Jeff Wang Blog

• Did you know that in the 1960’s, that the average income in America, when adjusted for inflation, was about 30x more than China’s, and about 20x more than India’s?
• Did you know that the reason there is a 2-3 month long break during the summer is that during the agricultural revolution, students had to help their parents in the summer during harvest season?
• Did you know that the average inflation rate in North America is around 2-3%? This means every year, a dollar loses 2-3% of its purchasing power. $1 today, is NOT worth $1 in 2019; it’ll be worth about $0.97 cents.
• And did you know, that the highest interest rate that banks offer in their “high-interest savings accounts” is about 1.5% (from CitiBank I believe)?
  • This means you technically LOSE purchasing power in your dollar for every year that you hold your money in a “high-interest savings account” at a bank.
• Finally, did you know that the average person in North America will live for 700,000 hours?

Maybe you knew some of those facts. I think they are interesting trivia, and I just took them off the top of my head. I am sure I know a lot more random and interesting facts.

But I am not here to gloat and show off how much random knowledge I have. Here is my point: I am sure everyone reading this knows something that I don’t, just like everyone reading this probably didn’t know everything that I just listed.

Were you supposed to know that stuff? No.

But that’s why you need to build connections. That’s why a successful relationship, company, businesses, friend group, or any team, always requires collaboration.

No matter who you talk to–high SAT score or low, plays an instrument or dances, college degree or high school dropout, Chinese or Italian, boy or girl or gender fluid–that person will always have some knowledge to share with you that you do not know.

It might be an opinion. It might be a random trivia fact. It might be about the intricacies of the digestive system of a cow. Or it might be a cultural perspective that you could never learn about in a textbook, and only either experience it or hear about it from a primary source.

Every time someone teaches you something new that you didn’t know…ask yourself: “How was I supposed to know?”

And then remind yourself of the answer: you weren’t supposed to know.

That’s why we learn.

Good Luck

Grateful Day 88: I am grateful for KNAWWWLEDGE

And also reading. I love reading; it’s a newfound passion!

Reading Day 28: Well, I did a lot of reading about banks today. A bit boring to discuss, but I did put some interesting facts above (most of those facts I read about, but not all today)