Jim Rogers’ book, Adventure Capitalist, is a surprisingly good read, about his trip with his finacee that took them 3 years, visiting almost every continent and over 116 countries in a banana yellow Mercedes coupe. Rogers was formerly a partner of George Soros and is a master investor himself, and a big part of his success (he retired by age 40) is a honed ability to spot new bull markets early on, when no one else (no mainstream American, at least) is thinking or looking at them – like China in 1990.
The book has some challenging ideas – e.g., he proposes that all passports and restrictions on immigration and emigration should be abolished, with everyone free to travel anywhere at anytime, in order for markets to work at spreading wealth as quickly and equitably as possible. What about the usual argument of national security? Well, Rogers points out that at the time of the American Revolution, the infant US had powerful enemies on all three borders:
- England to the North, in Canada
- Spain to the South, in Mexico and the Caribbean
- Native Americans, some hostile, to the West
…and in addition, fully one third of the colonists were loyal to England! The English and Spanish armies and navies were the most formidable in the world at the time. So, there were big-time enemies within and without the US – but when Benjamin Franklin was asked whether the colonies should institute new laws to control the population and verify loyalties, he answered with his famous line:
Those who would sacrifice essential liberty for a little safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Would that contemporary leaders were so principled.
Back to Rogers’s book – there are a lot more surprising facts and ideas, including his observations of Asia (China will be the premiere economic power of the 21st century), Europe (racist immigration policies ensure that their demographic time bomb will explode, with only two workers supporting each retiree), Russia (doomed to splinter further) and Africa (fantastic resources and human drive, but hampered by lousy and corrupt government). More after I finish reading this one.
