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ShoeshineBoy: I don't understand what you're lobbying for. What are the alternatives here? Do you really think state run energy and utilities is the silver bullet for an economy? Do you like tariffs, controlled foreign investment? Why do you think these will help any country?
I'm asking because I don't see many examples of this around the world. Japan, India, Russia and China all have some aspects of this, but in general they're open and opening up.
For the most part, the poor impoverished countries are the ones that don't open up, right?
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February 28, 2008
SouthAmerica: You asked me a very complex question here that I donât have a simple answer for you.
Even if I could write a book to answer your question, I know I am not smart enough to give you all the right answers.
If you had the chance to read some of my articles until 5 or 6 years ago, then you would know that I believed 100 percent on a free market economy, and the free market was the best vehicle for allocating scarce resources, and so on.
I was heavily influenced on my thinking by the years that I worked for John Templeton, in Englewood, NJ â before he moved his company to Florida.
But after he moved to Florida I kept in close contact with some of his associates that had been working very closely with Mr. Templeton for over 20 years at that time. And these fellows had assimilated over the years John Templetonâs philosophy and way of looking at investments, government regulation and so forth.
I was very young then, but these group of old men did not seem to mind that I attended weekly investment strategy meetings, went to lunch with them almost on a daily basis, and spent a lot of time after hours talking about investments on their offices, and on weekends I spent hours in the research library helping one of them doing research about some company.
They became some kind of tutors for me and we used to talk about economics and also about investments. But even tough these guys were very smart and successful and they had degrees from universities such as Princeton, Harvard and Cornell, still there was a certain reverence from everyone towards the Master â John Marks Templeton.
Everyone in that group was influenced by John Templeton â by the way, after all these years Mr. Templeton still is the smartest man I ever met in my life.
My very close friend he kept in touch on a regular basis with John Templeton until he died in 1996. And every time when I used to visit him he update me about everything that was going on with Mr. Templeton and his family.
I met Mr. Templeton a number of times over the years, and I saw his appearances on the Wall Street show on PBS with Louis Rukeiser â over the years Mr. Templeton appeared more than 30 times on that show.
John Templeton was the ultimate free market thinker and he was completely against any type of government regulation and intervention. I think that in his view everything that the government get involved with they screw up. He did not like government regulation, and he thought that governments should stay out of the way, and should not interfere with the private sector. He believed in privatization of any businesses own by governments, and he also believed in private sector solutions for everything.
Thatâs why I admire and have so much respect for Warren Buffet â basically he came from the same school of economic thought that John Marks Templeton did.
These were the major influences that helped mold my way of thinking in many ways. But I always read a lot books over the years, and I also read a lot of other materials, newspapers, magazines, journals, and so onâ¦
Despite all of this free market economics education my mind did not stayed frozen on the past, because I think out of the box, and I have an adaptive mind that takes into account the new changing circumstances. I understand that we live in a very dynamic world that is changing all the time.
There is nothing set in stone on my mind and my mindset is ready to accept new ideas, and new solutions to solve any type of economic problems.
You can see how much I changed my way of thinking over the years when you read my 4-part article about China investing $ 200 billion dollars in Brazil.
Today, I know that there is a place for government regulation, and in that article I wrote that the Chinese government in partnership with the Brazilian government should make the investments that I suggested.
Over the years I realized that the generals in Brazil did a good job regarding economic development during the dictatorship years, and I also realized that the private sector usually donât make the investments necessary for a country to prosper in the long run.
Today, I donât believe in the privatization of government assets, but right now I donât have time to explain for you why?
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