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Investing

So far we have spent some time elaborating on the basics of economy and economic factors. This is a good start, but believe me, what we have covered so far does not even account for the tip of the proverbial iceberg. I must stress the fact that many volumes can be written on every item that has been mentioned in this book. Unless you are prepared to dedicate your whole lifetime to it, you will never have enough time to dig deep into every item. The good news is that we covered enough information to put you on a solid ground before we delve into the investment chapters. But if you feel compelled to dig deeper on a particular subject, feel free to visit your local bookstore or library.With that in mind, let's begin our discussion of investing.

Why Invest?

The answer to this subtitle should be pretty obvious but a straight answer would be: to profit. This does not necessarily translate to monetary gains, but today our view of a successful investor is of a person who more or less consistently ends up with more money than the initial investment. If you come down to it, all creatures by design engage in some form of investment. They do it to increase their survival rates, enhance their quality of lives, and hopefully pass on their success to their offspring. A cheetah invests numerous hours patiently stalking its prey for a chance to feed itself and its cubs. With every attack, the cheetah reevaluates its strategies and its maneuvers in order to maximize the return on investment on its future hunting efforts.Many of us invest many years of our lives educating ourselves with the hopes of landing great jobs which compensate us financially and intellectually.

We all realize that investing carries a certain amount of risk and the payback may not always fall within our expected goals. Not all college …