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Perspective
Wealth
Failure
Pain and Adversity
Investing
Spending
Simplicity
Purpose
Risk
Character
Women
A Nobel Prize Winner
Weird Things About Money:
- Pope trinkets
- the Gilded Age
- the J.P. Morgan dynasty
- Tightwad Heddy Green
The talent for being happy is appreciating and liking what you have, instead of what you don't have. - Woody Allen
The secret to having it all is loving it all. - Dr. Joyce Brothers
Watch out, be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. - the Bible
Success is getting what you want. Happiness is wanting what you get. - Warren Buffett
Some people are making such thorough preparation for rainy days that they aren't enjoying today's sunshine. - William Feather
Perspective
Financial people…think money is real. Shoes are real. Money is an end result. - Peter Drucker
An American tourist in India stood by in awe as he watched Mother Theresa lovingly clean the infected wounds of a horribly disfigured leper. "Sister, he commented, "I wouldn't do that for a million dollars!" Her response? "Neither would I, brother. Neither would I."
"It is discomforting to think that once I'm gone, all my things will be owned by someone else. - Steve Martin
I started out with nothing. Luckily, I still have most of it left. - Jill Petzke
Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted. - Albert Einstein
Money is a lousy means of keeping score. - Unknown
People say that the money doesn't matter, but they are just being politically correct. - Assar Lindbeck, Swedish economist
I feel very rich when I have time to write and very poor when I get a regular paycheck and no time to work at my real work. - Natalie Goldberg
top
I suppose what I'm saying is, if money were a person, would you know them very well? Would you trust him or her? Would you take a week long vacation with him? Would you lend her your car keys? From my experience, Money (the theoretical person) would be serious, exclusive and elitist; only talking to a rigorously select few. Money would have a phalanx of courtiers running hither and far to execute the slightest monetary whim. Chaste, God-fearing bankers and economists who refuse to acknowledge a sense of humor would be the groupies, awaiting a beckoning, a summons to the side of Money to be graced with a task imbued with ceremony, legitimized by ritual. No wonder my mother, and most women I know, don't like money. For the most part, on the periphery of the Money court, what's to like?" - Ellen McGirt
Wealth
I once asked (semi-retired Internet entrepreneur) Jim Bidzos how being rich had changed him. "You know those pistachio nuts that are too hard to open with your fingernails?" he asked. I just throw those away." - Robert X. Cringely
Money often costs too much. - Ralph Waldo Emerson
I bet you're all wondering what it feels like to be a billionaire. It's disappointing really…I've learned that great wealth isn't nearly as good as average sex. - Ted Turner
I could never understand the popular belief that because a man makes a lot of money, he has a lot of brains. Some very wealthy men who have made huge fortunes have been among the most stupid people I have ever known. - Julius Rosenwald, former Chairman, Sears
Money doesn't buy happiness, but it will enable you to look for it in more exotic places. - Anonymous
Greed is good. Greed is natural. - Ivan Boesky, prior to his imprisonment
One of the dangers of having a lot of money is that you may be quite satisfied with the kinds of happiness money can give and so fail to realise your need for God. If everything seems to come simply by signing checks, you may forget that you are at every moment totally dependent of God. - C. S. Lewis
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My outlook is that little things are the trip. I'm very happy with very little. Maybe that's why I have so much. - Linda McCartney
Economic strength is making us weaker in head and soul. - A.M. Rosenthal, his final New York Times Op-Ed column, 5 November 1999
"Psychologist Jessie O'Neill says affluenza is somewhat like alcoholism in that it can be learned, or it can be passed down. Having inherited considerable wealth from her grandfather, Charles Erwin Wilson, a onetime president of General Motors, O'Neill knows of what she speaks. The children of the rich, in her experience, show signs of low self-esteem, a false sense of entitlement, and inability to delay gratification, and a loss of future motivation. Fortunately, there is a surefire cure for the malady: philanthropy. 'The only way that money ever buys happiness,' O'Neill says, 'is to give it away.'" - Loch Adamson
Failure
For me, the best stuff comes out of failure, absolute failure. What I paid attention to mostly is what (people) did when they failed. It's so easy to be nice when things are going your way, and not so easy when things fall apart. - Laurie Anderson
If you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to be a horrible warning. - Catherine Aird
I used to think that going broke materially was a horrible thing that happened to me. Not anymore. I daily thank God for allowing me to have large amounts of money appear and disappear into my life. The Lord has taught me how to be content in all circumstances and to cherish godliness with contentment as great gain. Naked I came into this world and naked I will depart. May I continue to praise the Lord as He gives and takes away. - Todd A. Sinelli
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Pain and Adversity
It's been said that adversity introduces us to ourselves. - George W. Bush, 09-14-01.
The trouble with being poor is that it takes up all your time. - Willem de Kooning
Every time I close the door on reality it comes in through the windows. - Jennifer Unlimited
I try to take one day at a time, but sometimes several days attack me all at once. - Jennifer Unlimited
When one door of happiness closes, another one opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us. - Helen Keller
Adversity and deprivation seem to benefit in ways comfort and ease never could. - Philip Gulley
"If you have a problem you can solve by throwing money at it, you don't have a very interesting problem." - Anne Lamott, quoting her friend John
"The best thing that ever happened to me was when the Great Depression hit, and my father couldn't give me one more dollar for college. In order to return to school, I had to learn to be self-reliant, resourceful, and diligent. I took several jobs-the most lucrative of which was playing poker with rich boys-and I was able to pay my college expenses. When dealt a bad hand, you learn to play smarter." - Sir John Marks Templeton
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Investing
"The safest way to double your money is to fold it over once and put it in your pocket." - Kin Hubbard
The way to make a small fortune in the commodities market is to start with a large fortune. - Unknown
Do not argue with the market, for it is like the weather: Though not always kind, it is always right. - Kenneth E. Walden
Debt
Some debts are fun when you are acquiring them, but none are fun when you set about retiring them. - Ogden Nash
Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought six, result misery. - Charles Dickens
I am going to live within my income this year even if I have to borrow money to do it. -Mark Twain
Spending
The easiest way to figure the cost of living is to take your income and add ten percent. - Unknown
You can't have everything. Where would you put it? - Steven Wright
We heap up around us things that we do not need as the crow makes piles of glittering pebbles. - Laura Ingalls Wilder
Success is not about making purchases. If anything, it's about knowing why most purchases don't need to be made. - Jonathan Hoenig
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Don't let your possessions possess you. - Gloria Steinem's mother
Wisdom begins with sacrifice of immediate pleasures for long-range purposes. - Louis Finkelstein
When women are depressed they either eat or go shopping. Men invade another country. - Elayne Boosler
"'Never before,' as Stephen S. Roach, director of global economics at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter recently noted, 'have American consumers lived so far beyond their means.' How can Mr. Roach suggest such a thing when everyone I know is saving millions by shopping sales? One of my friends actually organizes her life around bargain hunting, keeping a chart of listings, marking her calendar with stars and even rescheduling family holidays so they don't overlap with one-day-only "private customer" sales. - The New York Times, 01-07-01
Whoever wants something great must be able to limit himself. - Wolfgang von Goethe
Simplicity
Simplicity isn't something you buy. You create it by chipping away the unreal, the useless and the meaningless until, like Michaelangelo's David, you are left with a life that is breathtakingly beautiful. Simplicity is about loving something more than you love "more." It isn't yours by buying a car or a laptop computer or a cigar or a spa-vacation. - Vicki Robin
From author and speaker Patrick Combs at www.goodthink.com:
Refuse to hoard money.
Don't sit around your house and watch TV.
Don't sell your soul for a great benefits package.
Don't buy things to have a cooler image.
Don't hang around with people aiming low in their lives.
Don't chase money and stuff.
Don't let the majority shape you.
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Purpose
A man's life is what his thoughts make of it. - Marcus Aurelius, Roman Emperor Everything comes if a man will only wait. Settled purpose must accomplish it, a will staying even with it's purpose. - Disraeli
A man is what he thinks about all day long. - Ralph Waldo Emerson
The greatest thing in this world is not so much where we are, but in what direction we are moving." - Oliver Wendell Holmes
Risk
Behold the turtle. He makes progress only when he sticks his neck out. - James B. Conant
Nothing will ever be attempted if all possible objections must be first overcome. - Samuel Johnson
In a moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing, the next best is the wrong thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing. - Teddy Roosevelt
Character
I would rather die in abject poverty than live in inordinate riches with the lack of self-respect. We must rapidly begin to shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered." - Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.
No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true. - Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter
Women
Eighty percent of all women will be solely responsible for their finances at some point in their lives. Twenty-two percent of women never marry. Fifty-two percent of all marriages end in divorce. Seventy-five percent of women are eventually widowed. - Dr. Christopher L. Hayes, the National Center for Women and Retirement Research.
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In a reversal of "No taxation without representation," women were required to pay federal income tax seven years before they had the right to vote. - United States Internal Revenue Service
Money and women are the most sought after and the least known about of any two things we have. - Will Rogers
Attitude of Abundance
"I…remember the periods when money was in short supply. While an ordinary parent might have fretted silently about money, (my widowed Aunt) Marge had a different tactic. She'd call her daughters in and declare that they were going on an Austerity Program. These belt-tightening periods always had a time limit and involved everyone. They'd discuss ways to lower their spending and ways to 'make do.' Should I suggest to my cousin Karen that we go to a movie during one of these times, she'd shake her head and say, 'Not right now, We're on Austerity.' That was the signal for us to cook up an alternative outing that didn't require money. None of them seemed to feel deprived during these times, because they believed they had options. There was always a feeling of abundance in that household which made it a wonderful place to be." - Barbara J. Winter
A Nobel Prize winner and his investments…like the cobbler and his children?
Douglass C. North won the Nobel Prize and $440,000 in 1993 for his contribution to economic history. Entire countries like Venezuela have asked asking him to redesign their economies. As for his personal economics, he has not fared as well. "We got a bad year," recalled North. After paying taxes of 46 percent, he thought the stock market was too high with the Dow at 2,000, so he bought tax-exempt municipal bonds, "which shows you this economist doesn't know a damn thing about investing." (The Dow climbed to a high of 11,600.43 in April 2000.)
Weird things people do for money…or with it
I. Selling the Pope:
Advertisement as seen on The Chicago Tribune online homepage, December, 1999: "Help us put the Christ back into Christmas-special edition: Pope John Paul II Christmas Ornaments @ papalcollection.com. Available in a selection of styles, this symbolic commemoration of the beloved Holy Father will add new grace to your home and fortify your faith." Included 28 different poses of the Pope with a little Christmas tree hook protruding from the top of his head. 6" tall, $45 each.
"The Kaminski brothers, Don and Ken, are working with the Catholic Archdioceses and Catholic Charities in getting their message and ornaments spread throughout the world."
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II. Vulgarity from the Gilded Age:
"At Delmonico's the Silver, Gold and Diamond dinners of the socially prominent succeeded each other failingly. At one, each lady present, opening her napkin, found a gold bracelet with the monogram of the host. At another, cigarettes rolled in hundred-dollar bills were passed around after coffee and consumed with an authentic thrill….One man gave a dinner to his dog, and presented him with a diamond collar worth $15,000. At another dinner, costing $20,000, each guest discovered in one of his oysters a magnificent black pearl. Another distracted individual longing for diversion had little holes bored into his teeth, into which a tooth expert inserted twin rows of diamonds; when he walked abroad his smile flashed and sparkled in the sunlight…"
-Robber Barons: The Great American Capitalists, 1861-1901. by Matthew Josephson (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1934) p. 338.
III. The J.P. Morgan Banking Dynasty:
Eccentric bachelor George Peabody was born in poverty in Danvers, Massachusetts, only had a few years of schooling, and as a teenager worked to support his widowed mother and six siblings. He established an American merchant bank in London, then didn't come back to America for 20 years. Never married, had two illegitimate sons whom he didn't support, nor provide for in his will. Worked 12 years without taking two consecutive days off. Long hours, very tight with his money, mean, only began to give it all away in his sixties (but insisted his name be on the door of the places where he gave money). Tall, homely, carried scars of early poverty, overcame by brute force, proud but insecure." Would you call this man wealthy?" Peabody amassed a $20-million fortune in the 1850s…he mostly hoarded his money in preparation for the next panic. His insecurities only worsened as he had more to lose.
Junius Morgan, who became Peabody's partner in 1854, later told how he found (George Peabody) one morning at the countinghouse looking sickly and rheumatic. The miserly Peabody didn't own a carriage but came to work by public horsecar. 'Mr. Peabody, with that cold you ought not to stick here,' Morgan said. Taking hat and umbrella, Peabody agreed to go home. Twenty minutes later, on his way to the Royal Exchange, Morgan found Peabody standing in the rain. 'Mr. Peabody, I thought you were going home,' the younger man said. 'Well I am, Morgan,' Peabody replied, 'but there's only been a twopenny bus come along as yet and I am waiting for a penny one.' By this time, Peabody's bank account bulged with over £1 million.
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Like other well-to-do young men, Pierpoint paid a stand-in $300 to take his place when he was drafted after Gettsyburg-a common, if inequitable, practice that contributed to draft riots in July 1863. (A future president, Grover Cleveland, also hired a stand-in, although he had a widowed mother to support.) In later years, Pierpoint would humorously refer to his proxy as 'the other Pierpont Morgan,' and he subsidized the man.
Perhaps never in financial history has anybody else amassed so much power so reluctantly. J. Pierpont Morgan was more exhausted than exhilarated by success. He didn't enjoy responsibility and never learned to cope with it.
Jack (Morgan, son of J. Pierpont Morgan) lacked the nerve to contest his terrifying, distant father…His anxiety grew especially acute about money, a subject invested with many family taboos." - from The House of Morgan: An American Banking Dynasty and the Rise of Modern Finance. by Ron Chernow (Touchstone Books, 1991).
IV. Heddy Green:
Arguably American's greatest tightwad. Died of a seizure in a grocery store while arguing with the grocer over the price of skim milk. Her son had had his leg amputated because she was unable find a free clinic to treat him in time and would not pay for medical treatment. She was notorious for dining on cold oatmeal because she refused to waste fuel heating it. Upon her death in 1916, she left an estate valued over $100 million.
Copyright 2002 by Sharon Durling. All rights reserved.