Heisenberg poster from the Breaking Bad Store.

There are obvious reasons for watching “Breaking Bad”: for once the Hollywood hype surrounding the television series is justified. But there is also a less obvious reason: it is one of the best studies available of the dynamics of modern business. A Harvard MBA will set you back $90,000 (plus two years’ lost income). You can buy a deluxe edition of all five seasons of “Breaking Bad”, complete with a plastic money barrel, for $209.99, or a regular edition for less than $80.

“Breaking Bad”, whose finale airs on September 29th, takes place in a recession-ravaged America where most people are struggling to get by on stagnant incomes but a handful of entrepreneurs live like kings. The hero, Walter White, is a high-school chemistry teacher with a second job in a car wash. When he is diagnosed with cancer he is also shaken out of his lethargy: he decides to go into the highly lucrative methamphetamine business to pay for his cancer treatment and leave his family a nest-egg.

Read Schumpeter: The best show on television is also a first-rate primer on business, in The Economist.

Thanks to our friend who could’ve saved his tuition at Harvard Business School for the link.

Interesting how some of the best television shows of the 21st century are about business. Deadwood chronicles the rise of the free market during the Gold Rush. The Sopranos is a primer on capitalism. The first season of The Wire is a dissertation on the drug trade.

Update: Our friend’s spoiler-free review of the final episode of Breaking Bad.

“Pitch-perfect ending, like a good poem.”

Lego Ultra-Sonic Raider. Thanks to Jackie for the alert. We remember how upsetting it was to lose parts of our toys so we really like this story.

From Forbes: Seven-year-old Luka Apps spent his Christmas money on the LEGO Ninjago Ultra Sonic Raider set. Against his father’s advice, young Luka took his newly aquired Jay ZX with him when they went shopping. And then, disaster struck: the figure went missing, never to be seen again.

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Have you observed how easily children can manipulate their parents? We’re talking about children between the ages of 4 and 10 whose parents have jobs. They sense that their parents are guilty about not being around to watch all their milk teeth fall out or take them to ballet class or praise them for every B+ they ever get in school, and they cash in on this guilt. Literally.

When they’re in a toy store, computer/electronics store or video arcade, they expect their parents to buy everything they point to, and if the adults refuse there’s hell to pay. Many parents, already frazzled from work, will cough up the money just to make the kids stop sulking, screaming and throwing those tantrums they know to be effective. The adults end up bribing their kids for a peaceful weekend.

Meanwhile the kids grow up thinking that all they have to do to get what they want is act up. Why not, when they’re rewarded for being bratty. The notion of saving up/working to get what you want never takes hold, and they don’t learn about the value of money. How do we know these things when we don’t have kids? Well we have seen them in action and used their tactics successfully.

How do you teach kids about money? Theoretically, by having a serious conversation about financial responsibility. Be strong. And let them read the Oishi Peso Smart series—books written and illustrated for the youngest readers, with lessons about money that they can appreciate.

Here’s one that’s especially relevant in these days of climate change: Making Paper Boats With Papa.

Click on images to enlarge.

Read the book:

Read the Oishi Peso Smart Series online.

Attention: Director of Museo del Pradao. Send this painting to our house immediately.

A couple of weeks ago I heard two random pieces of information that stuck in my head.

The first was that Spain, like Greece and some other European nations, is in the grip of a recession and its unemployment rate is a shocking 25 percent.

The second was that the Philippines is now a creditor nation. We’ve lent a billion dollars to the International Monetary Fund. The international media has noted that while many economies are struggling, ours is doing pretty well. Pundits say the Philippines is one of the breakout economies of the next decade, and “Asia’s perennial underachiever is outperforming.”

Then it occurred to me that these two random bits may be connected. They need money, we have money, their real estate prices are plummeting…

Let’s buy Spain.

1. We can afford it.

1.1. Thanks to our Army of World Domination—the overseas Filipino workers who send money home every month—we’ve got funds.

1.1.1. They laughed at us because we were willing to take the jobs they didn’t want to do in their own countries. Some of them even used “Filipina” as a synonym for maid/domestic helper.

Our column at InterAksyon.com.

The Philippine economy is doing well.

We can now lend money to other countries.

Europe is in a recession.

Unemployment rates are high.

Real estate prices are plunging.

Let’s buy Spain.

Smaug and his treasure. Wonder what he paid Benedict Cumberbatch to dub his voice in The Hobbit.

Don’t forget the “father” of the Seattle-based vampires, Montgomery Burns and Bruce Wayne.

The Forbes Fictional 15