Changing Tides

There was a story I remember from a long time ago, though I don't remember the details so forgive the poor story telling.

It was told from the perspective of a young boy, who admired one of his classmates and tried to imitate him as much as possible.

Then he realized that the boy he admired was doing the same - admired a different classmate, and using him as a role model. 

And that third classmate was imitating a fourth boy, who was that annoying little git who looked up to and tried to copy the original story teller.

I was thinking about that, because the frustrating thing about this book on enlightened capitalists (and the way nobody really follows their example) is that there's no easy culprit for this substandard system. Take the modern economy -

I am definitely not an expert, but iirc quite a bit of the stock market is actually owned by mutual funds, 401Ks, and the like.

Not to say that we don't have a very real problem with the 0.01% owning an extremely disproportionate share. But if one of them was an enlightened capitalist, they might not have near us much of a capability for changing that system as we think. (Though perhaps Jeff Bezos is an exception. I think I'd need real numbers to say for sure, not my guesswork here.)

Anyways, the average 401K holder isn't knowledgeably managing their stock, that's what the fund managers are for.

And the average fund manager is probably well aware that this isn't their money, and are (hopefully) doing what they think is best for their clients.

And 'best' is often like those young boys did. Look around and see what everyone else is doing. (after all, if you get it wrong so will everybody else, so it's not like you were somehow more foolish or incompetent).

I have to wrap this up real quick (work), so one small addition.

Changing that is complicated. Like something (I forget the details. Maybe it was discussing the housing crisis?) from a while back.

Everyone was assessing the markets or funds or business the same.

Then one changed their rating. And they faced some heat for doing so, but it also led others to quietly re-evaluate.

Little by little, more of them started charging how they rated the asset. In part because of new information, perhaps. Or they stopped suppressing any negative analysis. And SS more and more shifted, I'm sure some just followed the crowd.

I'm not sure it's right (analysis, especially of companies and stocks, should be taken with a grain of salt for exactly this type of reason. There's a lot of people imitating everyone else.) but I do think this is probably what change looks like.

It starts with one. And they probably receive opprobrium. Perhaps even vicious and heated attacks.

But others, who may have seen the same and chosen not to rock the boat, start speaking up.

And the tide begins to turn.