Re: Buffet's often said the trouble with BH being so big is the lack of stuff you can buy into.
@JS19:
"well enough run .... gives the sort of return they expect on a long term basis"
(emphasis by Warren Buffett)
The issue (and Mr B. has made this point) is on *real* value and long term viability. Neither of which is what the wall street 'miracle boys' (his term) are after - IBM and HP are both demonstrations of what happens when real value meets large technological change that alters long term viability, the resulting internal changes are driven by the 'miracle boys' cult of *stock value* over real value.
Bezos' company does a balancing act of being only barely profitable, but having the balls to keep trying 'the next little miracle', Buffet's company does the 'long view'. Tackling the OMG, next quarter targets ..... attitude of the modern day MBA crowd is something I suspect that they'll be able to do.
Somewhere in here the comment was 3/4 of healthcare costs were salary... This is technically true, *anywhere* outside of the US. Sadly, when the health care company is listed on the stock market, this becomes less true. I've seen brilliantly operated hospitals in the US, that do great things. However, one needs to be insured, and well insured, and able to *get* to the hospital, either by Uber or taxi or on your own two feet, in order to access this care. I've also seen what passes for 'the rest of them', the hanging on by a thread, armpit deep in disaster cases that 'everyone else' has as their only options.
When the medical tech companies, the pharmaceutical companies, the insurance companies, the hospital companies, and the pharmacies are *all* driven by wall street miracle boy next quarter growth in profitability logic, you have the US health care system.
For the sake of my US relatives and their various offspring I can only hope that Bezos and Buffett can shake the overall disaster of US medical/health insurance up sufficiently to change the direction the country is headed.