critical, bold views against HERD instinct or conventional mainstream thinking
–Commodity price ^ commodity stock price have high correlation, but over a long horizon, commodity price can climb very high — not possible for the mining stocks.
I believe the mining companies face lots of competition. They aren’t always “best managed companies”
–EM stocks ^ U.S. stocks have high correlation, but over a long horizon U.S. stocks usually outperforms.
All can be top performers in some year, but over 5Y or 10Y horizon, there’s big difference.
Nowadays I am convinced that the “best-performing” is mostly due to timing, and unrelated to fund manager skill.
best eg: Tech stocks tend to outperform in some window and under-perform in another window. It’s mostly driven by hot money and hypes
For a comparison against EM stocks. see Tech^EM^Commodity equity funds
I need to unlearn the basic rules of property investment learned in Asia
Brian of RTS said owning a home is probably an expense rather than an asset. Brian’s view probably originated from the renter’s perspective. If there’s only small appreciation, then the additional outlay [1] of the home buyer compared to the renter basically contributes to the appreciation .. 羊毛出在羊身上. There’s no advantage to either option.
[1] including maintenance burden (none for the renter)
The renter has many advantages such as flexibility.
Brian countered every point I made about housing as an investment.
Brian concluded that many of these factors are location-specific.
新加坡有几十家连锁品牌幼儿园, 主要吸引”怕输”华人家长. 商业策略就是提前教小学课程, 比如数数, 中英阅读,写字，造句,对话．． 每年级有教学大纲和标准, 如果某个孩子落后, 学校会暗示或直接建设(并不强求)父母在家里下点功夫. 当然他们也教画画, 运动, 唱歌, 跳舞, 手工…但属于次要.
收费远远高于普通幼儿园, 但门庭若市. 很多家长争先恐后, 心想 “早开发没啥不好, 至少利大于弊. 如果我的孩子四岁就落后, 对她绝对没好处”. 所谓”落后” 在许多家长心里主要是小学科目. 比如音乐不是小学考试科目, 所以落后也没那么可怕.
我儿子上过两年这类高级幼儿园中著名的一家. 他常常落后, 尤其是比不上同班小姑娘们. 事实证明, 我儿子比她们晚, 但后来居上. 每个孩子发奋图强的年龄不同. 事实上, 中小学成绩与四岁 “成绩” 的相关系数接近零.
那么小学考试成绩与大学成绩的相关系数呢? 略高于零, 但还是很低.
美国的学区和学区评级从 1 到 10 (满分). 问了两三个中国朋友, 异口同声说只有 8/9/10 是好学区. (今天我只谈小学). 这个评级标准我看过, 100% 完全依靠全州范围内统一标准考试分数. (两州之间不可比 — 加州的6 分学校可能强过另一州的 8 分学校.) 大多数著名高分学区房价是平均值的 1.5 倍 – 3 倍，比如一百多万相比四五十万．
我觉得移民美国的中国家长, 印度家长, 对学区趋之若鹜, 类似新加坡的”怕输”幼儿园现象. 花那个钱值得吗? 不乏盲目跟风心理.
Some parents consider an above average (like 7) school district unacceptable. We may find it good enough. If I lack a backbone, follow the herd instinct and pick a top school district, and sacrifice commute and take on 300k additional burden, I am likely to regret it.
–Some price factor in Bayonne
In some areas – particularly a handful of dense cities with good public transit such as the Bay area– the preference for being in the city center seems to outweigh the importance of school quality by a huge margin. Homes in central city locations are generally more valued than those farther out, and prices in the urban locations have risen far faster than in the suburbs since 2000.
Homes in the central city (SF) carry such a huge premium that buyers in suburban cities like Albany and San Ramon end up paying several hundred dollars less per square foot even though the schools are significantly better than those in San Francisco, in terms of test scores.
Some locations see price increases that are much more tied to density and proximity than school quality.
Above are some of the locations mentioned in the NYTimes article below.
Most of the value of a landed house is in the lot, rather than the superstructure.
My dad told me that he did the right thing as a parent not to push my sister and I to work extra hard towards top schools and university. He referred to his decisions (and his underlying attitudes) in the 1980’s China. He had the view that academic benchmark was overrated. He has the backbone. By the way, he did know the top universities well and taught in a few of them. His peers are mostly university professors.
Q: If I choose a location with clean safe streets but mediocre middle school with conducive learning environment -> private high school, will I feel inferiority and 对不起 my kids?
I think the inferiority is a personal pain but I ought to manage that as a second priority.
The parental duty to provide the best for my kids is a more serious, more real question. Answer is a decisive NO because
What’s the difference between a 7/10 vs 8/10 school? The rating is given by some rating agency, based on nothing but test scores. See my post on “methodology”
The state-level ranking is equally unreliable.
A 8/10 school here will pale against an average Singapore school in terms of standardized benchmark. So why treat it like Princeton?
A typical Singapore school may be rated 9/10 on many aspects not only academics.