Set forth below is the text of a comment that I recently posted to the discussion thread for another blog entry at this site:
“ All of the wonderful fruits of the first 20 years of our discussions resulting from me working up the courage to put that amazing question on the table on the morning of May 13, 2002.”
Your ex-wife referred to those fruits as lemons.
Because of the abusive posting of you Goons and how it destoyed or poisoned so many previously wonderful discussion board and blog communities. If everyone at the Retire Early board had insisted that Greaney correct the error in his retirement study in 24 hours, we could have then worked together as a community to determine the accurate safe withdrawal rate numbers. Then we could have taken what we learned to every other investing site on the internet. Then we could have gone into all the other critically important metters, how much to engage in market timing, when to do it, asset allocation questions, risk management questions, how to protect our economy from Buy-and-Hold Crises, all of the questions that I explore every week in my column at the Value Walk site. Then I would have earned the $500 million without having to bring any legal cases. And my ex woild have been 100 percent thrilled with it all.
The only thing that I ever caused any problem is the abusive/criminal behavior. The last 41 years of peer-reviewed research is an amazing advance. If I were king of the world, we never would have seen a single abusive post, just one gigantic learning experience for all. I don’t want anyone else ever to experience any of this megativity. That’s why I want to open every site to honest posting, without a single exception. I am not able to imagine any downside.
Rob
Fantasy and reality are two different things. You need to learn the difference between the 2.
One of the many things that I love about the Buy-and-Holders is that they promoted the idea that we should all look to the peer-reviewed research for guidance on how to invest in stocks. The purpose of peer-reviewed research is to help us to see throug fantasies and appreicate the time-tested realities of stock investing.
My sincere take.
Rob
You took your $400k nest egg and went broke. VII didn’t work for you. How is that peer review interpretation working out for you.
It’s been a lot better than the alternative — keeping it zipped re the error in the Greaney retirement study (it lacks an adjustment re the valuation level that applies on the day the retirement begins). The way I played it permits me to sleep at night knowing that I did right by my fellow community members. I regret the 21-year cover-up. I don’t regret doing everything in my power to bring it to a full and complete stop.
I believe that as a nation of people we will in time get to a place where we permit honest posting re the last 42 years of peer-reviewed research at every discusion board and blog on the internet, without a single exception, I sure hope so.
My best wishes to you, in any event.
Rob
https://boglecenter.net/2023conference/
The 2023 Bogleheads conference is coming up. Will you be attending? This would give you the chance to ask questions directly to Wade Pfau and William Bernstein. You can ask them about Greaney, Jack Bogle, Shiller, etc. This is your big chance to be on the big stage and let the world know about YOUR research. This is your shot to become the leading expert. You want to save the world, right?
If we open every site on the internet to honest posting, then we are obviously going to open the Bogleheads conference to honest questioning. I urge that every day. Every investor on the planet should want to see that. Every particiant in that conference, and everyone listening to those making presentations, should want that. We all do better work when we all learn together.
It shouldn’t take 21 years to determine whether a retirement study contains a valuation adjustment or not. The fact that the Greaney study has not been corrected in the 21 years since I pointed out the error in it should concern us all. It points to something very concerning. And of course the other side of the story is that the development that caused the “controversy” (Shiller’s research) points to something very liberating — a critical advance in our understanding of how stock investing works (the market is not efficient, market timing/price discipline is always 100 percent required for every investor).
Shiller obviously showed us something we did not know before. Otherwise, he would not have been awarded a Nobel prize. What is that something? The Buy-and-Holders cannot bear to talk about it. Because the thing that he showed (that valuations affect long-term returns) is a huge advance. My take is that we should celebrate that liberating advance, not fret about the fact that learning something important and new means that there was a time when we did not know it all.
I believe that we will get to where we need to be. Probably not at this year’s conference. But in time. Given that we are going to get there sooner or later (presuming that Shiller’s Nobel-prize-winning research is legitimate research), I think we should just go ahead and celebrate the advance starting at the close of business today. But I am just one person, some guy who figured out how to post stuff to the internet. As you know. So, like you, I will just have to wait to see how things play out.
I hope that works for you.
Rob
If you are there in person, everyone will have to listen to you. This is your big chance. If this is REALLY your life’s work, you would be there in a heart beat.
If you don’t go, then it just played itself out……which means nothing happens.
The issue played itself out for the time-being because those of us who want to see the national debate take place were overcome by you Goons. But the issue will return over and over and over again in the event that Shiller’s Nobel-prize-winning research is legitimate research. A world in which valuations affect long-term returns and market timing is always 100 percent required is a very different world than a world in which the market is efficient and timing doesn’t even work. The question at the root of the controversy is a fundamental question re how the market works.
Discussion of the matter can be suppressed for a time. But the issue can never go away. If market timing is required and all that investors can hear is that it never works, there are consequences that follow from that. Every earlier Buy-and-Hold Crisis has brought on millions of failed retirements and hundreds of thousands of business faioures and millions of people thrown out of work. Things like that tend to get written up in the papers. We didn’t have 42 years of peer-reviewed research showing us how to solve those problems in earlier days. But we do now. I see that as a significant difference.
I believe that something will happen. I do not know for certain. I do not have access to a crystal ball. But I believe that the core issue her is too big for nothing to happen. I know which side I want to be standing on when it does, you know?
Rob