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Opportunities are given to you by other people when they do stupid things. And, uh, this, uh...I would say that in the 58 years that we've been running Berkshire, the number of people doing stupid things has increased significantly, and they're doing big stupid things. And the reason they do this, to some extent, is because they can get money from other people much more easily than when we started.
So you could have started 10 or 15 stupid insurance companies in the last 10 years and gotten rich if you were smart about it , regardless of whether the business was successful; the underwriters got paid, the lawyers got paid, and that creates... if it's done on a large scale, what couldn't have been done 58 years ago?
Luckily, you couldn't get money for some of the stupid things we wanted to do. And that's why , I think, investing has so disappeared from this huge capitalist market, where anyone can play, but the big money is made selling ideas to other people. It's not about beating the results, uh, about better performance.
And I think if you're not managing very large amounts like we are, but managing small amounts, I think the opportunities are going to be greater. But Charlie and I have always had different views on this issue. He likes to tell me how bleak the world is, and I like to tell him that we'll find something, and so far we're both right to some extent.
Charlie, would you change your mind about this a little or not? There is so much money in the hands of so many smart people right now. Everyone is trying to outsmart each other. And outdo each other in promotion, extracting more money from other people. And it's a radically different world than the one we started in.
And I assume that it will have its opportunities, but there will also be unpleasant episodes. But they try to outsmart each other in arenas where you don't necessarily have to play. I mean, if you look at the government bond market, if you look at the Treasury bond market. I mean, you have this one bill that stands out from the rest.
The other day we had a bunch of people around 3 billion of this, and, but these are people, the world is mostly focused on the short term. And if you go on an investor relations call, they're all trying to figure out how to fill out a report to show earnings for the year, and management is interested in fueling expectations that can be slightly exceeded.
I mean, it's a world custom-made for those who are trying to think about what to do to make it work in 5, 10, or 20 years. And, uh, I just think I wish I was born today, came out with a little money, and hopefully turned it into a lot of money. But, actually, so does Charlie. He just, he would find something to do.
I guarantee you. Uh, and it wouldn't be quite like before. But he would have a big, big, big pile. I wouldn't like the feeling of losing my big pile and turning it into a small one. Well, I like my big pile the way it is. Well, I like it. We agree on that, by the way. OK. do. You are one of the most ardent supporters of the big pile.
So, we run a business that is very, very, very opportunistic. And, uh , Charlie always thought I did too much . He thought that if we did about five things in our lifetime, we could accomplish more than if we did 50, and that we were never focused enough. So this is what we would prefer, if we had 335 billion in Treasury obligations right now, we would prefer to have conditions where we would have about 50 billion or something like that.
But business doesn't work that way. And we made a lot of money without wanting to be fully invested all the time. And, uh, um, we don't think it's wrong for passive investors to just make a few simple investments and sit with them for the rest of their lives. But, we decided that being in this business, we think we can achieve a little better results by behaving very irregularly.
But if you told me I should invest, uh Well, let's say we have about 40 billion a year in revenue. And we start at 335. If you told me that I should invest 50 billion every year until we get down to 50 billion, that would be the stupidest thing in the world to invest that way. Things become extremely attractive very rarely.
The long-term trend is upward. Nobody knows. And, uh, I do n't know for sure. Greg doesn't know. Ajit doesn't know. No one knows what the market will do tomorrow, next week, or next month. No one knows what a business will do tomorrow, next week, or next month. But they spend all their time talking about it because it's an easy topic.
And, uh , but it has no value. I've never found anyone I'd want to listen to on this topic. And on the other hand, I found turning pages like in that big Japanese book that I can no longer read. It's, uh, a treasure hunt. And every now and then you find something. And occasionally, very occasionally, it will happen again, although I don't know exactly when.
It's not...it could be next week. It might be in 5 years, but definitely not in 50. We will be inundated with offers for which we will be grateful we have the cash. And it would be a lot more fun if it happened tomorrow, but that's highly unlikely. It is very, very unlikely that this will happen tomorrow.
But this is quite likely in 5 years. And then the probabilities become higher over time. It's like death. That is, if you are 10 years old, the chances of you dying the next day are less than the chances of you living to be 115 or something. This is almost guaranteed. Especially if you are a man. All the longevity records are held by women, and I tried to talk Charlie into changing gender so he could see if... But, uh, he was holding up pretty well for a man. Let's say this. OK.
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