Dinar

No, it means that while our income declined, quality of life improved because she had 40 more hours per week to devote to our family. Given that I came as a penniless immigrant with my parents to the US from the former USSR, your suggestion is interesting... My parents and I lived on less than USD 20K per year in NYC in the early 1990s. I would suggest that before giving this advice to me or anyone else, you take your family (including kids) to NYC/Tokyo/London and try to live on USD 40K a year today. I have lived a very frugal life - no air-conditioning for me during NYC summers, worked as a garbage man to pay for college. I started to work at 16.

Actually, I disagree. My relationship with my wife improved drastically after she got fired from her job. She had way more time to devote to our three kids, took a lot of burdens of me, and our stress level went down drastically. Of course we are going to have issues when Cobra coverage runs out....

It depends. The theory behind stock options and stock grants is that it aligns managerial interests with those of shareholders. If done properly (like at Watsco) then I think it is a very useful tool.

There is another problem - tax benefits associated with stock option issuance in the US. Tax and GAAP treatment differs and vastly different figures are reported for GAAP and tax purposes. So in a period of sharply rising stock prices, tax rates get reduced by tax benefits from options exercised.

Step one - record an expense on your income statement for stock compensation, which reduces your net income. Step 2, on the cash flow statement you add back all non-cash expenses - depreciation, amortization, and non-cash compensation. There is no issuing RSUs or options to the public.

@thepupil, Europe is very cheap, Germany particularly. I remember having amazing Michelin star restaurant meals that would be $300 per person in NYC and paying $75 per person. Italy and Spain same story. Real estate is a bargain as well. Healthcare is as well a bargain. In terms of nannies, most nannies on Upper West Side in Manhattan are legal, they are just all on the dole, that's why they don't want to work on the books. Some also "work" as home attendants for their healthy relatives, so don't want to lose the ability to double dip!

In NYC, the marginal tax rate on a self-employed individual or income of a spouse in a dual income household can easily be 60%. $60K for a nanny including benefits is cheap. By the way, never heard of anyone paying benefits for a nanny. An acquaintance is a lawyer who wants to go work for the government one day, so wanted to employ a nanny on the books - made three dozen offers, all declined, since all were on the dole and wanted cash.

Spek, isn't the issue with Vonovia that they cannot push through the energy increases that they have experienced (as much as two months of rent) and also places like Berlin trying to confiscate the property? There were accounting issues too I believe with Vonovia - capitalizing a bunch of expenses, etc... Do you like any of the German residential plays?

Sure. First of all, there are different neighborhoods - West Village is 10x more expensive than say Staten Island or Bay Ridge. Yes, for decades you could live on a middle class salary in Bay Ridge, Bensonhurst, Flushing, Riverdale, et all. Recently, immigrants from Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Egypt, Yemen, et all made Bay Ridge and Bensonhurst very unpleasant. In the 1970s of course, housing was very cheap all over the city. Riverdale is still quite cheap, so is Inwood.

I did not call Luca a communist, I said his behavior reminded me of communists in the West who were busy praising Soviet Union, yet would never move to the utopia and preferred to live in the West. The word that you are looking for is called a hypocrite - Luca thinks the West is awful and China is great but prefers to live in Germany rather than in China. China will not succeed and implode inspite of its hardworking population. Here is what will seriously damage China: a) The West and the East (Vietnam, South Korea, India, Japan, Taiwan, Philippines, et all) all recognize that China is an enemy and will treat it as such. China has no allies, (perhaps with the exception of Pakistan), only enemies. Russia hates and fears it. Nobody likes China. b) Chinese demographics are awful, probably the worst in the world. c) No Chinese is safe in China, anybody who is able to accomplish something can be a billionaire today and in jail tomorrow. So the best and brightest are fleeing China. How many people have left HK? How many people leave China every year? How many people would leave China if given the chance? d) Chinese science is awful and cannot improve in a climate of fear. What have the Chinese invented in China in the past fifty years? Sure, scientists of Chinese heritage have invented outside of China, but in China? China killed a doctor that wanted to blow the whistle on Covid-19! e) Their leadership is even more moronic than in the West. Look at Mao, look at the one child policy, look at Covid-19, look at crackdown on Jack Ma. What have the Chinese leaders of the past ten years accomplished? Yes, the West is mired in awful infrastructure, terrible politicians, idiotic debates over mental illnesses (transgenderism) and necessary but ill-thought out environmental transition, as well as other insane proposals - MMT, universal basic income, reparations, abortion bans. Yes, we have ethnic tensions. Yes, US and Western Europe should have never invaded Iraq in 2003, and never bombed Yugoslavia. However, we can vote the bums out - New York blossomed under Giuliani and Bloomberg. US can blossom under Lee Kuan Yew type leader. China has burned bridges and will continue to burn them as long as President Xi is in power. It is easy to destroy, hard to build. Who will ever trust China again?

He reminds me of a lot Communists in the West who supported the Soviet Union and communism but preferred to live in the West. He claims to live in Germany and yet admires China so much... He pisses on NY subway (which does deserve scorn) and his praise of Shanghai metro reminds me of Soviet metro, yet everybody who can tries to leave China and immigrate to the US, the reverse I do not see...

Dude, when you say that Covid did not originate in China and the China is not helping Russia in its war against Ukraine, you lose all credibility. And yes, better to not deal with China at all from the perspective of the civilized world (South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, Australia, New Zealand, Europe, USA)

What do you mean how will they defend it? Are you proposing that we bomb Russia as well?

Actually, China can get everything it needs from Russia in terms of raw materials

@Luca, you ask why China is pressured so much? Because it is an enemy of the West. It unleashed Covid on the world (let's not forget, you could not travel from Wuhan to the rest of China, but you could fly abroad), it steals intellectual property everywhere, it engages in mercantilism and destroys foreign industries via domestic subsidies. It is helping Russia in its invasion of Ukraine. The best thing for the West & Korea/Japan, is not to deal with China period. No imports and no exports. No intellectual property transfer.

This has to be a joke right? Everybody who can is fleeing China, it has insane demographic and water problems, capital is fleeing! What a recipe for a success?

Yes, but why did he say it? I think Sam was sitting on a mountain of cash and if rates are up another 3-4%, then perhaps massive bargains in real estate?

@RedLionand @CorpRaider, why wouldn't you buy ALX instead?

I spoke with Jimmy a couple of times, once he came to lecture at my school, and it was a small turnout so I got to talk to him for half an hour, incredible for me in 1998 I think, the second time was he was having dinner with his wife, my friend and I were sitting a couple of tables away, and I came up to say hello. He offered us to join him, and it was a very interesting conversation (for me at least), that must have been 2003-2005 time frame. Very interesting character.

John is very emotional when it comes to the Russia/Ukraine war, and like many people immediately gets angry when he hears something that he disagrees with. I know quite a few family friends with whom I avoid discussing the war since I don't want to get into a fist fights. People cannot separation passion/what they wish would happen, from reality.

As the population ages, and it is harder to climb stairs and drive, cities look more attractive, most of my parents' friends would move to Manhattan tomorrow if they could afford it.

And if you get Giuliani 2.0 from 1990, then could it all magically come back?

@dealraker, Sir Chris Hohn at TCI is incredible.

I will show you two (which are the exception that prove the rule) - Soros & Druckenmiller

I prefer the Seven Samurai