Tuesday, February 28, 2006
Great column by Thomas Sowell...I know that sounds redundant.
Suppose someone left you an inheritance of a million dollars -- with the proviso that every cent of it had to be spent on tickets for you to go watch professional wrestling matches. If you happened to be a professional wrestling fan, you would be in hog heaven.
But what if you were not? How much would that million dollars be worth to you? Certainly a lot less than a million dollars.
What if there was a clause in the will which said that you could forfeit the million dollars and instead receive a cash amount of $100,000 to spend as you pleased? Many of us would take the hundred grand without strings, even if that was only ten cents on the dollar compared to the million for watching wrestling.
In short, money with strings is worth less than money without strings -- sometimes a lot less.
**UPDATE**
As is usually the case, Dr. Sowell writes multi part articles this is part II.
And now Part III
