Gary North

March 12, 2010

If you own a resource, you are responsible for its use. You must put it to good use: for others, and then for yourself. If you put it to use mainly for yourself, you will find that you lack a ready market when it's time to sell it.

I have seen this over and over. Someone says: "Show me what business to get into where I can make a lot of money." He will fail. He should ask: "Show me how I can identify a market to serve." He has a better shot at making money.

TAKING INVENTORY

Begin with what you have right now. I offer this list:

1. Faith in the future
2. Confidence in yourself
3. Time to prepare
4. Dedication
5. Tenacity
6. Sources of accurate information
7. Plans: long, intermediate, short
8. A cooperative spouse
9. A circle of like-minded associates
10. Money

Money is the least important. Most people don't believe this, because they lack too many items higher on the list.

This site offers guidance for several of these capital assets. The forums are crucial. Yet most subscribers do not participate. I have a theory about this. They perceive that with greater knowledge comes greater responsibility (Luke 12:47-48). They prefer less responsibility. They prefer to kick the can. They are not alone in this preference.

KICK THE CAN

In other articles I have posted today, I have discussed the popularity of kick the can. This is a recurring theme in my writings.

At every level of authority, people prefer to kick the can. They think they can avoid the future by ignoring the future. They think there will always be a low-cost way out of tight problems. They have been told this all their lives by the experts. Keynes articulated it best: "In the long run, we are all dead." Scarlett O'Hara also articulated it: "I'll think about it tomorrow."

This strategy works for years, even decades. Then, without warning, it fails.

Think of some aged retiree in Russia. She (a widow) was told by Stalin to trust the Communist Party. She did. She was told that she would be taken care of in her old age. She isn't being taken care if. She did not save. Why bother? The ruble was fake. "They pretend to pay us, and we pretend to work." All of the lies came crashing down on August 19-21, 1991. Her economic world ended. The government defaulted. It was a rotten world based on lies and cheating. She adjusted to it. Then it collapsed. She now seeks to adjust. She is too old and too poor to adjust comfortably.

Most people think, "It can't happen to me." That's what she thought, too. That's what politicians and bureaucrats told her: "It can't happen to us. We are the wave of the future" It did happen to her. They were the wave of the past.

Unlike her, my subscribers have capital. They also have time. They have knowledge. They can read.

Kick the can is a religion -- a way of life for politicians, bureaucrats, and fund managers.

Think of those hot-shots at Lehman Brothers. They were masters of the universe. Now they are unemployed. The company was a house of cards. It was also a house of lies.

Think of those kids making $400,000 a year making subprime loans in California in 2006. Then, in one day, they were literally out on the street: no pensions, no jobs, no savings, and $200,000 underwater in their mortgages. They had believed it could not happen to them. To others, yes. Not to them.

There were warnings. Ignored. It clearly could not go on forever. Ignored. They preferred living in a dream world. Then the dream ended.

When you have been given a warning, you are supposed to assess it. Compare it with what you have learned. Go onto the Web and see what offsetting factors there may be. Make evaluations.

Then decide.

THE TWO THINGS YOU NEED

Having decided, then take action with whatever capital you possess.

You need two things: (1) a way/place to hunker down; (2) mobility. These are usually conflicting goals. That's the problem.

If your hunker-down place is where you live, your mobility had better be occupational. Can you develop other income streams that will sustain you when your job dies or the dollar starts to die? Can you diversity -- not your portfolio of assets narrowly conceived, but your portfolio of marketable skills?

Men hate to think about this. They want to be able to write a check and forget about the future. So do politicians. So do bureaucrats. This is kick the can.

If you can see vaguely what is coming, you are way ahead of your friends and relatives, who do not want to see what is coming or hear from you about it. They want to kick the can.

I think the #1 reason why subscribers cancel is this: they get a sense of what is coming. They count the cost of present evasive action: high. They want to reduce the future cost of inaction. Why? To justify doing nothing different. The easiest way to do this is to cut off the warnings. They stick their fingers in their ears . . . and save on subscription fees.

The pain goes away. For now.