media.  In our opinion, the most influential travel influencer of all times was Marco Polo. What do you think?    Top 40 Travel YouTubers  Luisito Comunica (43.5M subscribers, 4.2B views): Luis Arturo Villar Sudek, known as Luisito Comunic...

November 26, 2024 What can we learn about cells and neurons? A lot. We're just beginning and we are enjoying it. Human life is a complex cellular network. Our guess or hope is that by learning more about cells and how they work, we can gradually learn more about how we can stay in that state of being "alive" and how we can manage to enjoy this experience called life.  All life on Earth is cellular life. There are no exceptions. If it's alive, it is composed of one or more cells. Humans are composed of trillions of cells. Men are in average a cluster of 37 trillion cells. Women are a cluster of 28 trillion cells. The difference is due that men have more red blood cells. By the way, about 80% of all cells in the human body are red blood cells. Not counting red blood cells, it can be said that both men and women are about 7 trillion cells. We are trillionaires no matter how we look at it.  Cells can be categorized as generic (stem) or specialized. All cells, specialized ...