Reddit reviews Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr.
We found 18 Reddit comments about Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr.. Here are the top ones, ranked by their Reddit score.
(shelf 13.5.1)
Correct. He also made it a point to donate at least 10% of every dollar he made from youth and made good on it. He is one of the fathers of modern philanthropy.
He was a ruthless businessman, BUT prior to taking out/absorbing a competitor he would meet with them, offer them fair value for their business or stock in Standard Oil, and would go as far as to simply open his company's book for them so they can see the futility of competition. Very interesting life. If anyone wants to learn more about him, they should really read Chernow's "Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller" Excellent book.
https://www.amazon.com/Titan-Life-John-Rockefeller-Sr/dp/1400077303
Biographies are super interesting in general. I've read Steve Jobs and Elon Musk's, currently in the process of reading Rockefeller.
Speaking of, that would be my recommendation : [Titan: The Life of John D. Rockfeller.](https://www.amazon.com/Titan-Life-John-Rockefeller-Sr/dp/1400077303/ref=sr_1_1? ie=UTF8&qid=1527576392&sr=8-1&keywords=titan&dpID=51puoryvTiL&preST=_SY344_BO1,204,203,200QL70&dpSrc=srch) What better way to learn about empires than to read about the richest man since the invention of capitalism that had a monopoly on the oil industry, which would put him at a 400 billion dollar USD net worth today.
> But the way he talks about how Monopolies come and go is sort of the proof that they aren't really problems.
From the video, Standard Oil, American Tobacco, and Microsoft are all examples of competition and innovation stifling companies that resulted in government anti-trust action. Since the 1980s, US anti-trust law has loosened to mean only companies that destroy consumer surplus via artificially high prices. One of the interesting debates of the past couple years has been whether zero-cost monopolies Facebook and Google are stifling innovation. The EU has produced court rulings within that past year that indicate they believe the answer is yes. See this most recent stratechery post for some analysis.
If you're interested in the formation of the modern corporation, and the evolution of the railroad/commodity collusion and legislative bribery that allowed oil and steel magnates to become the world's richest people, I'd recommend Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr..
This was a very interesting book.
https://www.amazon.com/Titan-Life-John-Rockefeller-Sr/dp/1400077303
Available on Audible as well.
> Is it also not possible that the guy that has lived relatively frugally
It is possible, but he has objectively not done this, unless you're talking relative to other billionaires, even then there are far more frugal billionaires with 1/100th the public image he sells to
try to distance himself & his fund from the typical fund image (John Cauldwell, Azim Premji, a lot of the european dynastic old money as a few examples. For first generation, look at almost any of the Danish/Skandi billionaires)
If you have multiple private jets for the exclusive use of you & your family and own multiple properties, each worth millions of dollars - you're not frugal.
> is donating 99.9% of his fortune to charity when he dies
Is donating the massively tax deferred portion of his net worth to a privately run organisation that his family will be involved in running for decades to come, after already having set up all of his direct descendants as billionaires.
> calls out tax laws that are b.s. but personally benefit him is just that simple guy?
"don't hate the player, hate the game" with regard to tax law when you're the 3rd richest person on the planet, best mates with the 2nd richest person on the planet & literally have the money & power to CHANGE the game is not a valid argument. He talks a big game about tax reform, but does not work to actually do anything about it. Hell, his donations swing heavily toward republicans who are AGAINST tax reform. He's done very well thanks to them too:
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/2/24/17048378/warren-buffett-berkshire-hathaway-tax-cuts
A big chunk of Berkshire Hathaway's success is built on not paying tax, they've got $86,000,000,000+ in deferred taxes thanks to exploiting a loop hole where they don't have to pay tax while working on acquiring a company... So they just make sure they are always acquiring.
Imagine if you could defer paying tax forever with the argument that you're still busy buying shares or ETFs.. Given what subreddit we're on, it would be pretty appealing.
Then as previously mentioned in that linked article, the party you donate to comes along & cuts the tax rate, so now you owe billions less than you previously did - woohoo!
> His image may marginally help him
Buffett is selling what is essentially the antithesis of this subreddit. High fee managed funds that exploit tax rules for massive profitability to become personally one of the richest people on the planet. He's the anti-Bogle, yet this subreddit & a lot of FI/RE types love him, because of that image & brand.
Buffett is Berkshire, the reason why so many people & institutional funds are happy to pour money into Berkshire stock is because of the image. It hasn't helped him a little bit, it's helped him immensely.
> To me he seems to genuinely want what's best for the country/world.
To me he seems like another John D. Rockerfeller. A titan of industry who wants to be the richest so he can control where the money ends up. Win the game, then give most of it away. If you haven't read it yet, grab yourself a copy of https://www.amazon.com/Titan-Life-John-Rockefeller-Sr/dp/1400077303
The similarities are incredible.
Well, there was a string of less-than-savory Rockefellers to come out of the bloodline. Several went in to politics. But we're really getting beyond my realm, now. I pretty much only ever concerned myself with the man.
The book that got me in to Rockefeller is Titan by the brilliant Ron Chernow. I want to say it's almost 900 pages long - but don't let that intimidate you. The book is absolutely chock full of fascinating nuggets about the America of the day, and gives you an almost blow-by-blow look at how Clark & Rockefeller Produce and Commission went on to become pretty much the biggest beast our planet's ever seen.
Anyway, it reads quick and is a good go-to for me whenever I want to brush up.
But really, I think 'just relax' is best here, so:
etc etc etc
http://www.amazon.com/Titan-The-Life-John-Rockefeller/dp/1400077303
Great book... Incredible history
100% agree. Read https://www.amazon.com/Titan-Life-John-Rockefeller-Sr/dp/1400077303 and then tell me you wouldn't want that lifestyle...
The guy semi-retired in his early 50's to play golf and live a life of luxury in his various manor homes. He lived until 97, money seems to have done a great job of keeping him alive.
Medicine is bad? Chicago university wouldn't exist without him and his huge bankroll, His money was almost singlehandedly responsible for curing ringworm in destitute southerners (and curing other illnesses and maladies) too. A huuuuge amount of modern medicine is thanks to John D & his willingness to fund medical research.
I mean sure he couldn't play angry birds... But the guy was rich enough to have stables built in Manhattan so he could race the worlds finest horses with his brother through central park. Toward his later years he was able to afford the worlds best cars in the world and professional drivers to take him for drives. Sure, they weren't as quick as a modern sports car, but i doubt he really cared.. Reliability? He could buy 100 of them, no problem.
The impact John D and even his son, John D Jr had on areas such as medicine and the arts is mind boggling. The New York MoMA nor the Cloisters would exist without them. (Jr and his wife co-founded the MoMA, donated the land & an incredible amount of art work to it. HE DIDN'T EVEN LIKE MODERN ART, HE HATED IT.) John D Jr gave more money to medical research and charity than he gave to his own damn family.
The amount of charitable giving they did (most of it anonymous) is insane. They bought entire forests to save them, donated huge chunks of land to be national parks, etc.
The United Nations? The land the headquarters is built on in Manhattan - Jr donated that.
Versailles in France? Jr was posthumously awarded France's highest honor, the Grand-Croix de la Legion d'honneur for contributing huge sums of money (with no requirement for any recognition, public attention, etc.. If anything he worked incredibly hard to HIDE his involvement) to the repair efforts because he thought it was an important building for the French people.
These are people who on multiple occasions would pay double or triple the asking price of famous art works to the ire of their friends and colleagues who wanted to acquire them, because while others in their social circle wanted to horde them in their private collections, they wanted to buy them so they could be donated and on show for all of the public, not just the rich elite.
If I could have my life today, or be transferred to John D or John D Jr's era and have 1/10th the impact on humanity that they had, its a total no brainer. Yes, John D committed some unsavoury (monopolistic) business practices... So did everyone else in that era. He was a devout baptist who practiced philosophy and frugality (he was far, far less spendy than anyone remotely comparable) from his youth as a broke assistant bookkeeper to his dying days as a titan of industry.
I like biographies of famous people a lot.
Augustus, by Anthony Everitt: I find Augustus fascinating because his rise to power was one of the very very few examples in history where a Trio of teenagers defeated their enemies against overwhelming odds and succeeded creating an order lasting for more than two centuries. (The Principate stopped working after Septimius Severus took power in 193AD)
FDR, by Jean Edward Smith: FDR is simply my favorite US president.
Titan, The Life of John D. Rockefeller, by Ron Chernow: Rockefeller was born in a very poor family, never had an university education, and became a billionaire by the end of 19th century. Regardless how you view him today, his rise made an excellent story.
Steve Jobs, by Walter Isaacson: He was a jerk, but also a genius. His love/hate relationship with Bill Gates is story for the ages. This book also shines some good insight into the tech industry. I have to say this book helped me making lots of money in stocks.
i like Ron Chernow's historical biographies.
I've read his books on John D. Rockefeller, JP Morgan, and am currently reading Hamilton.
They are well researched, and he tells a good story.
In fact, iirc, you are local-ish to me so you can borrow one of them from me if you'd like. If I can find them (having moved recently).
"Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefella Sr." by Ron Chernow
amazon
Ron Chernow writes excellent financial histories, I haven't read his Warburgs or his Washington biographies, so I can't comment on them; however I recommend everything else by Chernow. "The House of Morgan" is a bit difficult to digest, but it provides a sweeping history of finance in USA.
Have you ever read Titan? It actually goes into this a bit when Standard Oil had to incorporate separately in each state. Pretty interesting stuff and a great book. Also goes into the nature of regulation the oil industry.
I will agree with that. There is a lot of redundancy involved in making multiple companies that service the same thing in each state.
I think we have to either go full socialized single payer or deregulate entirely. This halfway bastardization that we have is pretty horrible.
Slightly outside your request but Titan, the Life of John D. Rockefeller is excellent. It's a fascinating rags to riches epic that also tells the story of the industrial revolution and how it changed the US economy. Wonderful book.
The markets do not regulate themselves. Read up on some history if you actually want to learn something instead of repeating Rush Limbaugh. You can start with Rockefeller and Standard Oil. No regulations there. He did what he wanted, and it blows a massive hole in your talking point. This book was excellent.
> Rockefeller couldn't care less about people getting drunk.
He was a devout southern baptist who practiced and preached temperance WELL before the movement took off, mostly due to his experiences growing up with a father who was a heavy drinker.
He continued to practice it and punish his (adult) children for drinking well into his retirement.
Read: https://www.amazon.com/Titan-Life-John-Rockefeller-Sr/dp/1400077303
You will learn a tonne about Rockerfeller. He was a devout and pious man who was somehow capable of totally suspending his ethics in his professional work to collude with railways to form monopolies. His involvement with prohibition had nothing to do with his professional enterprise though.
Here's a far more detailed Quora comment rebutting this myth:
https://www.quora.com/Did-Rockefeller-bankroll-the-Prohibition-because-Henry-Ford-was-more-inclined-to-create-a-car-which-runs-on-ethanol
If you like that shit read Titan and Carnegie as well. Throw in The First Tycoon and you got a comprehensive lesson in people who have more money than you will ever have.
This one: https://www.amazon.com/Titan-Life-John-Rockefeller-Sr/dp/1400077303