Power is out, but not me!

Could have been worse. My husband worked for a tech startup that folded suddenly. They didn't make their last payroll, so everybody worked for free for two weeks. Only my husband got paid for his accrued vacation, because they needed him to help liquidate the clean room and that was what he demanded. Before they went under, at one point he told the CFO: "Put the money back in the 401K or I'm calling the FBI."

Not in the long run. A current example is Intel spending money to improve its technology and enable it to compete with Broadcomm, Nvidia and other vendors that are profiting from the current excitement about AI. This is seen as increasing future profits and leading to more valuable shares.

otoh TI's expansion plans are not meant with enthusiasm.

In my career I never encountered a project that went forward when the expected ted ROI was negative or even neutral. That's not to say that the blue sky expectations came true. That's the case for TI when some investors think the projected demand for increased capacity isn't going to happen.

Stock prices sometimes illustrate the madness of crowds but the expectation is there will be an increased positive cash flow. The madness comes in for cases like the dotcom boom where companies losing money with no real plan to ever show a profit attracted investors that were drunk on the champagne of the moment.

Wall Street's patience for projects that don't appear to yield a return is limited.

The Red Queen

Unfortunately, I think she's running the world today.

I never had a concrete plan and to put it bluntly money management bores me to tears. However I've always lived a minimalist life style which meant I had to stick surplus income someplace, either savings, CDs, or government bonds.

At the wrong side of 75 I really don't think I'm going to radically modify my lifestyle.

The second company I worked for was similar although it was exactly suddenly. I was on the hook for unreimbursed travel expenses and, since they'd been pocketing the group insurance, my wife's medical expenses. I contacted the state and did get paid for accrued vacation since that was a priority class when the vultures descended.

"example is intel collecting huge subsidies[*] to improve"

Corrected it for you.

Note that intel is not the poster child for stock appreciation, they're more like GE and Boeing, I'm afraid.

I was only 53 when I got the offer I could not refuse which was nearly 2 years salary, pension reduced by 25%, 10 weeks vacation pay and full medical coverage. I ended up an individual consultant.

Thank you. They join the list of companies that collected money for 'renewable energy', the entire war pigs contingent, and other industries where the government has put its thumb on the scales. While I think Musk is innovative part of his success is never leaving free money on the table.

Of course TSMC is no slouch either.

Cash flow concerns reduce significantly the day you pay that loan off.

And Putin and OPEC want trump to win so they can easily manipulate the USA, so they have raised oil prices to get Biden out.

And trump collapsed the economy. Unemployment surged, everyone quit traveling - of course gas prices dropped.

Don't forget record Oil company profits because they raised the prices, causing inflation.

iirc covid collapsed the economy. Some very bad choices were made and Trump was complicit in some of them. Given the hysteria I doubt very much Madame Pantsuit would have done any better.

I'm sorry if I wasn't clear. When I described my time living in an apartment, I had just recently joined the military and anticipated being relocated in approx. 2 years. I was single at the time. I was working almost 80 hrs/wk. An apartment was the most appropriate logistical and financial housing choice at that time. I certainly wasn't going to live for 2 years in the bachelor officer's quarters on base, nor did I have the time or energy to purchase and furnish a house much less the time to enjoy it. I got married during that time, was able to get orders for a follow-on tour for at least 3 years at the same base and my wife and I immediately purchased a single family detached home in easy commuting distance to the base. I was raised in a single family detached house. I much prefer it to apartment living.

The multi-unit condo we live in now has such thick walls, floors, and ceilings that we never hear neighbors and they never hear us (even when I play our stereo system loudly). Moving there after living in single family detached homes for the previous 38 years made that type of construction a prerequisite for us to downsize to that condo. Actually, in terms of square footage, our condo unit is only 170 square feet smaller than the house we moved from. The transition was easy.

Idle speculation with no factual basis.

So the reaction to covid had no effect on the economy? The Somali Scam is the tip of the iceberg for the fraud engendered by throwing money at a problem.

Yes, military life makes it hard to do other than rent.

The implication that Ms. Clinton would not have done better than her opponent is "idle speculation with no factual basis".

Clearly the efforts to limit covid fatalities had a significant effect on the economy.

I was referring to the gratuitous Madame Pantsuit slur. Sorry, wasn't clear about that.