The radio was on in the car and a lady was talking about sugar. Apparently we all eat too much of it as it is in many processed foods. Sugar has a great history starting from the sugar cane and then refined to brown sugar and further refined to white sugar. The lady on the radio was talking about the perceptions of sugar – if a bowl of brown sugar and a bowl of white sugar was on the table, which one would you pick first? For most people it is the white sugar, because white sugar was always more expensive as it took a longer period of time to refine. The extra time helped purify it and people generally saw it as better. The lady on the radio then used the analogy of race – brown sugar or white sugar? One of the early products of refining sugar is molasses – what words would you use to describe the product? Does that describe one race better than the other? The answer can be no, but it usually does have an answer.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, with sugar the ideal is to stick to the sugar producing stocks but all foods can have analogies tied to them and thus our initial perceptions. When you first thought of investing did you think of dividend paying stocks (for old people) except history has shown reinvesting your dividends will generate the most wealth with the least risk to your capital. The only trick is to ensure your company remains competitive (stays in business) and continually increases its dividends. This is one of the reasons you need to ensure your companies have a history of paying dividends.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions