My book ‘The Exciting Adventures of Boo’ was first published when I was fifteen. It is a children’s book with ten different stories. In each story, the main character Boo learns a lesson – one of the ten most important lessons I learned as a kid. I also donated all the money from my books I personally sold to my local ASPCA Animal Shelter.
In the record business, if you sign an artist that don’t really know too much about the business, you can really get over on them in a lot of different ways, so it’s a lot of people that don’t give artist the game because they’re trying to make the most money in the fastest way off their artists.
I love art dealers. In some ways, they’re my favorite people in the art world. Really. I love that they put their money where their taste is, create their own aesthetic universes, support artists, employ people, and do all of this while letting us see art for free. Many are visionaries.
My mother, she had a very good attitude toward money. I’m very grateful for the fact that we had to learn to save. I used to get like 50 pence a week, and I’d save it for like five months. And then I’d spend it on Christmas presents. I’d save up like eight pounds. It’s nothing, but we did that.
It affects every aspect of our lives, is often said to be the root of all evil, and the analysis of the world that it makes possible – what we call ‘the economy’ – is so important to us that economists have become the high priests of our society. Yet, oddly, there is absolutely no consensus among economists about what money really is.
Bitcoin’s revolution: an impossible-to-counterfeit digital store of value that can be used as money, that has no sovereign, or central bank involved, that can be sent anywhere instantly at virtually no cost, is irresistible. Anyone who uses it is converted.
My dad got a job in a factory in Philadelphia, so I was raised in Germantown in a sort of a barracks for soldiers. They had housing for temporary housing. And then my parents saved money and bought a little house in South Jersey, built on a swamp.
What a sound money system does is to stabilize all the elements in it, and reduces the uncertainty that people confront. And the one thing all human beings do when they are confronted with uncertainty is pull back, withdraw, disengage, and that means economic activity, which is really dealing with people, just goes straight down.
My first job was in sixth grade, sweeping the clay tennis courts at the yacht club near my house, which I was not a member of. Always had to pay my own rent. But I don’t really have any concept of how money works. I don’t know how much things cost. Like a BMW. Or a quart of milk. It’s embarrassing.
A deep cynicism is taking hold of the country, with more and more Americans convinced that big money calls the shots in Washington and that there is nothing that can be done about it. We must resist that conclusion and fight back on behalf of everyday citizens. Reform is possible, and it is imperative.
The Obama administration likes to say that it is ‘pro-worker.’ But something is amiss when its labor priorities are forcing unionization and labor contracts on American workplaces, and denying union members information on how their dues money is spent.
Professional services industries like finance, consulting, and legal services are, by definition, meta-industries. That is, they serve to help large companies raise money, buy and sell each other, reorganize, implement new systems, conduct complex transactions, and so forth.
In my early 20s I was so miserable doing construction, I wanted something that paid money. I liked nice stuff. I liked cars and architecture, and things that cost money. I wanted to not swing a hammer, and make money… and not do stuff that was dirty. I attempted to get into comedy. I started to do stand-up, but I wasn’t very good at it.
Only a few bloggers have the audience and credibility to effectively break stories, pressure the traditional media, incubate new ideas, or raise real money. These influential bloggers are usually sharp, opinionated, and focused on the world ‘offline.’ They refuse to view events through the solipsistic blinders of their own websites.
With my business, the way you make big money is you find a great management team and a good concept, and you stick to it, and you add to it over time. In philanthropy, there was more this idea that once an idea was formulated, you moved along.
Unless you’re living on the street and surviving on a diet of discarded turkey drumsticks, there’s no point in being gloomy. We’ve spent too long trying to cheer ourselves up by spending money on brightly coloured things we don’t really need. We’ve stopped using our imaginations.
I love food: biscuits and gravy, cheese grits, spaghetti and meatballs, chicken-fried steak with white gravy… but my favorite dish is my wife’s beanie weenie cornbread casserole. It’s so good. It sounds stupid, but if you eat it, it’s heaven. Of course, it’s only something you can eat if you’ve got a lot of money.
No money has ever been spent on ‘Peaky Blinders’ in terms of publicity, there’s no massive campaign – because it’s the BBC you just get the trailers. But what’s happened is people have found it for themselves and I think the loyalty is greater when people find than when they’re told to watch something.
Free Trade puts consumers at the centre of economic activity. It lowers the cost of imports, which gives people the opportunity to buy more with the same amount of money: domestic producers have to compete with the lowest global costs or invest in new business.
We can spend Rs 5,000 for a meal at the Taj and thousands on all kinds of shopping, but we’re always stingy about books. We always think of borrowing. Why? Writers can use some support. If you have space and money, you should buy your own books.
I think even in bad times it’s good to keep some money going into research. And that’s the purpose of the whole space program. It’s not just exploration and going to see how far we can go out into space and keep people alive and bring them back, although exploration certainly has its place.
Businesses can lead with their values and make money, too. You don’t have to simply be purely profit-driven. You can integrate social and environmental concerns into a business, be a caring business, be a generous business and still do very well financially.
Selling cookies is usually a girl’s first exposure to the world of business. She learns how to meet the public, talk about a product, sell the product, and is responsible for collecting money, giving change, and delivering the product. That’s quite a business venture for a 7-year-old.
‘m just going to be a good friend to my kid. One thing I definitely want to change is that whole ’I don’t want you to make the same mistakes’ mentality. My dad didn’t have much money growing up; he didn’t have much of an education. He forced that on me, and I didn’t want it.
Of course, ‘I Will Always Love You’ is the biggest song so far in my career. I’m famous for several, but that one has been recorded by more people and made me more money, I think, than all of them. But that song did come from a true and deep place in my heart.
