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> 97.8 billion dollars, 97.5 billion or so of that was earned after he was 50 years old. To think he started off with a paltry $300 million. How much avocado t

> 97.8 billion dollars, 97.5 billion or so of that was earned after he was 50 years old. To think he started off with a paltry $300 million. How much avocado toast do I need to not eat to get there?

rufus_foreman 4y ago
He didn't start off with it. That was after 40 years of investing. By the time he was 21 he was up to $20,000.
- zehaeva 4y ago
  That's the equivalent of ~$240k in today's dollars!
  - rufus_foreman 4y ago
    >> In 1945, as a high school sophomore, Buffett and a friend spent $25 to purchase a used pinball machine, which they placed in the local barber shop. Within months, they owned several machines in three different barber shops across Omaha. They sold the business later in the year for $1,200 That's ~$20k in today's dollars in a few months while still in high school. >> At 15, Warren made more than $175 monthly delivering Washington Post newspapers ~$3k a month in today's dollars.
    - PuppyTailWags 4y ago
      A 15 year old today cannot make ~$3k a month delivering Washington Post newspapers. I think the point still stands what much of wealth gain is lucky opportunity windows, such as being alive during a time where a job like newspaper delivery pays 3k a month.
      - wpietri 4y ago
        Yup. When I had a newspaper route in the 1980s, I was getting paid the same per paper delivered as my grandfather was 50 years prior: 2 cents. It reminds me of how people shit on today's college students without realizing how much college costs have risen. I get the initial "kids these days" reaction, but holy moly, fellow olds, please use Google to update your priors a bit.
        dayjaby 4y ago
        I am so lucky to have delivered newspapers in the 2000s for 3ct a piece, in a village. I am sorry that you didn't have this great opportunity.
        Sohcahtoa82 4y ago
        Drives me bonkers. There was a time when you could just work a minimum wage part time over the summer and it would pay for college the rest of the year. Now, you can work minimum wage full time year-round and if you're lucky, you MIGHT cover tuition at a community college if you're still living with your parents and they don't charge rent.
        googlryas 4y ago
        I think you're exaggerating a little bit. It doesn't help whatever point you're trying to make. Average community college tuition cost[0]: $3,400/yr. $3400/yr is $70/week in order to pay your tuition without a loan. Your argument is only lucky people making minimum wage for 40 hours/week, who have their rent paid for, can save $70/week? [0] https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-community-college https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-community-college
        wpietri 4y ago
        US minimum wage is $7.25; 40 hours a week would be $14,500 in pre-tax income. Average car ownership, per AAA, costs $10,728. Adding in the $3,400 for tuition leaves an entire $372 for food, clothing, hygiene, entertainment, and medical expenses. Seems reasonable! Setting aside quickly Googled statistics and the risks of using averages to understand individual situations, plus the wide state-by-state variation in support to community college, let's just take the minimum wage and your $70/week number. Let's also set aside how it's quite hard to get 40 hours per week these days in a lot of jobs because of corporate schedule fuckery that was much less severe when I was punching a McDonald's clock. That's circa 10 hours per week of pay or 25% of their time. Is that number a lot? I would say yes. I don't know many people who can save 25% of their gross pay. If that's you, congrats.
      - WalterBright 4y ago
        I made maybe $100 a month delivering newspapers in the 1970s. It wasn't practical to make much more because the territories were fixed and there was a long waiting list to get one.
        Kon-Peki 4y ago
        I made about $120 a month delivering newspapers in the 1980s in a terrible, small, rust-belt town. With all the overhead involved, it came out to less than $2 an hour. Nobody was "lucky" to have a paper delivery route.
        josephcsible 4y ago
        If there were more people who wanted to deliver papers for that price than there were delivery routes available, then you were indeed lucky if you had one.
      - jl6 4y ago
        Maybe not, but they can probably make that (and potentially a lot more) with a minor YouTube hustle.
        Volundr 4y ago
        YouTube is far from a sure thing. For every channel that reaches even moderate success there are many, many more that go nowhere.
      - rufus_foreman 4y ago
        >> much of wealth gain is lucky opportunity windows He sold gum, he sold Coke bottles, he sold magazines, he worked in a grocery store, he delivered newspapers, he sold golf balls, he sold stamps, he detailed cars, he invested in stock, he invested in land, he went to business school, he worked as an investment salesman, he worked as a stock analyst, he worked as a general partner, then chairman, then CEO at a company. The lucky opportunity was 82 years to compound returns. The question is why he wouldn't quit at 50 with a few hundred million and live off of the money instead of spending the next 42 years making more money which he will then give away to someone else to decide what to do with after he dies.
        schwartzworld 4y ago
        The only feasible answer is that billionaires are insane hoarders, walling off society's resources for literally no reason.
        sam-s 4y ago
        They are not hoarding anything people need (like food or clothing). They are not even hoarding anything people don't need (like gold or diamonds). The "money" (they don't hoard cash either) they accumulate is _investment_ which translates into _power_ to change the world. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power:_A_New_Social_Analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power:_A_New_Social_Analysis
      - achenatx 4y ago
        my daughter is 14, her friend makes $17 hour working at a juice store. She makes about 300/week. In 1987 I was making about 25/hour doing programming as a senior in high school. There are always opportunities and those opportunities are not the same in every era. Kids today are making 100K being influencers opening toys on youtube Kids today are making 100K playing online poker Kids today are making $$ writing apps Kids today are making $$ selling pot The point is not paper delivery, the point is there is a mindset. I will never be a billionaire because I will stop trying to make money once I have "enough"
        PuppyTailWags 4y ago
        > my daughter is 14, her friend makes $17 hour working at a juice store. She makes about 300/week. This is not 3k a month. This is less than 1/3 of that.
        rufus_foreman 4y ago
        Take $300 a week for a year, that is $15,600. Say that was invested this year, what do you think that would be worth 82 years from now?
        schwartzworld 4y ago
        Maybe a lot! Also maybe nothing. Also, the 15 year old is going to wait 82 years, happily becoming a billionaire or whatever at 97 years young?
    - NordSteve 4y ago
      There’s no way anyone who was doing delivery of newspapers in the 1940s and making $175 nominal. Newspapers then cost roughly 5 cents apiece, and in Omaha a route with 100 doors would take 90 minutes. Your monthly gross sales for a seven day route of that size would be $150, and the vast of that would go to purchase papers. You’d probably net $25, and then get $15 in tips. That’s about the same amount I made on my route in the late 1970s when adjusted for inflation.
      - rufus_foreman 4y ago
        He had 3 routes, this was in DC, not Omaha: "Young Warren attended the DC public school Alice Deal Junior High and he graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School. Buffett says delivering papers at age 14 instilled the importance of hard work and reliability. Wartime Washington was short of adult men and for that reason, says Buffett, he was able to get multiple paper routes at the Westchester Apartments, a five-building complex that was home to the city’s elite. “I also learned,” he says, “that if you did a good job you were going to move up. The very fact that I did a good job in Spring Valley got me the Westchester routes later on.”"
        NordSteve 4y ago
        Thanks for the additional info. Let's assume for a moment that $0.05 is still a good price for newspapers, and assume that the carrier received 20%, or a penny apiece. Also assume that he delivers every day. That's about 580 papers day. If they're really dense subscribers, I guess you could make a delivery every 10 seconds, so about 95 minutes to deliver that number if you never wait for an elevator, climb stairs, etc. Certainly was a great opportunity for Warren, but an outlier for paper delivery earnings.
spywaregorilla 4y ago
If you can expel negative avacado toasts from your body and sell them for $17, ignoring sales labor costs, about -18M.
- darkerside 4y ago
  My man is expelling tons of negativity, shouldn't be a problem
HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago
Dammit. I totally forgot that I have an avocado ripening... should be perfect just about now, but ate the last of my brioche for breakfast. I'm seriously not kidding. I've never had avocado toast (was going to make guac) and I'm thinking that brioche avocado toast would be amazing.
- jedberg 4y ago
  It is pretty good with a nice ripe avocado. Just remember you have to choose between buying a house and eating that toast.
  - HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago
    Maybe the reason I have a house is because I've skipped avocado toast for the last 20 years ;-)
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
betwixthewires 4y ago
"Started off" at 50.

> 97.8 billion dollars, 97.5 billion or so of that was earned after he was 50 years old. To think he started off with a paltry $300 million. How much avocado toast do I need to not eat to get there?

rufus_foreman 4y ago

He didn't start off with it. That was after 40 years of investing. By the time he was 21 he was up to $20,000.

zehaeva 4y ago
That's the equivalent of ~$240k in today's dollars!
- rufus_foreman 4y ago
  >> In 1945, as a high school sophomore, Buffett and a friend spent $25 to purchase a used pinball machine, which they placed in the local barber shop. Within months, they owned several machines in three different barber shops across Omaha. They sold the business later in the year for $1,200 That's ~$20k in today's dollars in a few months while still in high school. >> At 15, Warren made more than $175 monthly delivering Washington Post newspapers ~$3k a month in today's dollars.
  - PuppyTailWags 4y ago
    A 15 year old today cannot make ~$3k a month delivering Washington Post newspapers. I think the point still stands what much of wealth gain is lucky opportunity windows, such as being alive during a time where a job like newspaper delivery pays 3k a month.
    - wpietri 4y ago
      Yup. When I had a newspaper route in the 1980s, I was getting paid the same per paper delivered as my grandfather was 50 years prior: 2 cents. It reminds me of how people shit on today's college students without realizing how much college costs have risen. I get the initial "kids these days" reaction, but holy moly, fellow olds, please use Google to update your priors a bit.
      - dayjaby 4y ago
        I am so lucky to have delivered newspapers in the 2000s for 3ct a piece, in a village. I am sorry that you didn't have this great opportunity.
      - Sohcahtoa82 4y ago
        Drives me bonkers. There was a time when you could just work a minimum wage part time over the summer and it would pay for college the rest of the year. Now, you can work minimum wage full time year-round and if you're lucky, you MIGHT cover tuition at a community college if you're still living with your parents and they don't charge rent.
        googlryas 4y ago
        I think you're exaggerating a little bit. It doesn't help whatever point you're trying to make. Average community college tuition cost[0]: $3,400/yr. $3400/yr is $70/week in order to pay your tuition without a loan. Your argument is only lucky people making minimum wage for 40 hours/week, who have their rent paid for, can save $70/week? [0] https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-community-college https://educationdata.org/average-cost-of-community-college
        wpietri 4y ago
        US minimum wage is $7.25; 40 hours a week would be $14,500 in pre-tax income. Average car ownership, per AAA, costs $10,728. Adding in the $3,400 for tuition leaves an entire $372 for food, clothing, hygiene, entertainment, and medical expenses. Seems reasonable! Setting aside quickly Googled statistics and the risks of using averages to understand individual situations, plus the wide state-by-state variation in support to community college, let's just take the minimum wage and your $70/week number. Let's also set aside how it's quite hard to get 40 hours per week these days in a lot of jobs because of corporate schedule fuckery that was much less severe when I was punching a McDonald's clock. That's circa 10 hours per week of pay or 25% of their time. Is that number a lot? I would say yes. I don't know many people who can save 25% of their gross pay. If that's you, congrats.
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      I made maybe $100 a month delivering newspapers in the 1970s. It wasn't practical to make much more because the territories were fixed and there was a long waiting list to get one.
      - Kon-Peki 4y ago
        I made about $120 a month delivering newspapers in the 1980s in a terrible, small, rust-belt town. With all the overhead involved, it came out to less than $2 an hour. Nobody was "lucky" to have a paper delivery route.
        josephcsible 4y ago
        If there were more people who wanted to deliver papers for that price than there were delivery routes available, then you were indeed lucky if you had one.
    - jl6 4y ago
      Maybe not, but they can probably make that (and potentially a lot more) with a minor YouTube hustle.
      - Volundr 4y ago
        YouTube is far from a sure thing. For every channel that reaches even moderate success there are many, many more that go nowhere.
    - rufus_foreman 4y ago
      >> much of wealth gain is lucky opportunity windows He sold gum, he sold Coke bottles, he sold magazines, he worked in a grocery store, he delivered newspapers, he sold golf balls, he sold stamps, he detailed cars, he invested in stock, he invested in land, he went to business school, he worked as an investment salesman, he worked as a stock analyst, he worked as a general partner, then chairman, then CEO at a company. The lucky opportunity was 82 years to compound returns. The question is why he wouldn't quit at 50 with a few hundred million and live off of the money instead of spending the next 42 years making more money which he will then give away to someone else to decide what to do with after he dies.
      - schwartzworld 4y ago
        The only feasible answer is that billionaires are insane hoarders, walling off society's resources for literally no reason.
        sam-s 4y ago
        They are not hoarding anything people need (like food or clothing). They are not even hoarding anything people don't need (like gold or diamonds). The "money" (they don't hoard cash either) they accumulate is _investment_ which translates into _power_ to change the world. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power:_A_New_Social_Analysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power:_A_New_Social_Analysis
    - achenatx 4y ago
      my daughter is 14, her friend makes $17 hour working at a juice store. She makes about 300/week. In 1987 I was making about 25/hour doing programming as a senior in high school. There are always opportunities and those opportunities are not the same in every era. Kids today are making 100K being influencers opening toys on youtube Kids today are making 100K playing online poker Kids today are making $$ writing apps Kids today are making $$ selling pot The point is not paper delivery, the point is there is a mindset. I will never be a billionaire because I will stop trying to make money once I have "enough"
      - PuppyTailWags 4y ago
        > my daughter is 14, her friend makes $17 hour working at a juice store. She makes about 300/week. This is not 3k a month. This is less than 1/3 of that.
        rufus_foreman 4y ago
        Take $300 a week for a year, that is $15,600. Say that was invested this year, what do you think that would be worth 82 years from now?
        schwartzworld 4y ago
        Maybe a lot! Also maybe nothing. Also, the 15 year old is going to wait 82 years, happily becoming a billionaire or whatever at 97 years young?
  - NordSteve 4y ago
    There’s no way anyone who was doing delivery of newspapers in the 1940s and making $175 nominal. Newspapers then cost roughly 5 cents apiece, and in Omaha a route with 100 doors would take 90 minutes. Your monthly gross sales for a seven day route of that size would be $150, and the vast of that would go to purchase papers. You’d probably net $25, and then get $15 in tips. That’s about the same amount I made on my route in the late 1970s when adjusted for inflation.
    - rufus_foreman 4y ago
      He had 3 routes, this was in DC, not Omaha: "Young Warren attended the DC public school Alice Deal Junior High and he graduated from Woodrow Wilson High School. Buffett says delivering papers at age 14 instilled the importance of hard work and reliability. Wartime Washington was short of adult men and for that reason, says Buffett, he was able to get multiple paper routes at the Westchester Apartments, a five-building complex that was home to the city’s elite. “I also learned,” he says, “that if you did a good job you were going to move up. The very fact that I did a good job in Spring Valley got me the Westchester routes later on.”"
      - NordSteve 4y ago
        Thanks for the additional info. Let's assume for a moment that $0.05 is still a good price for newspapers, and assume that the carrier received 20%, or a penny apiece. Also assume that he delivers every day. That's about 580 papers day. If they're really dense subscribers, I guess you could make a delivery every 10 seconds, so about 95 minutes to deliver that number if you never wait for an elevator, climb stairs, etc. Certainly was a great opportunity for Warren, but an outlier for paper delivery earnings.

spywaregorilla 4y ago

If you can expel negative avacado toasts from your body and sell them for $17, ignoring sales labor costs, about -18M.

darkerside 4y ago
My man is expelling tons of negativity, shouldn't be a problem

HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago

Dammit. I totally forgot that I have an avocado ripening... should be perfect just about now, but ate the last of my brioche for breakfast. I'm seriously not kidding. I've never had avocado toast (was going to make guac) and I'm thinking that brioche avocado toast would be amazing.

jedberg 4y ago
It is pretty good with a nice ripe avocado. Just remember you have to choose between buying a house and eating that toast.
- HeyLaughingBoy 4y ago
  Maybe the reason I have a house is because I've skipped avocado toast for the last 20 years ;-)
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

betwixthewires 4y ago

"Started off" at 50.