Lucky Money

Bill Gates is fucking rich! Here's a short story about him:

In 1968, the total number of school-aged children worldwide was estimated to be approximately 303 million. Out of this vast number, around 18 million children lived in the United States. Further narrowing down, Seattle had slightly over 100,000 school-aged children, and only a tiny fraction of them, precisely 300, attended Lakeside School.

And to everyone's surprise, this was one of the only schools in the world to have a computer! Bill Gates went to this school. Talk about being lucky! At age 13, Bill and his friend would spend hours and hours learning about computers and soon came up with a trillion-dollar company - Microsoft! I know hard work plays a part in people's success but we should not deny the role 'Luck' plays.

People try all sorts of things to become luckier. 40% of Americans cannot come up with 400$ in an emergency, yet a vast proportion of them spend more than 400$ on lottery tickets during a year.

You might think they are crazy, but it makes sense to them. For example - I would spend 5,000$ on a car, only when I will have 100,000$ in my bank. I don't want to spend more than 5% of my wealth on buying a car. On the other hand, I have some friends who would even borrow money to buy a car they like. What you think of as crazy, might make sense to someone else.

We all are born in different generations, in different households, in different countries, with different economies, and with different parents having different income levels. Everyone has their own idea of how the world works. So when you see someone overspending or oversaving, do not judge them for the way they handle their money.

That's it from me this week. Love you all.

© 2023 Kunal Dutt.