For wage earners, money is a consumer good; for investors, it’s a factor of production.

Buffett's wife once complained that he even calculates the expected value when buying a casket for his own father.

Buffett's point was that spending a few hundred dollars on a decent basic casket would be fine. A casket is a consumer good, not an investment asset—it has no appreciation potential. Why spend tens of thousands?

For my money, tens of thousands of dollars today could grow into hundreds of thousands years from now…

Buffett's wife finally snapped and said, "Are you out of your mind? This is your father—your actual father—and you're calculating its appreciation potential?"