佳句書摘 - The Snowball (11)
Posted in Investment, Quote on Jan 29th, 2009
The Snowball還有最後幾段佳句書摘還沒和大家分享，最後幾個章節可說是全書菁華，尤其是最後一段，一口氣把Buffett的人生、性格做了濃縮版回顧總結。好酒當然不能這麼快拿出來，這邊先分享Buffett也常提起的”Ovarian Lottery”：
Buffett then spoken of the Ovarian Lottery. “I have been very lucky. I was born in the United States in 1930 and won the lottery the day I was born. I had terrific parents, a good education, and I was wired in a way that paid off disproportionately in this particular society. If I had been born long ago or in some other country, my particular wiring would not have paid off the way it has. But in a market system, where capital-allocation wiring is important, it pays off like no other place”
Buffett 90年代和Bill Gates同遊大陸，遊經長江三峽，看到在岸邊努力拉纜繩泊船的年輕人(a.k.a. 沒有抽中Ovarian Lottery)，不禁向Gates感嘆道：縱使這些年輕人當中，其中一位擁有Gates的IQ與潛力，出生在這樣的環境、社會中，這孩子不論怎樣努力，恐怕一輩子都是個船夫，一輩子都無法飛黃騰達。(當然10多年後的大陸改變很多了，現在聽說只要你肯努力，遍地是機會。)
感嘆之餘，Buffett也認為他所賺來的財富，不過是種claim checks，最終都要「還」給社會：
“All long, I’ve felt the money was just claim checks that should go back to society. I am not an enthusiast for dynastic wealth, particularly the alternative is six billion people who’ve got much poorer hands in life than we have, getting a chance to benefit from the money. And my wife agreed with me.“
所以，一點都不意外，Buffett決定把財富都捐給比爾蓋茲的基金會運用：
“It was clear that Bill Gates had an outstanding mind with the right goals, focusing intensely with passion and heat on improving the lot of mankind around the world without any regard to gender, religion, color, or geography. He was just doing the most good for the most people. So when the time came to make a decision on where the money would go, it was a simple decision.”
能出生在台灣，生活在網路世代，我們也算是贏了某一期的Ovarian Lottery，只可惜去年開始遇到金融風暴，獎金兌現時間可能要延後了。不過呢，我相信等待是值得的，大獎一直沒人領，只會越滾越大，君不見1929年大蕭條之後，隨之而來的是史上最長的一段bull market period嗎？！
延伸閱讀：有位大陸同胞把Ovarian Lottery直接翻譯成「卵巢彩票」，真是鏗鏘有力啊！
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