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I'm 84 and beyond dealing with puts, calls, shorts and whatnot. I'm sitting here enjoying a sip while BRK-B is down 11.8% from its all-time high 2.3 months ago.

I harbor a vague interest in the argument for cash and equivalents, leaning toward maintaining at least a few years' of recent withdrawals, and perhaps more if circumstances deteriorate or other opportunities are deemed likely to be more rewarding over the long haul.

At this point my wife and I have surely lived the bulk of our lives, yet I have few clues as to how long either of us may persist. We have four sons with families of their own. I love to imagine us leaving each of them something they'll likely appreciate.

The greatest threat to that is the government stripping us of our wealth as a prerequisite to compensation for either of us entering a quality full-service senior care facility.

That's a cross-generational stripping of the vast majority for the benefit of a small minority who aren't overly bothered by the exorbitant rates demanded to secure acceptable senior services.

I'm encouraged by the persistent growth in Berkshire intrinsic value, as calculated by many here. Regardless of what the market does, price always revolves around intrinsic value over extended time-frames, and so-far that's proven good enough for me. BRK's price is up about 500% over the past 14.5 years, despite it's recent 11%+ decline.

Along with Social Security and other market forces, that's produced an 8.1% CAGR in our liquid holdings. The value of our total holdings, including net liquid holdings, home, vehicles and so forth has increased 69% over the same 14.5 year period.

That may not mean much if the entire US economy goes to hell, but it's a good harbinger for now.

I'll hang onto my BRK, as I don't see a more reliable way forward.

Tom

We have four sons with families of their own. I love to imagine us leaving each of them something they'll likely appreciate.

The greatest threat to that is the government stripping us of our wealth as a prerequisite to compensation for either of us entering a quality full-service senior care facility.

That's a cross-generational stripping of the vast majority for the benefit of a small minority who aren't overly bothered by the exorbitant rates demanded to secure acceptable senior services.

I don't know if the rates are exorbitant for 24/7 care, but I do know the workers at those facilities are not paid enough. My daughter worked as a nurse's aide in order to get clinical hours for her med school application. $14/hour was definitely NOT ENOUGH for 13-hour shifts lifting people, changing diapers and wiping butts, and sometimes putting up with verbal abuse.

It doesn’t look great on the US equities front to me. Would expect Berkshire to stand up well in comparison. But would be surprised if it does much from here, unless they are presented with incredible opportunities and take them.

My internal monologue goes something like this. Valuations have been expanding for an extended number of years and are now off the charts. In 1929 the market got to 20 times earnings. Today that seems reasonable. Today we have companies like Tesla and Micro Strategy (Strategy as it’s now called) which are just complete vapour. We have crypto and we have leveraged treasury holdings companies accumulating crypto.

The everything bubble began to crash in 2022 and it cleared some of the excesses like NFTs but then generative AI came along and stopped the correction in its tracks. The bubble has since reinflated to become bigger than ever and more concentrated. We an inflation problem and a government debt problem.

It looks grim. But of course it might keep going up. I would not want to be all in on US equities at the moment.

$14/hour was definitely NOT ENOUGH for 13-hour shifts lifting people, changing diapers and wiping butts

That's a little under median wage. I'm curious what people think in general - which jobs do you think should earn wages below median? Some jobs, like this one, don't require many skills, but are difficult labor. Some jobs require substantial skills, but are easier labor. Do you want wages based on the level of labor effort or based on the skills required?

$14/hour was definitely NOT ENOUGH for 13-hour shifts lifting people, changing diapers and wiping butts


That's a little under median wage. I'm curious what people think in general - which jobs do you think should earn wages below median? Some jobs, like this one, don't require many skills, but are difficult labor. Some jobs require substantial skills, but are easier labor. Do you want wages based on the level of labor effort or based on the skills required?


I beg to differ. Shoveling dirt or maybe harvesting cabbage doesn't require many skills but is hard labor.

But properly caring for those unable to care for themselves is a different matter altogether. Should I find myself on the receiving end of such care, I certainly hope my caregiver knows more that how to load or unload a wheelbarrow.

As to your question of wages, when it comes to effort/skill/knowledge, it doesn't have to be either/or.

I don't know if the rates are exorbitant for 24/7 care, but I do know the workers at those facilities are not paid enough. My daughter worked as a nurse's aide in order to get clinical hours for her med school application. $14/hour was definitely NOT ENOUGH for 13-hour shifts lifting people, changing diapers and wiping butts, and sometimes putting up with verbal abuse.

I hear you. Your daughter's to be admired for her service to the elderly, and her compensation did indeed fail to recognize its value. Nevertheless, as best I can tell, the costs to the elderly are typically beyond affordable for average folk.

Upon reconsideration of my initial post I believe the reference to senior care would have been better left out. Then again, there's surely a plausible rationale for saying nothing at all.

Tom

As to your question of wages, when it comes to effort/skill/knowledge, it doesn't have to be either/or.

I agree that it doesn't have to be either or. However, you still have to pick about 50% of the population to earn under median wage. There's no either or there, you MUST pick about 50%.

In these types of conversations ("XXX doesn't earn anywhere near as much as they should", "Teachers should be paid way more", etc), I have asked this question very often for decades now. And so far, not a single response has ever identified which jobs should be paid under median. Not once. Not ever.

Once on the old motley fool boards, probably at least 20 years ago, during a long and somewhat heated debate, I mentioned that the median wage was something like $36.5k. Immediately there was a strong response along the lines of "that's ridiculous, that's not a real living wage, nobody should earn so little, nobody should earn under $50k". Seriously, that was the response, and tons of people agreed with it. I suppose they had no clue what "median" means, or maybe they just didn't think about what they were saying.

No dog in the fight about who gets what, but $14 an hour is below the minimum wage in the state where I live.

This is from the Bureau of Labor statistics (16 April 2025):

Median weekly earnings of the nation's 120.9 million full-time wage and salary workers were
$1,194 in the first quarter of 2025 (not seasonally adjusted), the U.S. Bureau of Labor
Statistics reported today.

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/wkyeng.pdf

Assuming a 40-hour week, $1,194 is just under $30 per hour.

Baltassar

I don’t know what “fair” is in terms of monetary compensation. I always thought it was a little more than what I was paid. :)

I do know some one whose only qualities are they’re reliable and work hard—that person has never had more opportunities for employment.

Now add on to that a little education or a little skill—and the pay rises.

But if you expect to monetize a $250,000 degree in liberal arts and expect your next employer to subsidize your crazy education consumption, that’s not happening. And if your “skill” was roping clients into 1% annual wrap fees—a free AI app can now replace your alleged “skill”. So I understand the anxiety here.

The greatest threat to that is the government stripping us of our wealth as a prerequisite to compensation for either of us entering a quality full-service senior care facility.

I guess I’m not understanding this. The only lens I see through is that you either pay for yourself using your own assets, choosing the level of care and quality of institution as your assets allow - or if you have no assets then the government steps in and you wind up in a Medicaid (or similar) place.

Are you saying you should be able to keep your assets and still have government pay for your care?

Or have I overlooked something simple?

" But properly caring for those unable to care for themselves is a different matter altogether. Should I find myself on the receiving end of such care, I certainly hope my caregiver knows more that how to load or unload a wheelbarrow."


A family member is in an Altheimer's facility in New Jersey. Her care is 16,000 a month, a month. Her husband is in the assisted living wing of the same facility, his care is 12,000 a month. He told me he now understands why old people do the murder suicide tragic ending. She doesn't recognize or know anyone, it's been two years so far. Terrible ending to the game of life.

" Are you saying you should be able to keep your assets and still have government pay for your care?"


For an American it's not a bad idea to gift generously to family years BEFORE you get sick. That reduces the opportunity for the govt to claw that money back to cover your care. Also, once you see who is caring for your loved ones, slipping these hard-working people 100$$ each once a month doesn't hurt and is much appreciated.

However, you still have to pick about 50% of the population to earn under median wage. There's no either or there, you MUST pick about 50%.

Option "C" - pay more and raise the median.

I hear you. Your daughter's to be admired for her service to the elderly, and her compensation did indeed fail to recognize its value. Nevertheless, as best I can tell, the costs to the elderly are typically beyond affordable for average folk.

Thanks, and to be clear, though my daughter did think her and her co-workers were underpaid, that did not affect the level of care she gave her residents. She is a caring soul, as are most who chose this work. She's quit now her med school application was successful, but she goes back to visit her residents every month or so. The one's that are left.

I think I misunderstood your comment: "That's a cross-generational stripping of the vast majority for the benefit of a small minority who aren't overly bothered by the exorbitant rates demanded to secure acceptable senior services."

My daughter's generation are definitely not the ones benefitting. But just like general medical care, if the workers are paid more the costs to the patient go up.

Living out one's last days in a nursing home, not able to feed oneself or use the bathroom, it's no way to live. It's not for me.

Living out one's last days in a nursing home, not able to feed oneself or use the bathroom, it's no way to live. It's not for me.

Nor for me. From what I've read and am now beginning to observe, the problem is that the slippage is gradual, and somewhat confounding. Then there's the challenge of arranging a way out that doesn't traumatize others.

Tom

Do you want wages based on the level of labor effort

Ah, that would be the Labor Theory of Value expounded by Karl Marx.
So, no.

or based on the skills required?

To paraphrase Little Bill Daggett (Gene Hackman), "Skill's got nothing to do with it."

There is a very high skill required to the Lord's Prayer on a grain of rice. How much are you willing to hire this person for?


The only true basis of a wage is as high as it needs to be to convince qualified people to take the job.

I have asked this question very often for decades now. And so far, not a single response has ever identified which jobs should be paid under median. Not once. Not ever.

That's because it is a nonsense question. The fact that nobody has answered it should be a clue.

There is no "should" involved.

A job that pays less than the median is a job that nobody wants to pay a high wage for. There is a reason that nobody pays $200 to get his lawn mowed.

And certainly the opinions of anyone besides the employer and employee don't enter in to the matter. That's the converse of the "is-ought problem".

The only lens I see through is that you either pay for yourself using your own assets, choosing the level of care and quality of institution as your assets allow - or if you have no assets then the government steps in and you wind up in a Medicaid (or similar) place.

Are you saying you should be able to keep your assets and still have government pay for your care?

No ... I'm saying end of life care should not be designed to impoverish even modestly well-to-do people, thereby suppressing their ability to pass on their wealth to their offspring. I believe the US is extraordinarily ineffective in delivering affordable healthcare (and education) at all ages, in dramatic contrast to many other developed countries. Musk and others are perverse examples of this imbalance. It's complicated but demonstrably achievable if there's a will to do it, even though it may require standing up to oligarchic demands for lower taxes on themselves.

Tom

That's a little under median wage.

You're so very wrong.

Years ago I worked for a Fortune 500 company and they explained the system to new hires. The system was the Hayes Method and it was utilized to determine pay for all the jobs inside the company. Mind you this company had 113,000 employees at that time during the 1970s. Below is Google AI's first paragraph explanation of the Hayes Method:

"The Hayes method, formally known as the Hay Guide Chart-Profile Method, is a job evaluation system that assesses the relative value of different roles within an organization to determine appropriate compensation levels. It focuses on three primary factors: Knowledge, Problem Solving, and Accountability. These factors are further broken down into sub-factors, with each job assigned a point value based on its characteristics within these categories. The point values are then used to establish a hierarchy of jobs and inform compensation decisions."

The simple explanation given to me so many years ago in that Fortune 500 company was pay was determined using two factors: a. The Skill level needed to do the job (Knowledge and Problem Solving) and b. The Accountability involved with the job (the number of people being managed, the amount of assets being managed, etc.). We had PhDs in the R&D side of the business who were making relatively big bucks who were only managing one or two staff members (lab assistants). They got the big bucks for their unique skills (specific PhD knowledge area + Problem Solving capability). Conversely, we had folks making equivalent big bucks pay having only modest educational attainment that were managing, say, two hundred staff members (Accountability).

We operated our small business over the years utilizing our assessment of the Skills and Responsibilities involved with each position to determine appropriate compensation. Additionally, in recent years we also began using subscription software services that track pay by position description within a defined metro market area. As a small company in a small town located within a 30 minute driving distance of a much larger metro population area, we utilized the information to pay above the 70th percentile for a position. To those not aware, small companies in small towns frequently pay more to attract and keep talent. To recap: Some form of Hayes methodology (Knowledge, Problem Solving, Accountability + locale market conditions) is how pay is logically determined for most jobs here in 2025.

Uwharrie

"The Hayes method, formally known as the Hay Guide Chart-Profile Method, is a job evaluation system that assesses the relative value of different roles within an organization to determine appropriate compensation levels. It focuses on three primary factors: Knowledge, Problem Solving, and Accountability. These factors are further broken down into sub-factors, with each job assigned a point value based on its characteristics within these categories. The point values are then used to establish a hierarchy of jobs and inform compensation decisions."

Oh baloney. You pay people what you think they have to be paid not to go to a competitor, and (pass/fail) whether their continued employment is important to the corporation. Full stop.

There are exceptions, like when your wife’s brother has to have an income even though he’s basically useless, or when the zoning commissioner’s wife could be very important to your expansion plans, but absent those (and other) unique situations, somebody who sits around and “determines appropriate compensation levels based on knowledge, problem solving, and accountability” are called Human Resource Managers. I thought we got rid of all of those a dozen or so years ago after realizing that they had no idea how business worked.

"Oh baloney. You pay people what you think they have to be paid not to go to a competitor, and (pass/fail) whether their continued employment is important to the corporation. Full stop.

There are exceptions, like when your wife’s brother has to have an income even though he’s basically useless, or when the zoning commissioner’s wife could be very important to your expansion plans, but absent those (and other) unique situations, somebody who sits around and “determines appropriate compensation levels based on knowledge, problem solving, and accountability” are called Human Resource Managers. I thought we got rid of all of those a dozen or so years ago after realizing that they had no idea how business worked."

I love this. Yes, often those are the determining aspects for doing whatever is necessary to keep folks, take care of relatives, pass out favors and whatever. Unfortunately, over my lifetime I have seen that type of "exceptions".

Over the long run, companies cannot use loose rule sets as it will eventually led to employee issues. The biggest driver of employee dissatisfaction at the Fortune 500 company where I worked was employees perceiving some staff members being treated better than the rest of the employees. It is a quick way to have all sorts of unhappiness in the business and that is why it is orders of magnitude better to have a system that as fairly as possible determines pay via assessment of knowledge, Problem Solving, Accountability, and for production jobs to include measures assessing physical labor aspects and/or other relevant aspects.

There were frequently overlooked "interactions" seen in the 1970s that would result in instant termination today. The stories we old-timers could tell . . . . . . .

Uwharrie

that is why it is orders of magnitude better to have a system that as fairly as possible determines pay via assessment of knowledge, Problem Solving, Accountability, and for production jobs to include measures assessing physical labor aspects and/or other relevant aspects.

How did that work out for the Soviet Union?

A job that pays less than the median is a job that nobody wants to pay a high wage for. There is a reason that nobody pays $200 to get his lawn mowed.

It is not what people want to pay, it is what you have to pay to find someone to do the work. In our expensive boom town we pay $180 a week for mowing and gardening. We had an undocumented lady cleaning for years. We paid her to stay home during Covid. We paid her to just do a walk through when we were on vacation. She told us she had more work than she could handle at $50 an hour. We offered her $45 and she quit.

<<However, you still have to pick about 50% of the population to earn under median wage. There's no either or there, you MUST pick about 50%.>>

Option "C" - pay more and raise the median.

Median wage has been almost consistently going up all the time. For well over a century. But that has nothing to do with my question and statement above. Which jobs (half of all of them!) do you think should be paid below median wage?

<<I have asked this question very often for decades now. And so far, not a single response has ever identified which jobs should be paid under median. Not once. Not ever.>>

That's because it is a nonsense question. The fact that nobody has answered it should be a clue.

There is no "should" involved.

You didn't read my post closely enough. If you did, you would have noticed that I pose this question to the people who say "XXX should be paid more". Because they start with the "should", I reply with the "should" in the other direction. Once in a while I get a flippant response "CEOs should get paid less than median", and the answer of course is that CEOs are 0.0001%, now find another 49.9999% that "should" be below median.

Nor for me. From what I've read and am now beginning to observe, the problem is that the slippage is gradual, and somewhat confounding.

Yes. As this problem gets closer to me over the years, I have (so far) come to a few conclusions:

- many older people would benefit from seeing a physio (or very good physical trainer), say once a month. Never mind whether they have an injury / problem or not. Just make it a regular appointment, like getting a haircut. Let the physio decide what needs to be worked on.
- the above is about maintaining muscle, strength, mobility. Eating enough protein to do this might be important.
- eat a diet that minimises insulin levels. That might be low carb, or veggie, or include fasting, or ... whatever. Keep insulin low.

SA

unskilled labor that poses no danger to the employee comes to mind as jobs that should be below the median wage. To view specific jobs that pay below the median wage one simply has to visit their local Dollar Tree. Other than the store manager all of the other employees are below the median.

Oh baloney. You pay people what you think they have to be paid not to go to a competitor, and (pass/fail) whether their continued employment is important to the corporation. Full stop.


Yep.

My experience working for a federal government agency was somewhat different and sometimes frustrating. The employees at the lower echelons, the ones in the field who interacted with the public, were there because they believed in the mission of the agency and were, with few exceptions, dedicated to the work and appreciated by the public. But a trend I witnessed over nearly 30 years with this agency was a tendency for the organization to grow ever more top heavy. While the staff in the field stayed the same or, more often shrunk, the size of management grew until the service to the public was reduced and the organization chart became an inverted pyramid. The higher in the pecking order you were, the closer you were to the source of funds. Many managers who wanted to advance found that one way to get a promotion was to create more jobs underneath their position which would result in an increase in their 'span of command' and a consequent increase in their grade level. They had control of the funds and could divert them to this end at the expense of field operations.

There was one brief attempt to get a handle on the growth of wasteful middle-management and that came in Clinton's tenure with Al Gore's 'Reinventing Government' program. And it actually made a difference...for a while. Sadly, it didn't take long for the old organizational problems to creep back in.

Could government be more efficient? Yes. But the Trump administration's approach is to just indiscriminately demolish federal agencies. Taxpayers will not be well served by this.

"We have poverty not because we cannot feed the poor, but because we cannot satisfy the rich."

But a trend I witnessed over nearly 30 years with this agency was a tendency for the organization to grow ever more top heavy.

This is odd because the Federal workforce has been growing more slowly than the general population for many years.

The federal workforce, as of November 2024, is just over 3 million people, according to data from the Pew Research Center. This represents approximately 1.87% of the total U.S. civilian workforce. When compared to the total U.S. population, the federal workforce has remained a relatively stable percentage (around 0.6%) over the past 15 years, despite population growth. However, this percentage is significantly lower than historical highs, (from Google AI).

Hard to do if you’re inverting the pyramid. Possible, but difficult.

Here is an example of a Federal organization growing more top heavy:
https://www.thirdway.org/report/star-creep-the-cos...

This is odd because the Federal workforce has been growing more slowly than the general population for many years.

My point was that the upper echelons grew at the expense of the staff 'in the field'. Inverted pyramid was probably not the way to describe what happened, that would be an exaggeration.

But this is what I observed between 1976 and 2006 in the area where I worked: when I started as an intern the headquarters staff consisted of a supervisor and 3 division heads and 3 or 4 support staff. There were three field areas that were supervised by this HQ. Taken together (going from memory) there were about 21 staff in those areas. Some of these were seasonal hires as the work was seasonally variable, but the full staffing was there when most needed.

By 2006, the headquarters had moved to a new, much larger, office space and the HQ staff had expanded significantly, while the field staffs had not increased much at all. Some of the additional HQ staff was justified but in other cases it was grade creep due to supervisors seeking higher pay and looking for other staff to take on some of the duties that (in my opinion) the supervisors could have handled.

Other factors were at work, no doubt. For one thing the staff in field positions had managed (after many years) to have grades increased to reflect the work being done. Less money to go around.

Given what the Trump administration is doing to the Civil Service, I would not want to be working for the government now.

Without a doubt the best example is the military. So much money pissed away.

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