china steel to build 5 new plants in the US

[adammil1]

Well, if you arent putting even 50 bucks a month away in an IRA, good luck when you get old.
I have never had a "real" employer- been self employed since I was about 20- so nobody but me ever saved a dime for me. And I pay my social security, and I get those letters that tell me I will get $1100 a month when I retire.

So, in addition to that, I try to save a little. And due to the tax laws, the best way to save is in a tax defered IRA, and when you put your money in an IRA, you can buy stock with it.

As I understand it, "Most" people actually have jobs, and most jobs have 401k's, or IRA's, and you can just have ten bucks or twenty deducted from your paycheck.
Most everybody I know just gets more premium channels on the sat dish instead, or buys a bigger truck with more leather, but you COULD save some money.
And if you did, you COULD buy stock in actual companies that make things.

Ries,

For someone who often supports so many socialist ideas, that I disagree with it is nice to see such a quote on individual responsibility! If you ask me the real crisis this country faces today is such a short term mentality. We need some more companies who are in it for the long term. not just the next quarter.

If you ask me the solution to the whole problem after thinking long and hard about it is not more government regulation which smart people find a way around, but simple changes to the tax structure that favor long term growth investing over short term day to day trading. It seems to me that capitol gains tax on stock owned 10+years should be little 20+ go to almost zero, one year or less several times as much as what they are today 5years or more somewhere in between, to remove the casino attitude from Wall street. The next thing I would like to see is the Gov't tax the hell out of executive pay over a few hundred thousand $$$ but place little to no tax on executive pay in stock providing that they cant sell for 20-30yrs. If a CEO grows his company hundreds of Billions in genuine value I have no problem with him taking home a bunch of that but if he Enron's the books he should get nothing.

It seems to me if we had a structure where most people who owned stocks, and those who ran companies were stuck in their share value for 20+yrs do you really think they would have tolerated the decisions made in Bear Stearns say around 2005 knowing that they sat on $100's of millions of Bear Sterns stock well through 2015 at the earliest? Something has to be done to get people back to investing in the long term. It sure made a good chunk of $$ for Buffett so it can't be that bad.

In a similar post about ITW I noticed how people were saying that they don't tend to buy and flip companies and when they buy your company you have nothing to fear unless you are useless bloated management. I seemed to read that they tend to buy and invest in you, and make you stronger. I guess they will be on my radar for one of the next stocks to purchase.

Adam

 

[motion guru]

If you ask me the solution to the whole problem after thinking long and hard about it is not more government regulation which smart people find a way around, but simple changes to the tax structure that favor long term growth investing over short term day to day trading. It seems to me that capitol gains tax on stock owned 10+years should be little 20+ go to almost zero, one year or less several times as much as what they are today 5years or more somewhere in between, to remove the casino attitude from Wall street. The next thing I would like to see is the Gov't tax the hell out of executive pay over a few hundred thousand $$$ but place little to no tax on executive pay in stock providing that they cant sell for 20-30yrs. If a CEO grows his company hundreds of Billions in genuine value I have no problem with him taking home a bunch of that but if he Enron's the books he should get nothing.

Adam, you have a good head on your shoulders. I would support such legislation / financial reform as you have described above.

In order for the above to happen, we need adults in the halls of our congress and senate who value the future of our country more than they value holding onto their political office. We need to get back to a citizen government rather than a graft/bribe/power influenced government.

Personally - I think we as a nation are past the tipping point. We are wobbling now like a top. We will be close to stable a few more times in the next few years - but we are going down and very little can be done at this point that would do anything but buy a little more time.

I think you will find this summary an interesting read . . . Faber: Nations Will Print Money, Go Bust, Go to War…We Are Doomed - Big Government

 

[TonyOW31]

Ries,

For someone who often supports so many socialist ideas, that I disagree with it is nice to see such a quote on individual responsibility! If you ask me the real crisis this country faces today is such a short term mentality. We need some more companies who are in it for the long term. not just the next quarter.

If you ask me the solution to the whole problem after thinking long and hard about it is not more government regulation which smart people find a way around, but simple changes to the tax structure that favor long term growth investing over short term day to day trading. It seems to me that capitol gains tax on stock owned 10+years should be little 20+ go to almost zero, one year or less several times as much as what they are today 5years or more somewhere in between, to remove the casino attitude from Wall street. The next thing I would like to see is the Gov't tax the hell out of executive pay over a few hundred thousand $$$ but place little to no tax on executive pay in stock providing that they cant sell for 20-30yrs. If a CEO grows his company hundreds of Billions in genuine value I have no problem with him taking home a bunch of that but if he Enron's the books he should get nothing.

It seems to me if we had a structure where most people who owned stocks, and those who ran companies were stuck in their share value for 20+yrs do you really think they would have tolerated the decisions made in Bear Stearns say around 2005 knowing that they sat on $100's of millions of Bear Sterns stock well through 2015 at the earliest? Something has to be done to get people back to investing in the long term. It sure made a good chunk of $$ for Buffett so it can't be that bad.

In a similar post about ITW I noticed how people were saying that they don't tend to buy and flip companies and when they buy your company you have nothing to fear unless you are useless bloated management. I seemed to read that they tend to buy and invest in you, and make you stronger. I guess they will be on my radar for one of the next stocks to purchase.

Adam

Good post, that would go someway to addressing the problems caused by short-sightedness.
I was discussing this the other day, and thinking pretty much along the same lines concluded that it would also bring some stability to the markets, the wild swings we see now would disappear.