From: ohumukin@spectra.com (Kawika Ohumukini)
Newsgroups: misc.invest
Subject: Wealth in the 1990's
Date: 8 Oct 92 19:39:05 GMT
Organization: Spectragraphics Corporation

The distribution of wealth is not a good indicator of anything other
than that those who have it are doing something everybody that doesn't
have isn't doing.

It may be useful to not worry who has the wealth and try to blame them
for your financial or career woes.  They aren't the source, the government
isn't the source (although they certainly have assisted the growth of
the gap, later about that).  Instead of looking at that indicator and
expecting the government to do something about it (which they are slowly
just now beginning to address the issues) look at where the economy has
been and where it is going and anticipate the trend and be the first
to ride the shift.

Some questions you may find useful to ask:

-  What has happened in the past that has created massive change in
   the market and even changed the way most people live?

-  What dictates the speed of that change?

-  What does this trend indicate as a future direction of change and
   how can we create or be the first to ride that change?

-  Why don't people ask the first 3 questions and how can we get them
   to ask them?

My answer to the first 2 is technology.  The stone age, iron age, bronze
age, industrial age, information age (which is misleading) all came about
from technology.  We named the period in time after the technology.
The speed at which technology changes is, for the most part, determined
by the speed at which we transfer information, communication.  The printing
press permitted the industrial age because now we could print info. and
get it to everyone in the world in a short amount of time.  The computer
and fax machines is doing this even faster.  So the rate technology is
changing is increasing everyday because now we have faster communication
capabilities which speeds new innovation faster, more efficiently, and
to a much higher level of sophistication to others.  The information age
is misleading because information has always been the key to growth.
Specifically, the transfer or distribution of information is so important
people will pay thru the nose to get it faster and cheaper (ie: telephone,
tv, 900#'s, computers, UPS/FedEx, etc..).  Why?  Because it permits 
faster, more efficient, greater precision of information for the receiving
party to use to innovate a new technology.

What companies are the richest in the world right now?  Distribution
companies (ie: AT&T, IBM, Microsoft, EDS, UPS, Federal Express, RailRoad
companies, etc..).  The distribution of information or goods is the hot
ticket right now.  Let Japan squeeze out the few pennies out of every retail
product produced (Estimated 15-20% manufacturing, 80-85% distribution costs
of a retail product; Unlimited Wealth -- Paul Zane Pilzer) because the
biggest change can be made in the distribution percentage.  A 10% change
or reduction of cost in mfg equates to $1.50-2.00 (on a $100 item) whereas
10% of dist. comes to $8-8.50 savings.  So Japan is working on the smallest
percentage of cost of an item, fortunately for them they manufacturer so
much they reap huge amounts of sales.  The US on the other hand are masters
of distribution (Telephone, Shipping, Computers, Shopping Malls, Mass transit,
etc..) and reap huge amounts also.  The difference is we have a horizontal
economy, we have competition for a cheaper way to ship, there are thousands
of shipping companies that if one costs $12 to ship and another costs $10,
the second company will get most of the business.  In Japan they have a
vertical economy, the manufacturers own the chain of distribution.  This
does not lower costs of dist., politically closes the market through laws
(>5000 sq ft store must receive written permission from all stores within
1.6mi radius and (ex: Panasonic doesn't sell Sony and definitely will not
sell IBM)).  So they can only affect the mfg cost within their own country.

So distribution is the trend of the 90's.

Why don't people ask these questions?  Simple, scarceity.  The feeling
that we don't have enough.  What a bunch of horse ____.  And the government
encourages this.  They economically segregrate the masses.  They build
low income housing with 1,000's of units right in the worst parts of town
so children, and adults, living there don't know the possibilities through
modeling those who are financially more abundent than they.  So they don't
even try and even attempt to steal because they look at them and think,
"How come they get it and I don't?"  The government also doesn't educate
people to handle their money and how to ride this shift in technology.
This "3rd world country" we are developing within our nation causes people
to live in a feeling of lack, and I don't know where there is a feeling of
lack, that something cannot be accomplished because you don't have the
resources, that people will perform at their highest potential.  And then
for the final slap in the face, the government does not provide "enough"
money for secondary education.  And even then by the time they graduate
the market has already changed and the profession they were studying may
not be the hot item anymore.  This can be observed by the vinyl record
industry.  In 1985 records were the way to go, it was a multi-billion dollar
business.  In 1991 record stores didn't even sell them anymore.  For a person
in that industry the future looked dim because there was no market for
your product, it had been replaced by CD's.  So the time between market
changes, due to technology, doesn't take 60 years anymore (Learn a profession
and do it all your life) now it only takes 6 years and that time is shrinking
all the time.  Recordable CD's is here, DAT is here, recordings on PROM is
just around the corner.

What's the point?  If you are living with a sense of lack or waiting for
the government to assist, forget it, it isn't going to happen soon enough.
By the time government reacts it will have changed at least once if not
more.  We all have the resources to do anything, we all have the same basic
physiology, ride the shift and anticipate.  Most technologies that are
making people rich today probably weren't around when they were born if
not only in the last 10 years.  Change will not slow down, the rate of change
will only increase.  I wish all well and see you on wall street.
Have a great day!

Kawika 
Newsgroups: misc.invest