A Rich Life

The Old Ideas on Saving & Investing Don't Work -- Here's What Does

“A Horrible Experience Like This Could Be What We Need to Open the Entire Internet to Honest Posting re the Last 39 Years of Peer-Reviewed Research in This Field and That Could in Time Bring on Positive Economic Effects Bigger Than the Negative Economic Effects of the Crash Experienced.”

by

Set forth below is the text of a comment that I recently posted to the discussion thread for another blog entry at this site:

This is all playing out to be your worst case scenario.

It’s not entirely clear to me what you are trying to suggest here.

If you are suggesting that the coronavirus matter might provide enough of a negative economic shock to send stock prices from a CAPE value of 30 to a CAPE value of 8 and that a price drop of that size will bring on an ocean of human misery, then, yes, you are right that the idea that something like that could happen has indeed long been my worst-case scenario. I pray that it doesn’t happen. But I certainly worry about the possibility. And I have been worrying about this possibility for many years now.

The other side of the story is that a horrible experience like this could be what we need to open the entire internet to honest posting re the last 39 years of peer-reviewed research in this field and that could in time bring on positive economic effects bigger than the negative economic effects of the crash experienced. I think that Shiller’s research points us to an amazing economic advance and I very much want us all to begin reaping the benefits of that advance. If going through a scary rough patch is what it takes to reap those benefits, then I guess that that is what it takes. I hate the idea. Hate it, hate it, hate it. But nobody asked my opinion before setting things up in the way that they have been set up. I have to play the cards that I am dealt whether I like what I see in my hand or not.

I am scared of what may happen. Please feel free to quote me re that one.

I am also very excited about the good stuff that we may see on the other side of this thing. I am obviously going to do everything in my power to minimize the bad and to heighten the good. I can do no more and I can do no less.

Please pray with me that we are all able to make it to the other side in one piece. The risks here are very big. If that is the suggestion that you are intending to advance, I get it loud and clear.

Worried Rob