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Friday, 16 August 2019

Weekend Reading - Some Interesting Stuff

1) Americans are now buying survival bunkers for themselves
Americans have, for generations prepared themselves for society’s collapse. They built fallout shelters during the Cold War and basement supply caches ahead of Y2K. But in recent years, personalized disaster prep has grown into a multimillion-dollar business, fueled by a seemingly endless stream of new and revamped threats, from climate change to terrorism, cyberattacks and civil unrest.
“Fear sells even better than sex,” Professor Hoopes said. “If you can make people afraid, you can sell them all kinds of stuff,” he added, “and that includes bunkers.”

2) Keeping calm under stress - from those whose accomplishments will blow your mind
This elite organization was founded in 1904 and has 3,000 invitation-only guests. To qualify for nomination, you need to have done something truly earth-shattering (literally, for those members who study earthquakes). At their annual dinner this year, for example, 250 people had been to the North Pole, 150 to the South Pole, an odd dozen had summited Everest, two had been to the bottom of the Mariana Trench (the deepest point in the ocean), a bunch had orbited the Earth, and six people—six!—had been to the Moon.
Last month, the group held its inaugural Global Exploration Summit in Lisbon. It was the kind of conference where you’d overhear stories that started with “So, when we were coming back to Earth…”

3) How US Fed policy created the last 2 boom and bust cycle
The central bank cannot control the economy. The idea of discretionary monetary policy is a flawed concept stemming from Keynesian ideas of government intervention in the economy. It creates a boom and bust cycle. Until central bankers abandon the boom and bust cycle idea, things are not going to change—there is no "correct" rate hike or decrease. Once a boom occurs (tech bubble), a bust happens when interest rates are raised (2001 downturn). In order to get the country of the downturn, another boom is created (housing bubble), which also leads to a bust (2008 crisis).

4) The great companies of the future is not going to look like those of the past(!!)
As tech companies move into finance, as the fortunes poured into health research reap a new harvest of breakthroughs, as our dependence on fossil fuels for transport and energy disappears, as robots eliminate mindless work, the consensus is that we will genuinely move into a brave new world of ever-better modern conveniences. But while this sounds attractive and exciting, we should remember that multi-year investment trends are like very big dogs: they seldom live past their first decade. Instead, the historical precedents would suggest that the top 10 companies of 2030 are more likely to reflect either the growth of capitalism into new territories (India? Latin America? China? South East Asia?) or the fear that there won’t be enough for everybody.

On this point, the Mayans used to believe that history was made up of recurring cycles of 52 years; a notion which fits nicely with the popular belief that people avoid making their parents’ mistakes, only to repeat their grandparents’ errors. So perhaps in 2030 the market will be primed for a return of the belief that democracy can only lead to inflation, as politicians chase votes with barely-dry cash?

5) More food will be delivered than eaten in restaurants
In 2020, more than half of restaurant spending is projected to be “off premise”—not inside a restaurant. In other words, spending on deliveries, drive-throughs, and takeaway meals will soon overtake dining inside restaurants, for the first time on record. According to the investment group Cowen and Company, off-premise spending will account for as much as 80 percent of the industry’s growth in the next five years.



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