Skip to main content

Real story lies beyond wealth creation

Seeking out the billionaires rode in the Rs. 5.5-crore Maybach in 2004. The Rs. 3.8-crore Bentley followed in 2007. And through a journey that saw Rolls Royce and Porsche (both over Rs. 2 crore) and the biggest of them all - the Rs. 16-crore Bugatti Veyron last year - vroom into India, could the Rs. 2.2-crore Ferrari be left behind? These cars - and a whole industry catering to the 600 wealthiest Indians - driving in is merely a signal, a symptom of an economy that at 9% is soon going to be the world's fastest growing. And as the cultural barriers towards wealth creation and enjoyment fall by the wayside, Indian entrepreneurs are finding opportunities, from steel and oil to software and commodities, and turning them into islands of immense affluence. At 55, the number of Indian billionaires - two of them in the top 10 list - is the highest-ever. This is in tune with the global trend, where the number of billionaires (1,210) as well as the value of their wealth ($4.5 trillion, up 25% over the previous year's figure) are at a record high. With 100 out of the 214 new billionaires coming from BRIC nations, the growth of wealth is clearly happening in emerging markets. Problems of yesterday have overnight become opportunities of tomorrow. And as smart businesspersons get busy building roads and houses, running power plants and telecom services, they are converting great ideas into great wealth. By going public with their enterprises, the billionaires are able to multiply every rupee of profit they make by 15-25 times into wealth on stock markets. While the multiple is the financial incentive for entrepreneurs, the country's ongoing fight against black money - so commonly found in real estate and gold, the traditional storehouses of wealth in the pre-1991 India - is catalysing the clean up. But the bigger story is not the creation of wealth anymore. Hidden behind the numbers is the true wealth of the world's second-wealthiest man, Bill Gates ($56 billion). He is at the No 2 slot not because Carlos Slim ($74 billion) beat him to it. It is because Gates beat himself - he has given $30 billion away in charity. The next-placed Warren Buffett too has said that, "More than 99% of my wealth will go to philanthropy during my lifetime or at death." Buffett and Gates will be in India shortly to speak to the wealthiest Indians about giving. Giving is not an easy business - apart from the sense of loss, there is an insecurity of the right use of the money. This is a discourse that our wealthy leaders need to get into and engage with. We'll be listening.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Floyd Mayweather Baby Mama Sues for $20 Mil ... He's a Despicable Liar

Floyd Mayweather could lose tens of millions of dollars from his big payday if his baby mama gets her way ... because she's just filed a lawsuit claiming he ruined her with lies to save his own ass. Josie Harris, who has 3 kids with Floyd, claims he lied through his teeth in an interview with Katie Couric just 2 weeks before the big fight ... when he claimed Josie was in a drug-fueled rage and he had to "restrain" her during their infamous 2010 domestic violence incident. Point of fact ... Floyd was convicted of domestic violence and spent two months in jail. Josie recounts her terror in the lawsuit, explaining how she and Floyd had broken up ... but he flew into a jealous rage that night, broke into her home and viciously attacked her while she was sleeping on her couch ... and her kids saw part of the beating. Harris says she is now labeled a drug addict thanks to Mayweather's lies -- and was embarrassed and humiliated on a global scale.   Her lawyer, Dan Friedl...
Post a Comment
Read more

Dangerous sex Positions For Men

The most common cause of pénile injury is found among the variety of potentially dangerous positions used for séxual intercourse. The most popular is the ‘woman-on-top’. This type of position can result in an impact between the pénis against the female pelvis or perineum that can easily traumatize the pénile cylinders. A pénis becomes érect when the lining of the cylinder within it is engorged with blood.  A pénis fracture can occur when there is trauma to the eréct pénis, resulting in a rupture of the cylinder lining. This very painful injury is often accompanied by an abrupt, distressing cracking noise that is immediately followed by dark bruising of the pénis due to blood escaping the cylinder. In ten to 30% of pénis fractures, the urethra is damaged and blood may be visible at the urinary opening. Given these signs, an injury should be relatively simple to diagnose, right? You would be surprised, even with the unsettling sounds of a fracture occurring, many men...
Post a Comment
Read more

Google, harder to search for results from other countries

For a long time, there was an easy way to conduct a Google search in a country other than the one you’re in. If you wanted to get results specific to Japan, for instance, you would visit www.google.co.jp; to get Australian results you would visit www.google.com.au — but this trick no longer works. Google has announced that it will now always serve up results that are relevant to the country that you’re in, regardless of the country code top level domain names (ccTLD) you use. The reason given is a little bizarre. The search giant says that the change has been introduced because of the way people are using the search engine these days. It says: “around one in five searches on Google is related to location, so providing locally relevant search results is an essential part of serving you the most accurate information.” The argument seems counterintuitive, however. Anyone who has changed the ccTLD has done so consciously, and for a reason — for Google to override this decision is strange...
Post a Comment
Read more