I recently engaged with a lefty ex-co-worker I'm friends with on a similar topic. I don't think they are interested in prosperity, only in equality. They would rather live in a shithole where everyone is poor than tolerate the billionaires who create the stuff they use on a daily basis. Yes, that’s...

Okay, I guess I have gotten this out of my system for now. I'm open for replies of course, but I just cannot imagine there is anything from the left which will make any sense economically.

The official Democratic platform of 2024, as published in Chicago and beginning with an acknowledgment that they were meeting on lands that used to belong to various native tribes. https://democrats.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/FINAL-MASTER-PLATFORM.pdf Too big to cut and paste much, but here are ...

This is from the New Democrats Coalition (Centered & Strong) in Congress, for 2025. Presumably "centrists" or "moderates"? I. Economic Growth and Opportunity: Work, Wages and Wealth Helping Americans achieve financial freedom — not just making ends meet but getting ahead. Low...

Eat the rich. Tax billionaires giev UBI. They'll point to Norway, Denmark, Japan, Switzerland. And dismiss that those countries have generational wealth and closed borders. Palo Alto and Scarsdale are old-money paradises too. The Convoy ended our free trial version of communism.exe in 2022. That ex...

I literally could not be more pleased with the results of my PP. I started with a pseudo-PP in about 2000, and turned it into the real thing in 2008. Both dates involved windfalls received due to sales of business assets. The CAGR for the past 10 years is right at 8%. I should break out the spreadsh...

If I were to ask a left or progressive person to lay out their vision for a successful economy, what could they say? My main question would be something like, "Do you accept that prosperity means producing more than you consume? If you agree, how do you propose to accomplish that?" It woul...

I agree with everything you said. I’m appalled that people increasingly see murder as a solution. Luigi Mangione, and now this. It may just be the beginning. Yes, Luigi too, that's a good point. For some reason the reactions to that one didn't resonate as much with me at the time but they should ha...

I’m really disgusted by the self published reactions of many young leftists to the murder of Charlie Kirk. Untold numbers of people taking to X etc to say, “now how about Ben Shapiro”, or JK Rowling, or others. First off, it almost goes without saying that social media is a cancer. The problem is th...

Have you read Deep Risk, by William Bernstein? It’s about your question, including the PP.

The Elon Musk story has a long way to go. But at this point he’s starting to look like a character in Atlas Shrugged.

Also, our US intel agencies said Iran was not developing the bomb.
Trump says they are wrong.

Jeez, with a town full of liars, and a media full of mouthpieces, it's just so hard to know. Which goes back to my first comment. Too much work to even care.

And, what is happening on Trump's suggestion that the US will take over Gaza and develop it as a tourist destination?
Seems reasonable. Med beachfront, sunshine.

I'll admit right up front that I know nothing and don't care to put forth enough effort to learn more. Mostly because it's a fool's errand, given how everything that is available to us is heavily biased. I'm sure there is something unbiased out there, but there is no way to tell, given the environme...

Luck or did you time it I had sold some commercial property, and was going to be hit with significant capital gains taxes. As stocks and commercial bonds fell throughout the latter part of the year, I kept selling, booking losses, and replacing with similar components. I wiped out my gains while st...

I’ve mentioned this before. I bought all my positions near the bottom in the 08-09 crash. As such, the stocks and gold have huge unrealized gains. Selling anything would be quite expensive. So I don’t. Now the stocks are 40-some percent. That’s fine. I could rationalize it as having a PP with a side...

Basically it’s not a ground breaking article. Just the usual stuff.

I don’t have a better link. Interestingly it was not paywalled for me. There was an overlay that I was able to click away. Edit, I tried it now, and can’t get in.

perfect_simulation wrote: ↑Mon Apr 21, 2025 6:08 pm

No president should be able to do any of that, frankly.

Shocking. Have you given any thought to emigrating somewhere? I know it’s not that simple.

Here is a good article on the US government gold, and the various actions and reactions since FDR confiscated gold.

And if you don’t laugh at the name of one of the men mentioned in the article, you’re probably not immature like me.

https://www.theflyingfrisby.com/p/the-m ... ricas-gold

Ugly_Bird wrote: ↑Tue Mar 18, 2025 3:55 pm

sophie wrote: ↑Sun Mar 16, 2025 6:37 pm Sitting tight.

Just was thinking.
The Gold portion of my 4x25 HBPP is close to 30%.
In order to reach 35% bracket it should get to $3500.
Is it even realistic?

Every once in a while, gold goes straight up. So yes, I think it's realistic.

I’m kind of skeptical that I’ll ever rebalance gold. l’m starting to think of it as part of its own portfolio. It’s not part of my retirement savings. It’s not to be touched except as a last resort. Added to when excess cash is on hand. Passed down to my children with these same instructions, along...