Tributum Newsletter #41
Hello
It seems like dark times. Inflation is creeping up, so are interest rates, There is war in the Ukraine, conflict elsewhere. There is/was a pandemic. Crime is bad and of course, load shedding. It can definitely be better. But, it also was a whole lot worse.
Following the infamous “Rubicon” speech SA’s inflation peaked at 18.7% in 1986. Our interest rate was 25% mid 1980’s, and also again in 1994. The 20th century saw 2 world wars, a Cold War, a Vietnam war, fighting in Ireland, the Middle East and even SA’s own “border war”. A century ago the Spanish flu infected a third of the global population with a conservative death toll of 17million. While crime is ever present the daily SA murder rate per the Institute for Securities Studies was 32 around 2018, about 50% of the 66 murders per day in 1994.
Per the technical definition of a recession SA only had 1 since 1994 – during the global recession in 2008. Between 1974 and 1994 we had 7 recessions. The amount of the global population that lived under the poverty line ($1,90 per day adjusted for time value of money) reduced from 74% in 1910 to 10% in 2015. And even then, I would think people would rather be poor in 2022 than poor in 1910…or 1929. Our generation is not special in our struggles, maybe it’s time we put on our big person pants and just get on with getting the job done. Doing the best we can with what we can.
During July I read a LinkedIn post with the caption “The cow does not give milk”. It did not dispute the fact that cows produce milk but made the point that you need to get the milk from the cow. They don’t just give it. And that requires work…first by keeping the cow alive and cared for, then getting up at the crack of dawn every day to actually milk the cow. There is no instant gratification, there is no “free” milk. You need to put in some effort. And not just one day, every day.
The old saying goes that “success” only comes before “work” in a dictionary. And we may not like to admit that the people we view as successful now had to put in the effort earlier, or that they actually still work hard. Differently maybe, but still hard. Elon Musk slept on the factory floor, Bezos spent years toiling in his garage, Kobe Bryant trained more than his teammates and in an interview singer Ed Sheeran once said that his talent is not his voice, its working hard at it.
Why, because hard work beats talent if talent does not work hard. Regardless of what work is for you, it needs to get done. Consistently. You must tend to your cow, and you have to milk it. It will not just give you the milk. We need to understand that and teach our children. Happy farming. Until next month, keep breathing.