Good morning! Day 2 of the blog ... way so exciting (to me, if not to you)! You'll have to hang with me for a while as I (a) grow this monster and (b) get better and more interesting (despite your protestations to the contrary, it could happen!).
I realized that I should provide some warning that many of the topics here will have been generated from articles in The Wall Street Journal (I think a subscription is required to view it). I am a daily reader of WSJ and although I don't agree with it's editorial stance, I am a believer that it is the one US paper that is national in scope and both interesting and informative (don't even get me started about McPaper).
In that vein, here is an interesting juxtaposition of articles on how America is viewed by non-Americans. Gerald F. Seib's Capital Journal article from WSJ (I'll quote some of it for those of you that aren't subscribers), posits:
"Here's the problem: The U.S. sees itself as highly vulnerable, standing in the cross hairs of every terrorist group in the sphere of radical Islam. The rest of the world sees the U.S. as invincible, and sometimes arrogant in its invincibility. . . . It has become a superpower of striking proportions, simply dwarfing everyone else in both economic and military power. . . . This makes America the New York Yankees of the world scene: the franchise with all the money and all the advantages. To others, the idea that the U.S. would feel seriously threatened by, say, Iraq is hard to comprehend."
Having read that within 15 hours of reading an interesting interview with Peter Schwartz on scenario planning brought to my attention by John Robb's excellent blog has made me think about bullies and power brokerage in the world arena. Should the United States be a "benevolent dictator," as one poster to Robb's blog suggested (supposedly facetiously), actively managing it's interests in the world through economic and military force, or should it act as more of a broker of the desires of NATO, the expanding coalition of nations which theoretically holds the interests of its member nations above the interests of any single nation? if you have an opinion, e-mail me. I'll post thoughtful responses (and maybe even some knee-jerk, reactionary responses). Be advised that I may edit them for content suitability (e.g., no unbridled profanity), length, etc. I promise to attempt to maintain the spirit, if not the letter, of your missive, but note that I will be the judge of what gets posted -- after all, this is my blog, and you are a (welcome) guest here, dear reader.
Here's an idea that may or may not be legal: when selling your home, structure your deal with your selling agent(s) on a variable commission basis. Let's say, for example, that you and your agent(s) agree that a reasonable asking price for your house is $150,000. If you structure a commission arrangement so that the agent(s) will receive, say, 6% if the house sells for between $147,500 and $152,500 (inclusive), and something less (say, 4%) if it sells for less than $147,500, you will give the agent(s) a strong financial incentive to market your house in a manner you would prefer. For example, your $150,000 house could probably be sold in a day for $140,000, but the agent(s) will receive commission of only $5,600 (vs. a commission of $9,000 if the house sold for $150,000). Likewise, it is reasonable (and desirable) to offer a higher commission rate for a higher selling price. So if the agent(s) were able to sell the house for $160,000, the commission received would be 8% of the sales price, or $12,800. Effectively, then, the agent(s) are paid an additional $3,800 for selling your house for $10,000 more than the asking price. That is, of your supernormal gain of $10,000, you would keep 62%($6,200) and the agents would receive 38% ($3,800). That may be kind of generous, but it is in keeping with the risk/reward trade-off I am advocating here. CAVEAT: This idea just came to me, and I have done no research on the legality and/or ethical nature of this proposal. If you know anything about this, please e-mail me to advise. Again, I will post thoughtful and/or useful responses.
And the numbers keep on circling me . . .
fkaJames
I realized that I should provide some warning that many of the topics here will have been generated from articles in The Wall Street Journal (I think a subscription is required to view it). I am a daily reader of WSJ and although I don't agree with it's editorial stance, I am a believer that it is the one US paper that is national in scope and both interesting and informative (don't even get me started about McPaper).
In that vein, here is an interesting juxtaposition of articles on how America is viewed by non-Americans. Gerald F. Seib's Capital Journal article from WSJ (I'll quote some of it for those of you that aren't subscribers), posits:
"Here's the problem: The U.S. sees itself as highly vulnerable, standing in the cross hairs of every terrorist group in the sphere of radical Islam. The rest of the world sees the U.S. as invincible, and sometimes arrogant in its invincibility. . . . It has become a superpower of striking proportions, simply dwarfing everyone else in both economic and military power. . . . This makes America the New York Yankees of the world scene: the franchise with all the money and all the advantages. To others, the idea that the U.S. would feel seriously threatened by, say, Iraq is hard to comprehend."
Having read that within 15 hours of reading an interesting interview with Peter Schwartz on scenario planning brought to my attention by John Robb's excellent blog has made me think about bullies and power brokerage in the world arena. Should the United States be a "benevolent dictator," as one poster to Robb's blog suggested (supposedly facetiously), actively managing it's interests in the world through economic and military force, or should it act as more of a broker of the desires of NATO, the expanding coalition of nations which theoretically holds the interests of its member nations above the interests of any single nation? if you have an opinion, e-mail me. I'll post thoughtful responses (and maybe even some knee-jerk, reactionary responses). Be advised that I may edit them for content suitability (e.g., no unbridled profanity), length, etc. I promise to attempt to maintain the spirit, if not the letter, of your missive, but note that I will be the judge of what gets posted -- after all, this is my blog, and you are a (welcome) guest here, dear reader.
Here's an idea that may or may not be legal: when selling your home, structure your deal with your selling agent(s) on a variable commission basis. Let's say, for example, that you and your agent(s) agree that a reasonable asking price for your house is $150,000. If you structure a commission arrangement so that the agent(s) will receive, say, 6% if the house sells for between $147,500 and $152,500 (inclusive), and something less (say, 4%) if it sells for less than $147,500, you will give the agent(s) a strong financial incentive to market your house in a manner you would prefer. For example, your $150,000 house could probably be sold in a day for $140,000, but the agent(s) will receive commission of only $5,600 (vs. a commission of $9,000 if the house sold for $150,000). Likewise, it is reasonable (and desirable) to offer a higher commission rate for a higher selling price. So if the agent(s) were able to sell the house for $160,000, the commission received would be 8% of the sales price, or $12,800. Effectively, then, the agent(s) are paid an additional $3,800 for selling your house for $10,000 more than the asking price. That is, of your supernormal gain of $10,000, you would keep 62%($6,200) and the agents would receive 38% ($3,800). That may be kind of generous, but it is in keeping with the risk/reward trade-off I am advocating here. CAVEAT: This idea just came to me, and I have done no research on the legality and/or ethical nature of this proposal. If you know anything about this, please e-mail me to advise. Again, I will post thoughtful and/or useful responses.
And the numbers keep on circling me . . .
fkaJames
posted by fkaJames at
11/20/2002 11:30:00 AM
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