QuestionerI have two questions. Question one. Your view on world financial business environment in the next decade. Question two, U.S. position for economic competition in the next decade. Thank you.
WarrenWell, you've asked two big questions, but you're going to get very small answers, I'm afraid. And that's no disrespect. But we just, we don't have that. We don't think about those things very much. We just are looking for decent businesses. And incidentally, our views in the past wouldn't have been any good on those subjects. And we try to think about two things. We try to think about things that are important and things that are knowable. Now, there are things that are important that are not knowable, in our view, those two questions that you raised fall on that. There are things that are knowable but not important. We don't want to color our minds up with those. So we say, what is important and what is knowable? what is knowable? And what among the things that fall within those two categories can we translate into some kind of an action that is useful for Berkshire? And we really, there are all kinds of important subjects that Charlie and I, we don't know anything about, and therefore we don't think about them. So we have our view about what the world will look like over the next 10 years in business or competitive situations. We're just no good. We do think we know something about what Coca-Cola is going to look like in 10 years. what Gillette's going to look like in 10 years or what Disney's going to look like in 10 years or what some of our operating subsidiaries are going to look like in 10 years. We care a lot about that. We think a lot about that. We want to be right about that. If we're right about that, the other things get to be, you know, they're just, they're less important. And if we started focusing on those, we would miss a lot of big things. I've used this example before, but Coca-Cola went public and I think it was 1919. 2019. And the first year, one share cost $40. The first year, it went down a little over 50 percent. At the end of the year, it was down to $19. There were some problems with bottler contracts. There were problems with sugar, various kinds of problems. If you'd had perfect foresight, you would have seen the world's greatest depression staring you in the face when the social order even got questioned. You would have seen World War II, you would have seen atomic bombs and hydrogen
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Warrenbombs, you would have seen all kinds of things. And you could always find a reason to postpone why you should buy that share of Coca-Cola. But the important thing wasn't to see that. The important thing was to see that they were going to be selling a billion, eight-ounce serving of beverages a day this year, or some large number. And that the person who could make people happy a billion times a day around the globe ought to make a few bucks off doing it. And so that $40, which went down to $19, I think, with dividends reimbableness, invested has to be well over $5 million now. And if you develop the view on these other subjects that in any way forestalled you acting on this more important, specific, narrow view about the future of the company, you would have missed a great ride. So that's the kind of thing we focus on. Charlie?
CharlieYeah, we're not predicting the currents that will come, just how some things will swim in the currents, whatever they are.