Warren Buffett's Huge Dividend Income

Warren Buffett Dividends

Warren Buffett is not only one of the greatest investors of all time, but, and most people don't know or recognize this: he is one of the great marketers as well.

When I say he's one of the great marketers, I'm talking about personal branding and the image he portrays.

Buffett knows the envy rampant in the world concerning wealthy people, and wisely he cultivates a persona of humility and commonality that the regular person relates to, and forgives of Buffett what they won't forgive of most other people, and that is that he's rich.

Beyond that, and probably more important than that, is the way Buffett portrays himself as a free market capitalist, when in fact he's not close to that, but rather is a strong proponent of big government and socialist programs, which have emerged in his public responses to the actions of the U.S. government under Obama.

Now even hear it's hard to tell if Buffett really believes the things he says, as the canny investor thoroughly understands what he's up against with potential government interference, and is an expert at saying the right things at the right time for the benefit of himself and Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK-A).

For example, read through his quarterly reports on the Internet and see how many times he supports heavy taxation, or other times he's encouraged the death tax to be rescinded for those who are far less wealthy than himself, and which would devastate family wealth.

These are done from personal beliefs, but also from expediency in regard to shoring up the socialist idea that the wealthy should share the wealth with everyone through forced distribution, rather than pass it on to their family, or whoever or whatever they want to.

Anyway, the point is Warren Buffett while marketing himself as a low-income CEO making only $100,000 a year, doesn't bother revealing he makes millions a quarter on dividends he receives from personal investments.

At the end of 2008, Buffett had made $15.5 million for that quarter, the highest level, which of course went down in the midst of the economic crisis and some of his holding cutting their dividend rates.

Even so, think of how much that is for Buffett, who has cultivated the persona of being a thrifty guy in relationship to his money.

while he is that outwardly, he definitely makes far more money that most people know, and many of his outward expressions are part of the role he plays to protect Berkshire Hathaway.

Do I begrudge Buffett this? Not at all. I'm just saying he's far more canny than given credit for, and the things he says and moves he makes is far beyond simple investing, but takes into account the many forces in the world envious and ready to take the wealth from the deserving and transfer it to the underserving.

Buffett has battled this over the year, but unfortunately, in my opinion, has harmed capitalism and free markets from catering to the political crowd in a way that is beneficial for him, but not necessarily for his competitors and other business owners.

Warren Buffett: Now is one of Best Times to Buy into U.S. Stock Market

One of the many things Warren Buffett is known for saying, is to "be fearful when others are greedy, and be greedy when others are fearful." In our lifetimes, this is one of the most significant times where that saying has more meaning than ever.

We do have to keep one thing in mind right now before going ahead, and that is the U.S. government is now using Warren Buffett as a mouthpiece to calm the markets down and hopefully bring investors back to equities in order to get some money flowing. So everything he says in these areas has to be taken with that as a backdrop.

Even so, what Buffett is saying about this being a great time to invest in American publicly-held companies is true.

This difficult market has one great value for investors: it exposes the weak as well as the solid companies, so what to look for when considering investing in U.S. companies at this time is really simple - don't invest in companies that are highly-leveraged, and look for those with strong competitive advantage. These companies will perform strongly in the next 10 to 20 years.

The current discount on some of the better companies in America make this one of the most ideal times to expand our ownership in companies.

As Buffett has always said, over the short run, there's no way anybody can know how a company will do, but keeping in mind the competitive advantage and companies without too much debt, we will do good over the long haul.