Risk takers never lose, do they?

It could have been 1980. All over again.

A television programme.

Some entrepreneur had got tired of the restrictions in Europe and gone off to lead his life in Hong Kong.

We were about 14 seconds into this item, when it produces the old chestnut:

"He likes to take risks".

I had seen 16 seconds or so of this, enough was enough.

Back to 1980.

Risk takers. They never get it wrong, do they?

They always succeed, they never make a mistake.  

They go on getting richer and richer, don't they, and they never ever lose their shirts (and shoes and trousers and underwear ....).

Back to the 1980s. This thinking was in the tabloid press in the UK every day. They made a huge number of adverts on television stressing the theme. They were out on their own carving opportunities for themselves in the capitalist wilderness.

And the millions on the dole queue were all losers who didn't try hard enough. Think of all the opportunities out there. They were there to be taken, if only you were willing to take the risks. AND NOBODY EVER LOSES, THE RISKS ALWAYS SUCCEED! 

Don't they?

And governments were just faceless bureaucrats who only got in the way of this thrusting, vibrant entrepreneurial spirit! Who needs them anyway?

......

Interesting, isn't it? An interesting piece of hogwash!

I know a lot of people would prefer to forget what happened in 2008, and how many of these people came running to governments when the whole theory above turned out to be the one huge very expensive joke!

And the risk takers got handouts. Usually a far larger handout than any of us can hope to get in total from governments in out entire lives. And in the recent words of one well-known American politician we are the "moochers"????

And if the guy in now Hong Kong does take risk after risk after risk and eventually he is left standing only in his socks if they all fail? Should anyone care, never mind bail him out?

It is 2012 now, not 1980. There are lessons to be learned from what happened in 2008.

But to repeat what I said to a good friend this week - if you do not learn the lessons, you do not pass the exam!