主题： Politics and Current Events

If you look back on the 19th century, we had seven great bank panics. If you look back at the 20th century, we had the Great Depression and world wars and flu epidemics. This country doesn’t avoid problems. It just solves them.

I think the big factor in the continuation of the recovery will be the Steve Jobses of the world coming up with new products that nobody thought of before. And millions of Americans doing what people before them have done, trying to think of ways to do them more efficiently.… Capitalism works, and I think we’re seeing it work.

Geico got in trouble in the mid ’70s. American Express got in trouble in the mid ’60s. Those are two of the greatest investments I’ve ever had, and you had to look out five or ten years out. That’s what you have to do with the economy, incidentally. We have a wonderful economy in the United States over time, and it will come back, just like GEICO came back and American Express came back.

Nothing rivals the market system in producing what people want—nor, even more so, in delivering what people don’t yet know they want. My parents, when young, could not envision a television set, nor did I, in my 50s, think I needed a personal computer. Both products, once people saw what they could do, quickly revolutionized their lives. I now spend ten hours a week playing bridge online. And, as I write this letter, “search” is invaluable to me. (I’m not ready for Tinder, however.)

I was born in August of 1930. You know, if a genie had come to me and said, “Warren, in the next two years, the Dow is going to go from 180 down to 40, there’s going to be 4,000 banks closed. You know, there’s going to be a dust bowl in Nebraska where you live, and farm prices are going to go to hell, and in another 10 years we’re going to have a surprise attack by an enemy that looks like it’s going to win the war for a while, we’re going to have nuclear bombs”—you know, I’m not sure I would have come out.… But the truth was that America, in the 80 years since I’ve been born, the average person lives six times better than when I was born.

I’m 80 years old, and in the 80 years since then, the average standard of living for Americans has improved six for one in real terms. Six for one! You go back to the Middle Ages, you went centuries and you were lucky if you were looking at a 1 percent increase. When I came out of the womb in 1930, we faced a depression, we faced a world war that it looked like we were losing, but the system works. It unleashes human potential.

I have not put my politics in a blind trust. On the other hand, I don’t speak for Berkshire in doing that. Berkshire, to my knowledge, Berkshire the parent company never had any contributions to politicians. And I don’t believe [in] imposing my views on 370,000 employees and a million shareholders. I mean, I’m not their nanny on that.

It’s always been a mistake to bet against America, since 1776. And, you know, we take our body blows from time to time, but this country always comes through. And when we get united, get out of the way…. And of course, after 9/11 we saw it. But I’ve always had enormous faith in this country to do anything, whether it’s in economics or whether it’s in liberating people or whatever it may be.