Greece and Numbers

Greece and Numbers

Over 40% of youth (under 25) are still unemployed, suicide rates remains extremely elevated, emigration among the smart and young is prevalent, and of course there is the immigrant crisis that Greece appears to have become the main bearer of.
According to the Guardian, a study by the DiaNeosis thinktank found that 15% of the population, or 1,647,703 people, in 2015 earned below the extreme poverty threshold. In 2009 that number did not exceed 2.2%. The net wealth of Greek households fell by a precipitous 40% in the same period, according to the Bank of Greece. Unemployment, austerity’s most pernicious effect, hovers around 22%, by far the highest in the EU, despite a 5% drop in the last two years.

So, if all this bad news is real, how does one explain this chart?

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Three-by-Five Index Card Advice‏

A couple of years ago, University of Chicago professor Harold Pollack did an online video chat with personal finance writer Helaine Olen. The topic was how regular people get steered into bad investments by financial advisers.
Pollack said that the best personal finance advice "can fit on a three-by-five index card, and is available for free in the library — so if you're paying someone for advice, almost by definition, you're probably getting the wrong advice, because the correct advice is so straightforward."
Then he did it. He is, of course, writing a book about it.
Here it is:

Pao! Kaboom!

Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers is a VC firm, a big one with a number of high profile guys (including John Doerr, the firm’s best-known partner.) They see themselves as more than innovators, they see themselves as leaders. When a former partner, Ellen Pao, sued them alleging gender discrimination they did not settle; according to many, they fought because they were offended.
There has been a lot of debate over gender bias in the industry. According to research from Babson College, the percentage of female venture capitalists is now 6 percent, down from 10 percent at the peak of the dot-com boom in 1999. The tech industry is male dominated and engineering is top-heavy with men.
Vignettes emerged in court. Mr. Doerr’s told an investigator that Ms. Pao had a “female chip on her shoulder.” Chi-Hua Chien, a partner, said women should not be invited to a dinner with former Vice President Al Gore because they “kill the buzz.” A senior partner at the time, Ray Lane, joked to a junior partner that she should be “flattered” that a colleague showed up at her hotel room door wearing only a bathrobe.

Ms. Pao is married to Alphonse Fletcher Jr., a Wall Street financier whose hedge fund is bankrupt. Pension funds are suing to recover their money amid accusations of fraud. Kleiner tried to insert Mr. Fletcher into the case, which would have raised questions about Ms. Pao’s motives in bringing suit, but the judge, Harold Kahn, refused to allow it.

Pao lost her case last week.

No Giant Has Gentle Hands

The new Dodd-Frank Bill was a reaction to the problems created in 2008 resulting from public trading of financial derivatives. Among other things it creates over 500 laws and agencies. But derivatives are used by a lot of people and companies that are not financial houses. Farmers sell futures on the exchanges to lock in a price for their crops. Manufacturers will buy metal futures to guarantee the cost of their production. 180 companies have petitioned the government to be exempted from participating in Dodd-Frank, companies like Ford. These companies estimate their cost of compliance--for a peripheral part of their business--will be 250 million dollars a year per company. They estimate a loss of 100 thousand jobs.

When I was a child we played a game called "Telephone." One person at the end of a line or row of kids would write a single sentence on a piece of paper and hand it to the kid next to them. That kid would whisper what was written to the next kid and so on down the line. At the end of the row, the last kid would write down what he heard and everyone would compare what sentence started and what emerged at the end of the line. The difference between the two was usually quite funny.

That game is now called "Government."

Conspiracy or Accidental Chaos

I hope everyone read my little financial link yesterday. Here is a link of a different stripe. I do not know why this interview is not being discussed every hour by everyone. It suggests a remarkable event and legitimate terror on the part of our esteemed leaders. One could easily see this story as part of a huge James Bond plot. Who was moving this money out? Who has the economic muscle to do it? Why did they do it? Its proximity to the election is very provocative; was that a factor? Most importantly, why is such a huge and astonishing event ignored? It is more than curious: That money movement could anonymously threaten the security and stability of a culture must be addressed. But before that, it must be recognized.
From Motley Fool: http://caps.fool.com/blogs/viewpost.aspx?bpid=143295&t=01006124249416869148
And there are individual lessons, too. This is a complex world and we may not have all the understanding or the tools to control its most basic components. That places a burden on every individual to protect himself as well as possible. And that start with being informed.