Yesterday’s blog entry reported on an e-mail that I sent to Academic Researcher Wade Pfau on March 21, 2011. Wade’s next e-mail arrived on March 28, 2011.
Wade offered his assessment of the Returns Sequence Reality Checker in this e-mail.
I had asked if the concept made sense. He said: “Yes, indeed. You are making a good point with the spreadsheet.”
We exchanged a number of e-mails relating to technical points re the building of the calclualtor.
On April 5, 2011, Wade sent me an e-mail titled “Classy Discussion” with a link to the Early Retirement Forum:
The discussion thread at the link includes numerous defamatory comments about me (the forum banned honest posting on the safe withdrawal rate topic after I reported on the errors in the Old School studies and the Greaney Goons threatened to burn the entire site to the ground unless honest posting was banned). It contains a comment arguing that, since Wade has agreed to associate with someone with a long history of posting honestly on safe withdrawal rates, he should be treated as possessing “zero credibility.”
I responded the same day. The text of my response follows.
Wade:
Thanks for letting me know.
There’s a serious issue here. This is not normal human behavior. Buy-and-Holders are in serious emotional pain.
Investment professionals need to write about this aspect of things more often. People shy away from the subject. But we don’t solve it by shying away from it. Emotions matter.
I of course would like to see people speak up at that board in favor of a lifting of the ban on honest posting. But how do you think you would feel if you were one of those who had insisted on the ban some years back? As a society, we have created a huge problem. As delicate as this matter is, we are going to need to work through it as a society in days to come.
That’s my take, in any event. It’s the most extraordinary thing I have ever seen. The moon landing is a very distant second.
Rob
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