A Rich Life

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

Buy-and-Hold Goon to Rob: “I Have Never Seen One Buy-and-Holder Go Broke”

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

What pain?  Going broke?  I have never seen even one buy and holder go broke.  I have never seen any successful outcome with VII.  The only cover up going in is taking place at this website.

Have you ever watched the movie “Grapes of Wrath”? It stars Henry Fonda.

Rob

Comments

  2. Grapes of Wrath told the story of a Buy-and-Hold Crisis that really happened. My parents lived through it. They told me stories of what it was like. I don’t like tje idea of my boys (and millions and millions of others) having to live through something like that.

    Buy-and-Hold Crises have been optional since 1981. All that we need to do is to open up every site to honest posting and we can use the peer-reviewed research to persuade stock investors to keep the irrational exuberance garbage under control.

    I can live with that. I think that a 6.5 percent real annual return is just fine. Permitting irrational exuberance to get out of control hurts all of us.

    Rob

  4. And, again, failed retirements are real.

    We should be permitting honest posting re the peer-reviewed research at every site.

    Rob

  5. “ And, again, failed retirements are real.”

    I agree. Your failed retirement is real. I don’t want to end up like you, so I don’t follow a timing scheme.

  8. There’s a big difference between someone facing financial difficulties because someone got the numbers wildly wrong in a retirement study posted at his web site and someone facing financial difficulites because the internet goon who got the numbers wrong in his retirement study leads a 21-year-long smear campaign against the person who pointed out the error in his study to block millions of people from learning about it. It’s not even a remotely.

    I don’t like it that I have faced financial difficulites because of your abusive and in some cases criminal behavior, But I of course don’t want anyone else ever to be put through something like this. I think that the answer is to open every site to honest posting re the last 42 years of peer-reviewed research.

    I know it is!

    Rob

  9. You error about Greaney has nothing to do with you being broke. Further, there is no difference between one broke person and another. The whole discussion is about having a financially secure retirement.

  10. I don’t agree, Anonymous. I knew about the error in the Greaney retirement study in May 1999, when I first posted to the old Motley Fool board. I learned about it by reading John Bogle’s book “Common Sense on Mutual Funds,” in which he states that reversion to the mean in stock prices is an “iron law” of stock investing (and, thus, it is a logical impossibility that the safe withdrawal rate is the same number at all valuation levels). I was afraid to go public re the error for three years. That was creepy behavior. It was unethical. I owed better to my fellow community members at that board, some of whom I came to consider friends. I would rather suffer financial difficulites than know that I am a person who sold out his friends because he was afraid of what some internet goon squad would do to him if he posted his honest beliefs about the subject matter of a discussion board at which he posted.

    I believe that I will have a settlement check of $500 million coming to me in the days following the onset of the next Buy-and-Hold Crisis. So the financial setbacks caused by the behavior of you Goons will prove to be a temporary thing. But the feeling that I would have about myself if I continued to sell out my friends at the old Motley Fool board would have made my feel bad about myself for the remainder of my days if I didn’t eventually work up the courage to “cross” Greaney by posting honestly re what the research says. Thanks but no thanks, you know?

    I believe that money is important. Obviously. That’s what I do the work that I do. But I also believe that there are things in this life more important than money. I am proud of myself that I eventually worked up the courage to post honestly re the Greaney study. I only regret that it took me so long. I think it would be fair to say that that part of the story does not reflect well on me.

    My best wishes to you and yours.

    Rob

  11. “ I believe that I will have a settlement check of $500 million coming to me in the days following the onset of the next Buy-and-Hold Crisis.”

    How many bills can you currently pay with this fantasy? When you go to the grocery store, do you tell them about your error regarding John Greaney in hopes that they feel sorry for you and let you take the food home for free?

  12. I do not.

    But I go to sleep every night knowing that I did everything in my power to protect the people who work in the grocery store from the effects of the next Buy-and-Hold Crisis. Knowing that I have done all that I could makes me feel more connected to all of the millions of good people who inhabit this world. That’s worth something to me. It’s worth more than dollar bills. I had more dollar bill in the days before I worked up the courage to point out the error in the Greaney retirement study. But I feel better about myself today. Go figure.

    You cane take the boy out of the ’60s. But you can’t take the 60’s out of the boy!

    My best and warmest wishes.

    Rob

  13. You haven’t saved anyone. The only crisis is the lack of savings crisis (which is your issue). A wise man once told you: “ You go about it in a manner that is catastrophically unproductive by adding missionary zeal that inflates your importance and demeans others. The whole idea that there is a new school of Safe Withdrawal Rates reeks of personal aggrandizement.”

    You should have listened to him as well.

  14. I believe that there’s a new school of safe withdrawal rate analysis. It was born on the morning of May 13, 2002. Thousands of our fellow community members have expressed a desire that honest posting re the peer-reviewed research be permitted so that the new school can grow in popularity over time. The new school posits that Shiller’s Nobel-prize-winning research showing that valuations affect long-term returns is legitimate research and that thus it is a logical impossibility that the safe withdrawal rate is the same number at all possible valuation levels.

    I believe that it is the 42-year cover-up of Shiller’s amazing research findings that has been “catastophically unproductive.”

    My best wishes, etc.

    Rob

  15. I think you need to read his advice again. If you would have taken it before, you wouldn’t be in such a horrible position.

  17. There is nothing difficult about it. It is simple to understand. If you just kept working when people told you to not quit your job, you would have had millions in savings right now and your wouldn’t be divorced. Further, if those savings were left in the market vs timing, you would have had substantially more money in your investment accounts. There is nothing to really debate about it. It is just simple to look at the historical record.

  18. And I would not have a nearly finished book on how stock investing works in the real world in my files. I see that book as the accomplishment of 50 lifetimes. It’s not something that I set out to achieve. It is an achievement that was thrist upon me when I worked up the courage to point out the error in the Greaney retirement study (it lacks an adjustment for the valuation level that applies on the day the retirement begins) and then saw the reaction to that post from all sorts of people at all sorts of places.

    The last 21 years I have walked a very hard path. I don’t say different. But I think that I made the right choice. I wouldn’t do it over differently if I were presented with that option.

    I naturally wish you all the best that this life has to offer a person.

    Rob

  19. “ And I would not have a bearly finished book on how stock investing works in the real world in my files. I see that book as the accomplishment of 50 lifetimes.”

    An unfinished book that just repeats this website and only makes 3 or 4 points is a complete waste of time.

  20. We are all in this together. We all want the same things. We all need to know how to invest effectively.

    I pointeed out the error in the Greaney retirement study (it lacks an adjustment for the valuation level that applies on the day the retirement begins) on the morning of May 13, 2002. It has not been corrected to this day, It’s been 21 years.

    There’s clearly something missing in our understanding of how stock investing works. It would seem to me that a book filling in that gaps in understanding would be og huge value.

    I am not able to imagine any other way we will all be able to move forward from the horrible place where we are tosay (a CAPE value of 31!) to the wonderful place where deep in our hearts we would all like to be tomorrow.

    I only wish that someone had written this book before I came on the scene. It would have saved me from a lot of rough times!

    Rob

  22. If you had never engaged in any abusive posting, I would not be broke. I would have made millions spreading the word about Valuation-Informed Indexing (market timing/price discipline rules!) all over the internet. Do you see that?

    Rob

  23. Millions? You didn’t/don’t have anything to sell and no one has/is asking you for anything. You can’t even get one person to post on this board, let alone sell anything. Also, no one has been “abusive”. People demand facts to back up claims and that is not abusive. To the opposite, you continue to call people names and tell them they are going to prison. now that is what is known as abusive.