In Search of the Perfect Investment

For pain, there’s Spain. Just after Greece. Too much debt. The banks are loaded with busted housing loans. Too much construction boom. Half-finished houses everywhere. Construction boom now truly bust.  Housing prices are down by 50%, and still falling — down 14.4% in August year over year. All the constructions workers are out of work. 55% of kids under 30 don’t have a job. 30-year old kids are living with their parents. This place needs a major re-think:

+ Employment laws are still too rigid. A man worked 29 years for the same company. One year before retirement, they sacked him. He was entitled to 90,00 euros (about $117,000). They offered him €40,000. He took it. The firm was bankrupt. In the old days, it was 45 days / year severance. Now it’s 25 days. There’s a new conservative government in Spain. They’re loosening labor laws. They need to. The penalties on firing are too high a bar to hiring new workers.

+ Latest twist: Kids get a one-year unpaid internship with a firm they want to work for. At the end of the year, they pray they’ll get hired. A lot of Spanish firms are getting a lot of enthusiastic, free labor. Be fun to try that in the U.S.

+ Few of the kids want to be entrepreneurs. They all went to college — usually on government money — and startup work is not what they were trained for. It’s a mindset called entitlement. They all want to work for a big telecoms company. No kidding. I heard this several times.

+ With so many kids out of work, you wonder why there aren’t street demonstrations. I asked kids. They said “it wouldn’t make any difference.” Which is civilized, if fatalistic. I suspect most of the demonstrations in the mid-east against the Mohammed video used unemployed, bored kids, who don’t have mortgage payments to meet. The worldwide youth unemployment is a bigger problem than the housing bust. I don’t want us to lose that generation. But, then, I don’t know how to fix it either.

Spain is gorgeous (and cheap) to visit. What’s amazing is that its infrastructure is so much better than the U.S.’s. Highways are modern. Tunnels plough through mountains, making car travel a joy. The trains are fast, clean and run on time. Try this. I’m on the Madrid subway. It’s airconditioned. People are checking their phones for messages. Some speak on their phones. You can speak on a moving subway train! That’s mindblowing. As a New Yorker, I still can’t make cell phone calls from our subway platforms (let alone our subway cars). New Yorkers huddle near stairs, speaking on their phones awaiting their trains. In Madrid, they speak on the train! The Madrid subway gets to the airport quickly and cheaply. Only €6.

This is the town of Gaucin. Our rented villa is three miles out of  town on the other side of the mountain. You can see a crane. It’s on a quarter-built construction site. now idled. The town is full of unfinished apartments that, I’m guessing, will never be finished. In fact, the whole of Andalusia (the state we’re in) is littered by white, unfinished construction sites. There are more than in California, Nevada an Florida  combined. And this place (Spain) has only 48 million people — about 15% of the U.S.’s population.

This is the view from Gaucin. The first rock is Gibraltar. The second is Morocco. It’s that close.

The place is dripping with ham (jambon) and croissants. When the Moors invaded from Morocco many hundreds of years ago, the locals needed a way of snubbing them. Hence they ate boatloads of ham. It stuck. When the Moors were finally chucked out, a baker celebrated by making a crescent-shaped pastry, now called a croissant.

Jimmy Kimmel of late night TV send a team went out on the streets with an iPhone 4. They told people it was the new iPhone 5. It actually was the present iPhone 4S. Some people actually owned the latest iPhone 4S. What they said is a lesson in marketing, and cupidity.

For the Kimmel video, click here.

The Spanish fireman.
He had two sons. The first he called Jose.

And second?

Why, obviously, Hose B.

That “joke” is because I’m in Spain. And I don’t know any other Spanish jokes, yet.

The Blood Donor and The Sheik
A rich Arab Sheik was admitted to Hospital for heart surgery, but prior to the surgery, the doctors needed to store his blood in case the need arises.

As the gentleman had a rare type of blood, it couldn’t be found locally, so, the call went out.

Finally a Scotsman was located who had a similar blood type.

The Scot willingly donated his blood for the Arab.

After the surgery, the Arab sent the Scotsman as appreciation for giving his blood, a new BMW, diamonds & US dollars.

A couple of days later, once again, the Arab had to go through a corrective surgery.

His doctor telephoned the Scotsman who was more than happy to donate his blood again.

After the second surgery, the Arab sent the Scotsman a thank-you card and a box of Quality Street chocolates.

The Scotsman was shocked that the Arab did not reciprocate his kind gesture as he had anticipated.

He phoned the Arab and asked him: “I thought you would be generous again, that you would give me a BMW, diamonds & money, but you only gave me a thank-you card and a box of Quality Street .”

To this the Arab replied: “Aye laddie, but I now have Scottish blood in ma veins”.

Harry Newton who is entranced by the sun here, and the possibilities for solar, now that the panels and other solar paraphernalia have come down so dramatically in price. And the manufacturers (at least some anywhere) have learned that their business is not making panels, but making efficient power plants. Think Israel, Morocco, etc. FSLR suddenly appeals.