Something More Dangerous than Wealth
It is interesting to see how American millionaires expected or forecast in advance the economic conditions of 2008.
It is because there are many politicians, economists, journalists, and people concerned in the world, including Japan, who believe that America is a kind of almighty and thus the American millionaires and super-rich never fail.
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Wealth in America 2008
Findings from a Survey of Millionaire Households
January 2008
Northern Trust commissioned Phoenix Marketing International to conduct the survey, which was administered online and drew from a panel associated with Phoenix Marketing International’s Affluent Marketing Service program. A total of 1,014 online questionnaires were completed; all respondents had stated liquid assets of $1 million or more.
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The 2008 Wealth in America study was conducted in October, 2007, a period marked by gloomy news about the U.S. economy and by uncertainty as a result of ongoing crisis in the credit markets. Despite the onslaught of negative economic news, most millionaire households retained an optimistic outlook for the performance of the U.S. stock market in 2008. Three reasons were cited by the optimistic households: some foresaw a decline in interest rates in 2008, while others were confident about strong corporate earnings growth or expected strong U.S. economic growth.
Of course not all were optimistic. Those who expect negative or flat market performance in 2008 almost doubled in number since last year’s survey, from 6% to 11%. These households’ negative outlook is based mainly on their expectations of slowing economic growth and a continuation of the downturn in the real estate market.
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Wealthy Gen X households were considerably more optimistic about the stock market’s performance in 2008, with 28% expecting the market to increase by at least 10%, compared with 14% and 9% of the Boomer and Silent generations, respectively.
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Most millionaires contribute both time and money to charitable and philanthropic causes. The average total donation among millionaires in the past year was $11,000, and, among decamillionaires, nearly $36,000. This represents a significant decline from 2005, when charitable contributions were unusually high in response to Hurricane Katrina and the Southeast Asian tsunami. In general, millionaires have very altruistic motivations for their charitable giving: supporting causes that they personally believe in and making a difference in their community rank far higher as reasons for why they give than do honoring a family member or creating a legacy for oneself.
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2008: three-quarters (76%) expect a market increase of between 1% and 10% in 2008. However, there is some sign of increased pessimism this year. Compared with 2006, nearly twice as many respondents this year say they expect the stock market to be flat or fall in the coming year.…
When making decisions about investing, millionaires most commonly obtain the relevant investment information from their principal advisor, followed by financial websites.
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Millionaires represented in this survey are predominately well educated, middleaged professionals, with average investable assets of $3.6 million.
http://www-ac.northerntrust.com/content/media/attachment/data/white_paper/0801/document/wealth_america2008.pdf
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American millionaires are not a kind of omnipotent at all.
They and their advisors, in addition to financial web sites they rely on, cannot foretell this large-scale Wall Street organizational crisis and the global money market recession that is still proceeding as of early October, 2008.
If so, how super rich Americans could know this crisis beforehand?
What I want to emphasize is that politicians, economists, journalists, and people concerned in the world, including Japan, should not blindly believe that America is a kind of almighty and thus American millionaires and super-rich people never fail.
Now, the key to solving this global financial crisis triggered on Wall Street has to be the good practices of charity.
AS the above document indicates, "the average total donation among millionaires in the past year was $11,000, and, among decamillionaires, nearly $36,000."
In order to prevent the possible Great Depression, the average total donation among millionaires in the coming year must be $110,000, and, among decamillionaires, nearly $3,600,000.
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That is all for today.
One more scientist of the Japanese race has won another 2008 Nobel Prize.
"A clever trick borrowed from jellyfish has earned two Americans and one Japanese scientist a share of the chemistry Nobel Prize."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7658945.stm
You know mankind, including the American super-rich, cannot even create a jellyfish.
The American super-rich are not a kind of almighty at all like all other members of mankind.
They cannot even trigger a financial crisis on Wall Street.
(There is a generation called “Zen-kyou-tou Sedai” among the Japanese population; some of those who belong to this generation must have a memory of joining anti-Vietnam War demonstrations conducted on streets in Tokyo and other major cities and in universities in Japan. Nowadays some of them might spiritually reach an age to win the Nobel Prize or deal with the possible Great Depression comparable to the one that occurred before WWII.
Now what generation do you belong to, say, in Paris or New York?
http://www.fukuchan.ac/music/j-folk2/tomoyo.html )
"GIVE ALL THE MONEY RECEIVED TO THE POOR AND FOLLOW ME, THOUGH YOU CANNOT SINCE YOU ARE RICH"