Money Musings #2: Understanding the World's Greatest Gambling Hall

SHAKY TIMES
In Response to the Collapse of the Stock Market
By Byron Belzak 

On Feb. 3, 2009, I responded to an email from a friend who was lamenting the volatility of the stock market brought on in part by unscrupulous corporate behavior and executive greed.

Here's my message to Jim Beacon, editor of TheGreenerHome.com:

As my dad would say, even when he played the market, "The New York Stock Exchange is the world's largest gambling hall."

That was when he was in his forties.

Now, in his ninties, he still says the same thing. Through the years he has been more right than wrong on this matter.

He backs his talk with his walk. He owns no stock. He invests solely in CDs ensured by FDIC, offering, "The full weight of the U.S. Government can be trusted." He sleeps well at night.

And, yes, he still lives on his own, pays his own bills, and has all the money he needs to more than get by. "I don't eat much anymore, either."

He does not turn down the heat in the winter, but turns off any extra lights. He doesn't forego any prescriptions, but buys generics. He never misses the opportunity to send checks in the mail to his grandkids on their birthdays.

"And best of all, given my antiquity, I have not pain," says my dad of 92. "So given all that -- except for my wobbly walk, my shortness of breath, and my shaky handwriting -- life is good."

He's right. He's figured out the market -- and he has life pretty well figured out too -- as shaky as it may be sometimes.

Copyright 2009 Byron Belzak, Mediabear

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