Set forth below is the text of a comment that I recently put to the blog at this site:
I think millions would disagree with your level of knowledge versus those you have listed.
Millions would disagree with what I say about my level of knowledge TODAY, Pink. We agree re that one.
How about tomorrow? What happens tomorrow matters.
Bogle does not believe that he can respond effectively to my questions about Buy-and-Hold, Pink. We know that beyond any reasonable doubt.
I announced plans to ask Bogle questions at one of the Bogleheads annual meetings and he responded fearfully. And, when Rob Arnott copied Jack on his e-mail to me saying that my views on investing are “sound.,” Jack did not respond. Nor has Jack responded to my e-mails to him.
Jack sees the entire Buy-and-Hold house of cards collapsing before his eyes and can’t figure out where to turn.
What are the millions going to say about who is better informed re the realities of stock investing following the next price crash, Pink? I think it is fair to say that there will be few calling Bogle an “expert” tomorrow. And, once word gets out all across the internet that I discovered the errors in the Old School safe withdrawal rate studies a full 10 years before any of the big-name “experts” in this field, who do you think is going to be perceived as the true expert in the eyes of millions of middle-class investors?
Now –
The full truth is that people will be overstating my expertise then as much as they are understating it today. That’s unfortunate. The reality is that I know lots of things that Bogle and Bernstein and Swedroe do not know. But Bogle and Bernstein and Swedroe also know lots of things that I do not know.
If those guys were as smart as they pretend to be, they would acknowledge what they do not know. They would stop playing this stupid little-boy game of pretending that they knew it all on the day they were born. Everyone sees through that garbage. Many have been reluctant to say they see through it for so long as they have continued hoping that Buy-and-Hold might work out okay for the first time in history. But, if Buy-and-Hold destroys as many lives this time as it has on every earlier occasion it was tried, millions are going to acknowledge that they have at least suspected for a long time now that a lot of the “experts” possess an expertise primarily in marketing.
Get Rich Quick sells, Pink. I get that loud and clear.
Research-based strategies work.
I am the most knowledgeable person today on the subject of how average middle-class people should invest in stocks not because I spent 20 years in school or possess a genius level I.Q. I am the most knowledgeable todaybecause I am honest, because I care about what will happen to the people who will follow my advice.
That’s gives me a huge edge in a field that I think can fairly be described as 100 percent corrupt today, Any field in which errors in retirement studies have been publicly revealed but not corrected for 11 years is 100 percent corrupt. No?
I ain’t no great shakes in my knowledge of stock investing. And, in fairness, I learned most of what I know from people like Bogle and Bernstein and Swedroe. But the full reality here is that I am 11 years ahead of those guys today. Because when I saw the reluctance of the Buy-and-Holders to acknowledge their errors, I abandoned ship and got about the business of figuring out why the “experts” in this field are so arrogant and puffed-up and defensive.
It’s not all a math exercise.
Honesty matters. Caring about what happens to the people who follow your advice matters.
This is a field in which you can quickly go to the head of the class just by being honest and by caring about what happens to the people who follow your advice.
I look forward to the day when my good friends Jack and Bill and Larry catch up to me and then surpass me. Nothing would make me happier. I pray every day for that to happen.
Rob
feed twitter twitter facebook