It seems that I’m doing a lot of thinking and reading, so I suppose that’s good. One thing I’ve been thinking about a lot is human capital and I believe that is what it’s going to set us apart from others when it comes to hiring and productivity—our levels of human capital.

So I saw this article - California high-speed rail hires CEO for $375,000.

An executive for the company that built France’s bullet trains will lead California’s high-speed rail project for a salary of $375,000, making him one of state government’s highest paid nonuniversity workers.
The California High-Speed Rail Authority board on Thursday unanimously voted to hire Roelof van Ark, 58, of New York as CEO of the $43 billion undertaking being touted as the largest public works project in the nation.

Van Ark will leave his job as president of Alstom Transportation, a role he has held since 2005. Alstom Transportation is the North American subsidiary of the French company Alstom, a corporation with $20 billion in annual sales that built France’s TGV bullet trains and employs 65,000 people.

My first thought was wow, that must be a nice sum of pocket money except the pay is actually low. Van Ark, the CEO, was earning close to a million dollars at his current position. Another thought is that Van Ark only needs to bring himself to the U.S. and his relocation expenses will be covered. How nice is that? Clearly, he’s got the human capital skill that is high in demand and the board is willing to pay him the salary.

That got me thinking and how I can raise my human capital and be more productive.

I was glad to see this because I wrote a similar post so it affirms my thinking.

What People Buy

People only pay for what they want or need when the price is low enough to be a greater value then the alternatives. Think about your own buying decisions: When the need or desire is great enough you buy when it’s not you don’t. If the price is too high, you look for an alternative or go without. Sometimes the need or desire outweighs the reality that you can’t afford it, hence the financial mess (debt) most folks put themselves into. But when the value is bigger than the other offerings, they buy.

Link

My post - The American Dream

And god, I need to re-work my website…

Thought I’d take a stab at explaining how economy works, generally speaking, in layman’s terms and from the macroeconomics’ perspective. I’m not trying to write a Ph.d dissertation so don’t be shooting me with reference whereabouts as I am just writing off my head, with what I know and being reasonable.

I suppose it’s hard not to be thinking about economy since that’s the hot issue right now, with 2.4 million jobs being lost—the most since 1940. Yikes. So, I’ve been thinking what economy really is. At first, I thought it is just a cycle that if studied and know how it works, enables you to become rich and have a great life, or in other words, living out the “American dream”.

Let me say that economy is purely abstract. It only exists as math in your head. Numbers. It used to be based on the value of gold till someone realizes that’s not necessary and break off the valuation. That’s because there are enough goods, services, and possessions created that apparently, people want them badly enough. Dollar simply provides the means for it. Want a Porsche? then you’d have to work your ass off till you have enough to afford it. Want some hot flesh lap dance and more some than that ? Pay some fat dollars. Nothing to do with gold. Just numbers.

Price is simply the amount that you would be willing to pay for it. Marketers are expert in pricing their items in such a way that it’s not too high that customers won’t pay nor too low as to lose the profits. They aim to achieve profit margin as wide as they can. No buy? then lower the price (called a sale) till customers say “hey, this is pretty affordable. I can purchase this.” A sale is made—seller gets money and the buyer is now one happy customer with the wanted good.

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