A fool and his money get a lot of publicity. — Don Marquis

A fool and his money get a lot of publicity.

Author: Don Marquis

Insight: We live in an age where the most spectacular failures often get the most attention. Someone makes a terrible financial decision—overpaying for a trendy investment, falling for a get-rich-quick scheme, betting their savings on a meme stock—and the story explodes across social media. We rubberneck at the wreck, fascinated and slightly relieved it wasn't us. What Marquis captures is that foolishness is actually a magnet for visibility. The dramatic loss, the embarrassing miscalculation, the cautionary tale—these are way more interesting than quiet, sensible choices. A person who invests steadily and lives modestly doesn't trend. But someone who publicly loses their shirt? That narrative writes itself. This creates a weird distortion: we might assume foolish money decisions are more common than they actually are because we never hear about the thousands of boring, competent choices people make every day. The deeper angle here is about what stories we tell ourselves. If you only look at what gets amplified, you'll start believing the loudest, most sensational version of reality. The real wisdom isn't just in guarding your money—it's in remembering that what captures attention and what matters most are often completely different things. The unsexy, unglamorous choices are usually where real stability lives.