Curious how the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is investing its money? Checkout this SEC filing reflecting holdings as of 12/31/03. What’s interesting is the absence of any technology holdings — it’s mostly a big S&P 500 holding, drug/medical, media/cable, travel and garbage collection (!) companies.
Edward Tufte’s on to a new way of communicating data that he calls “sparklines“. Powerful stuff.
Dan Bricklin posts on a recent interview with Clayton Christensen.
Amy Wu writes in the New York Times about Cashflow, a board game designed by Robert T. Kiyosaki, author of “Rich Dad Poor Dad.”
More than 300,000 copies of the game have been sold, said Sharon L. Lechter, the chief executive of Cashflow Technologies and the co-author of all nine of Mr. Kiyosaki’s books. Many players say the game gives them tools to gain wealth, helping them figure out ways to pursue their dreams by earning income beyond their 9-to-5 jobs.
Halley Suitt points to Michael Watkins’ blog where he posts about not getting tenure at Harvard Business School. Ouch.
Over the last year or so I’ve become intrigued by exchange traded funds and was pleased to see Vanguard announcing a series of new VIPER exchange traded funds today. These funds track various indices/segments and have expenses which are much lower than typically found with actively managed mutual funds. In addition, they can be bought and sold during the trading day — unlike typical mutual funds.
Ross Mayfield comments on Heidi Rozen’s reflection about the impact underhiring has on a startup’s potential success.
Amen. In my experience, many start-up CEO’s can’t believe how much time it takes to get the hiring right. It’s consistently underestimated. And, following a bad hire, the time lost to correct it is also way too long. I can’t remember anyone saying “Gee, I really wish I had waited a while longer before letting that person go!”
Big news in the banking world last night with the announcement that JP Morgan Chase and Bank One are merging — becoming the second largest bank in the US. More information about all of this over on Payments News.
The Bay Area Economic Forum has announced its latest report on the economic profile of the San Francisco Bay Area.
Sean Randolph, president of the Bay Area Economic Forum, said, “The Bay Area’s extraordinary resources of human capital, venture capital, and research capacity underpin its ability to innovate, and give it a unique position in the national and global economies. Despite the economic downturn and its devastating effects, the region’s fundamental strengths remain intact.” However, the Bay Area is slowly losing its once-insurmountable lead over other metropolitan regions, and the report raises basic concerns about its economic future.
The Bay Area’s economic productivity is almost twice the U.S. average
(194 percent). While this reflects the caliber of the Bay Area workforce, its strength in research and development, and its emphasis on high value economic activities, the high cost of living is shrinking its competitive edge.
What’s not at all clear is what can proactively be done to address some of the key issues raised. Clearly things like taxes and the high cost of workers compensation insurance could be addressed by legislative action. But, realistically, what can you do about high prices on homes in an area with limited usable land left for building? How can you best force a consolidation of the many transit administrations to reduce overhead, ensure area-wide policies are effective while remaining responsive to local needs?
Back to taxes, a key issue here is the dramatic surge in costs associated with retirement benefits for public service employees at both the local and state levels. As those costs have exploded, other budget categories are being tightly squeezed with services suffering — dramatically in many cases. Here’s an example of the issue for Menlo Park (from The Almanac):
Menlo Park is expected to pay $260,000 in retirement benefits in 2003-2004 and $1.75 million the next year, Mr. Boesch said. The numbers are so dramatic in part because higher benefits negotiated with the police department a few years ago don’t take effect until 2004, he said.
Sacramento Bee columnist Daniel Weintraub shares his point of view re: the benefits Wal-Mart brings through lower prices.
So for the sake of 250,000 grocery store clerks and baggers, and their employers, the other 35 million people in this state are asked to agree to pay billions of dollars more than they ought to for the necessities of life, and to deprive themselves of choices that could make their lives better. You don’t have to be a Wal-Mart shopper to see that this is not a bargain that makes sense.
He follows up with some additional commentary on Wal-Mart’s medical plans for its employees.
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