Starbucks Corporation (SBUX), Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN): Eight Fascinating Reads

Wisdom
Tren Griffin writes on a dozen things he learned from George Soros, including:

“Money is made by discounting the obvious and betting on the unexpected.”

“I only go to work on the days that make sense to go to work. And I really do something on that day.”

“If investing is entertaining, if you’re having fun, you’re probably not making any money. Good investing is boring.”

“Market prices are always wrong in the sense that they present a biased view of the future.”

Sacred cows
Bruce Bartlett writes on the mortgage interest deduction:

Contrary to popular belief, the mortgage interest deduction wasn’t adopted to encourage home ownership. The original income tax enacted in 1913 allowed a deduction for all interest on the theory that it was largely business-oriented. According to Dennis Ventry of the University of California, Davis, School of Law, only a third of homeowners carried a mortgage in 1910.

It should also be noted that the personal exemption was $3,000 in 1913, equivalent to $70,000 today. Consequently, very few taxpayers could deduct any interest at all. Only 357,000 tax returns were filed in a population of 97 million.

How to innovate
This old interview with Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) gives a simple explanation of how the company innovates:

“We innovate by starting with the customer and working backwards,” he says. “That becomes the touchstone for how we invent.” Pushing the publishing industry to make books available electronically was a customer-friendly proposition: Readers got instant gratification at lower prices. Amazon Prime, the company’s addictively popular all-you-can-eat delivery offering, eliminates friction; if you’ve already paid for unlimited shipping, then you order what you want, when you want, in the quantities you want. Amazon Web Services, the company’s newest big division, offers business customers the same sophisticated online infrastructure technology that Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) has developed for itself.

Economic systems
Here’s a great old video with the late Milton Friedman on capitalism:

Enjoy your weekend.

The article 8 Fascinating Reads originally appeared on Fool.com and is written by Morgan Housel.

Fool contributor Morgan Housel has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Amazon.com and Starbucks. The Motley Fool owns shares of Amazon.com and Starbucks.

Copyright © 1995 – 2013 The Motley Fool, LLC. All rights reserved. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.