Set forth below is the text of a comment that I recently posted to the discussion thread for another blog entry at this site:
“Even Evidence-Based Investing recently said that he does not believe that Greaney included a valuation adjustment in his study.”
That is an accurate description of my position.
“I applaud Evidence for acknowledging that Greaney got the number wrong in his study. “
That is not an accurate description of my position.
My position is the same as yours
“We agree that Greaney calculated properly the rate that survived all existing 30-year historical time-periods.”
If you wish to see an estimate of future rates that survive then you need to produce that calculation yourself or find others to produce that calculation for you.
I was suggesting that we have that discussion at the Retire Early board when I advanced my May 13, 2002, post. We saw a huge positive response to that suggestion. A large number of my fellow community members thanked me for starting the most exciting and helpful discussion ever held in that community. John Walter Russell spent eight years of his life working on that question and on related questions. Russell and I created a calculator together dealing with it. Wade Pfau devoted 16 months of his life to developing research with me on issues relating to it and we had that research published in a peer-reviewed journal. The interest in having the discussion is very intense and very widespread.
However, as strong as that interest is, the fear of you Goons is even stronger. People do not feel comfortable hearing death threats directed at their loved ones. People do not like to hear demands for unjustified board bannings directed at them. They do not like to see thousands of acts of defamation aimed at them. They do not like to see acts of extortion directed at academic researchers who have worked with them.
When as a society we work up the courage to stand up to you Goons, all of our problems re these matters will be in the past. I expect to see this happen in the days following the next price crash, when people will be able to see with their own eyes how much the widespread promotion of a pure Get Rich Quick/Buy-and-Hold investment strategy eventually hurts each and every one of us. I am not God. I could be wrong. But my sincere expectation is that the next price crash is going to open a lot of people’s eyes and cause enough of us to stand up to your Goons that we all will be able together to make the transition from Buy-and-Hold to the first true research-based investment strategy.
We’ll see.
My best and warmest wishes to you, Evidence.
Rob
Evidence has been nothing short of respectful to you, yet you can’t stop being childish for even one minute, including your non-stop name calling.
Evidence has in recent days acknowledged that the Greaney retirement study is in error. I have praised him for that. I have said that he is right on. I see his acknowledgment that the study is in error as a potential breakthrough.
The other side of the story is that Evidence has NOT called for Greaney to correct the study. So he has gotten us only halfway to where we need to go. He has been 100 percent clear about this and had repeated his position on numerous occasions. I don’t see it as “name calling” to point this out.
Evidence says that the Greaney study lacks a valuation adjustment. He has said that “nobody” truly believes that the study contains a valuation adjustment, including Greaney himself. He also says that he does not believe that the Greaney study needs to be immediately corrected and in fact should have been corrected 20 years ago, when the error was made publicly known.
Huh? What the f?
I call that 100 percent nuts. Is that name-calling? Evidence is the one advancing 100 percent inconsistent statements under his name, not me. I am pointing out what he said. But he is the one who has said these things on multiple occsions.
He is trying to defend something that cannot be defended. That’s the bottom line. The Greaney study offers an accurate report on safe withdrawal rates to the same extent that fund statements issued by the Madoff fund offered accurate reports on the size of the fund. People believed in the Madoff fund for emotional reasons, not intellectual reasons, The same is true with the Greaney retirement study. Evidence nailed it when he said that “nobody” truly believes that the Greaney study contains a valuation adjustment, including Greaney himself. That’s what I believe.
Rob
“Evidence is the one advancing 100 percent inconsistent statements under his name, not me. ”
I have been 100% consistent.
A calculation of the withdrawal rate that survived in the past is different than an estimate of what withdrawal rate will survive in the future are 2 different calculations.
Changing the first calculation to try and turn it into the second one wouldn’t correct the study, it would break it.
You seem to be the only person who can’t understand the difference between the two.
I of course agree with you that the two calculations are different.
What I proposed in my post of the morning of May 13, 2002, is that we look at the second calculation. Thousands of community members expressed excitement over this idea. They thanked me for starting the most important discussion ever held in the history of the Retire Early board. Greaney freaked out. He had been trying to deceive people into thinking that he had calculated the safe withdrawal rate and he could see that honest discussions were going to cause people to lose confidence in his false clams that a 4 percent withdrawal is always “100 percent safe.”
People need to know the safe withdrawal rate to be able to plan effectively for their retirements. I believe that we should be permitting honest discussion of this question at every discussion board and blog on the internet, without a single exception. I believe that that’s the answer.
I am sure of it.
And it wouldn’t “break” the Greaney study for him to add a few paragraphs at the end of it noting that in no way shape or form can a 4 percent withdrawal be considered the safe withdrawal rate, that he never even tried to calculate the safe withdrawal rate. Doing that would bring an end to the deception, which would be a very good thing. Once the deception was brought to an end, we would all be free to discuss what we want because the Buy-and-Holders would no longer feel a need to “defend” their long-discredited retirement studies. We could all move on to better and more enjoyable and more productive pursuits.
Rob
“ We could all move on to better and more enjoyable and more productive pursuits.”
Everyone has long since moved on. You haven’t.
I haven’t moved on. I believe that we need to open every discussion board and blog on the internet to honest posting re the last 40 years of peer-reviewed research in this field. I see this as the most important public policy issue facing our nation today.
Today’s CAPE value is 40. In the days following earlier Buy-and-Hold crises, we have seen the CAPE drop to 8. So we are looking potentially at a loss of stock market value of 80 percent. That’s many trillions of dollars. That means millions of failed retirements. Hundreds of thousands of businesses going under because of a severe contraction in consumer spending. Millions of people thrown out of work. A dramatic increase in political frictions, especially when people learn that all of this could have been avoided just by permitting honest posting re the last 40 years of peer-reviewed research in this field.
I have not moved on because I love my country and the people in it. I offer no apologies.
My best and warmest wishes to you, dear Goon friend.
Rob