If you think that there is some major economic turmoil ahead with dropping asset values across the board (and I personally this is fairly likely), the general advice is to aim for a positive alpha. That is, if you are moderately well off or better, invest to "go down less than your neighbors". Assets across the board lose value, but if at the end of the fall you preserved a higher fraction of your money to invest than your neighbors and are willing to pick the best assets after the collapse you can reap huge benefits.

The counter argument to this is that the above approach absolutely requires an iron discipline. And without experience non-professionals are prone to making very costly mistakes (e.g., invest on feelings, double down inappropriately, etc.). So, a general audience advice is usually: do not invest money you need within 5-10 years and do not make rash decisions; it is better to ride this train down and then hopefully back up than jump randomly. And diversify (across countries, economies, asset classes, etc.).

Just my 2c; not an investment advice!

I think this is probably the most useful wisdom for the average person:

> do not invest money you need within 5-10 years and do not make rash decisions; it is better to ride this train down and then hopefully back up than jump randomly.

Gaming the market successfully requires a ton of skill and knowledge, and even then you are not guaranteed success.

Most people are better off focusing on asset-class diversification (i.e. spreading money across many different kinds of asset classes - i.e. physical assets, securities, commodities, cash, etc) than playing just the stock market.

And even when playing the stock market, most people are better off focusing on "time-in-the-market" vs "timing the market".

Right; so my plan of having 60% of my wealth tied up in unvested stocks in a single company is really coming to fruition!

Unvested stocks are not your wealth. Try not to think of them that way. You own them the same way you own next year's paychecks, i.e. not at all.

There are ways to mitigate this risk. Talk to a professional.

As long as you heed standard advice (treat stock as nice to have but value it at zero during wage negotiations) then the impact on your net worth should be minimal :)

Oh man, so sorry.

Not really, if they go to zero, then he/she will be in the same situation as most (99.9%) of employees who get no stock.

We call it the lottery — the last ~5 years we "won"; this year? Maybe not so much.

“We” meaning a subset of “not me”

The general advice is always to aim for a positive alpha. No investor aims for a negative alpha, regardless of the economic climate.

> The general advice is always to aim for a positive alpha.

On the contrary, for the past 20+ years the general advice has been to specifically aim for the alpha of zero ("just use index funds"), not for a positive alpha ("don't try to beat the market", etc.).

> No investor aims for a negative alpha, regardless of the economic climate.

Factors other than alpha are way more important for most people. Many retirees put a high value on low volatility or stability of dividends and are perfectly OK with getting a small negative alpha as part of the package.

Original hedge funds (before they joined a cutthroat trading jungle) set up with a similar goal in mind: a small negative alpha, but protected against the loss of the principal. And had plenty of wealthy investors who were happy with this deal.

Alpha becomes the critical parameter to optimize for when actively investing in times of turmoil (then a negative total return on a positive alpha on the down leg is a success). But few people actually do that, so few care about alpha.

Yes, but it's unclear how to intersect this with a reasonable tax strategy for many retail investors. i.e. do I sell everything and pay capital gains or sit?

I actually don't have a good answer for this. Not financial advice. Talk to a fiduciary.

The problem with inflation is that you need to protect yourself before the fact, and at this point, it's difficult to read to what extend the fed will respond with rate hikes and how much inflation we get going forward.

In my personal view, it would be stupid to hike to 10% since that will also cut off the needed supply response: this will decapitate energy, farm, and housing expansion while at the same time decimating all forms of wealth. But there is a possibility depending on how trigger happy the fed becomes.

More likely than not, they raise rates, but it stays below the rate of inflation (3-5%), so anything that yields above that range is a good investment. Anything below would be protective.

As for stocks, I'm looking at individual companies that are cheap with high cash flow that have macro tailwinds, but I'm still waiting. There are always bull markets inside of bears, but you have to look for them. Mind you, bear markets have vicious rally from time to time which fool people into getting an all clear signal. A bear markets job is to bleed everyones money dry, which is why I'd recommend people stay away until no one is interested in stocks anymore.

You need complete despair.

> In my personal view, it would be stupid to hike to 10% since that will also cut off the needed supply response: this will decapitate energy, farm, and housing expansion while at the same time decimating all forms of wealth. But there is a possibility depending on how trigger happy the fed becomes.

The only reason Volcker managed to bring down inflation is because he was willing to actually do what needed to be done. If borrowing money is cheaper than inflation, why would anybody not just continue to borrow money indefinitely? The Federal Reserve can fight inflation or it can fight a recession; it cannot do both simultaneously.

You have to decide which is a bigger problem: a recession, or inflation. The notion that you can walk a tight rope between the two is disconnected from reality. And while you continue to make inflation worse, you only make the inevitable recession worse. Tick tock.

> You need complete despair.

I agree. We are fucked.

Lots of assumption buried in your comment/worldview about what's actually causing inflation. Is it actually just a slow accretion of growing costs for resources, distribution? Is it companies deciding that now would be a great time to increase prices "because inflation" and thus get ahead of the nascent wage growth that was threatening to take off post-pandemic? Clearly it's a mixture of the two but the implications are completely different if its 90/10 vs 10/90.

Honestly, that's really not that important for what I was saying, because we're talking about the Fed. The Federal Reserve can choose to fight inflation or it can choose to inflate assets, and that lies on a spectrum. The "why" of inflation isn't nearly as important as the severity of it. If inflation is at 10% you're not going to debate it before doing something about it - that just allows the situation to fester instead of taking initiative. The reason we're in this situation where inflation is still getting worse, a year after being told not to worry about it, is because it's politically untenable to actually try to fix the problem. Meanwhile inflation continues to worsen while we make symbolic gestures about fighting it.

Yes, understanding what's causing inflation matters. I'm not saying it doesn't. But when you have a crisis, you want to focus on mitigation first and then root causing it after the situation is averted.

Also you mention two possible causes of inflation. Limited resources and distribution, and companies deciding to raise prices because they can. What about the Fed printing money like crazy, flooding the M2 money supply? That's the one that's relevant to this conversation.

The Fed can't do much at all to stop corporate-controlled price increases. Increasing interest rates makes it more expensive to borrow money, but that has little impact on a company choosing to bump its retail prices by 25%.

M2 is only relevant to a point. The increase in the money supply does not, in and of itself, cause any change in prices at all. Individuals and corporations have to make explicit decisions to respond to what they can see of the M2 effect, and none of these decisions are a law of nature. Rents don't have to go up just because M2 grew. Landlords sense that they can, and then they choose to do so. They could choose not to do so, too, but they don't because we're taught that this would be irrational, or something.

> Individuals and corporations have to make explicit decisions to respond to what they can see of the M2 effect, and none of these decisions are a law of nature.

The law is called supply and demand. If there are more dollars and the same amount of resources, the value of a dollar goes down.

Let's just agree to disagree. Cheers.

I'm certainly not going to argue about such a simplistic model of human economic behavior.

Inflation is still going up because there’s a war between Ukraine and Russia. This has caused food and energy prices to skyrocket. The Fed can raise rates to 69% but it’s still not going to cause (say) the grain in Odessa to make its way to people’s stomachs.

Is a certain amount of rate increase justified? Yes, you don’t want an inflation spiral to develop. Beyond that, we are going to have to live with a certain amount of inflation until the situation in Eastern Europe normalizes and the supply chains normalize after COVID. And the interest rates should be kept on the lower side so that companies can still finance solutions to this mess.

If it was just one item you would expect that consumers would cut back elsewhere. Instead we see that they can demand more wages, and companies can demand higher prices even if they are decoupled from wheat.

The latter is only possible if there is too much money in the system, the signal about wheat production gets lost. As the feds money printer doesn’t work evenly, those who are closer to it get more money. I can only speculate that eventually, like any corruption, the effect is to diminish productivity in the real economy in favor of a special class.

> Instead we see that they can demand more wages [ ... ] The latter is only possible if there is too much money in the system,

When your employee is making gigantic profits, asking for more in wages has no relationship to the money supply.

> ...until the situation in Eastern Europe normalizes and the supply chains normalize after COVID.

They won't "normalize" though (imho), as the reason is not really COVID anymore, it is China gaining ground and trying to do as much damage to the western economy as possible.

Very low interest rates and high asset prices indicate that 2020s can be another lost decade for investing that follows the great decade of 2010s. 2000s was also a lost decade, and unfortunate thing about it was that even if you managed to time the bear market perfectly and entered at the very low in 2002, the decade would still be lost to you, because the market in 2009 was below 2002 lows.

While many do not believe it's true, timing the market is possible and its a skill. *Find good active managers that have a track record of positive returns and low losses.*

While they did not beat the index in the last decade, I'm fairly certain they will going forward or more importantly minimize the drawdowns.

instead of pursuing speculative gains consider investing it in yourself or in your immediate locale or region, in the economic and ecological transformation we all sorely need

devaluation of everything is a consequence of unsustainable economics and the fix is not to find a convenient hidey-hole for your money but to invest time, money and attention building a future sans witless speculation, profligate consumption, public and corporate unaccountability, and consumer monoculture

I appreciate this comment. I think the way that it’s written might drive off, say, a more traditional conservative — but I think if rephrased, they would agree.

“Spend time at your church, and spend money to invest in a local private school” would line up perfectly w/ 75% of Republicans that I know, (and, if I may assume your views, probably does not line up with them); and yet I think it is a very similar line of thinking.

I am trying to orientate the way that I spend my money and my time more towards my local community. It’s surprisingly difficult. Not everyone does it. And we would be better off if they did!

I wrote it to try to appeal to traditionalists and progressives and people of all political persuasions!

spending time building a religious or spiritual community is fine by me, especially if it provides material services to the locality and a sense of civic responsibility

also fine with private schools although I do think they should cater to students without the means to pay exorbitant tuition (some provide tuition aid, in fact I went to one that did) and I think there is something to be said for allowing public schools some degree of curricular independence, which might make them more appealing to those who presently prefer private alternatives

really I think there's a lot most people can agree on and I hope we can begin to identify less with team R or D and reason from principles in our politics

> It’s surprisingly difficult. Not everyone does it. And we would be better off if they did!

totally agree, it's difficult but worthwhile!

If all assets are dead, you can spend your assets now to improve yourself or family. If you've been wanting some time to go to school or pursue some other self improvement, maybe spend some assets now to do so. Education and skills are an asset like any other, and can also be devalued though. I wonder how personal skills will fare in the coming years?

> Education and skills are an asset like any other, and can also be devalued though

good point

some skills will fare better or worse than others, the question is which

Unless you’re retiring in the next 10 years, or planning on purchasing a house in the next few years, then just make your emergency fund a little bigger and hold on to your job. Follow your normal financial planning.

You’re not going to outplay market trends, and if you’re young/middle aged then it doesn’t matter any way.

Yes it does. If you invested near the dot com peak or the japan peak, you still haven't made your money back.

This notion of passive investing that has been pounded into peoples heads for years is complete bullshit and has only worked because there was always someone else ready to pay more for the same asset and because rates were perpetually held low. Some points to consider:

(1) You have fewer millennials than baby boomers, as the baby boomers cash out from their vanguard accounts, who makes up for the difference?

(2) If the S&P 500 contains companies built for a certain macro regime (low inflation, low interest rates), and the macro regime is shifting, you can be penalized by owning a set of assets that do not provide adequate returns (Tesla is currently the 5th largest weighting in the S&P, they don't pay you squat.)

Go look at charts of the S&P 500 beyond the last 40 years when rates were more variable, you'll see the market can at times be a shit investment vehicle that might not give you a return by the time you retire and on an inflation adjusted basis has a negative return!

Buy low, sell high. Save cash and be patient.

> If you invested near the dot com peak or the japan peak, you still haven't made your money back.

What does this even mean? That you invested the only money you ever invested entirely in the relatively brief period of the dot com peak? Who does that? (Obviously not nobody, but ...)

To all effects and purposes, nobody does that. So what it really means is "the money you invested during that one period (perhaps a year or so), and likely only the money you invested in dot com and adjacent stocks, has yet to be made back". In the meantime, the other money you invested before and after the dot com peak has done rather well, unless you specifically made some particularly disastrous choices.

> you invested the only money you ever invested entirely in the relatively brief period

That's pretty common for a mortgage

The dot com crash was not associated with a particularly noticeable "underwater" period for real estate, so if you bought a house during that time, you're not likely to "still be underwater", which was the GP's claim.

The obvious issue with the obvious plan is that you can only tell what's "high" and what's "low" in retrospect, and if you time your lump sum investment wrong (dot com peak, Japan peak etc), you end up negative for a long, long time. Whereas DCA or equivalent guarantees that you capture the ups as well as the downs.

If you went all in on the day the dot com peaked then you more than made your money back. You're up + dividends.

>If you invested near the dot com peak

If you went all-in.. had no money in before and never invested after. Sure..

Microsoft has gone up 7% a year since .com peak. SP500 has gone up 5%.

> Buy low, sell high. Save cash and be patient.

Great advice. So, ummmmm, how long is patient enough? 18 months, 3 months? What's low? Is this the lowest it's going to get? If you have answers to all of this, I want to invest in your fund.

> You have fewer millennials than baby boomers, as the baby boomers cash out from their vanguard accounts, who makes up for the difference?

The Boomers are using or investing that cash, though. Sooner or later anyway. And that cash would flow to the current owners of the things they are patronizing.

It's not like they're investing in dry ice and then throwing it in the ocean.

I've lived through hyper-inflation -- spend your money on anything or take loans/mortgage.

As others have said, portfolio diversification (i.e. spreading your money around between lots of different asset classes) is more important than playing the stock market well.

Most people cannot play the stock market well, and even those who make it their day-job often don't end up playing it well. The reality is that the stock market is just too random to game reliably.

Same as always, keep investing in a well-diversified spread. The stock market as a whole will always bounce back. That or society collapses and your numbers in a computer are worthless anyway.

This is the first big downturn I've been prepared to invest in, so personally I'm going to buy more than usual. I see it as stocks being on sale.

> The stock market as a whole will always bounce back

Japan is the common counterexample. It is entirely possible the stock market will stagnate in the future as the era of American economic hegemony comes to an end.

> Japan is the common counterexample.

That only provides a counter example to investing all your money into a single country. Unless you think every stock market in the world is going to do poorly, that's a reason to buy a globally diversified index fund (like VT), so even if American economic hegemony ends, you can pick up on growth of other countries.

Is there really any western country that is "on the rise"? If the US is a poor choice, what else is there? I don't wanna invest in China as that could be throwing money into a black hole. I'm sure I'm not the only one feeling this way.

> Is there really any western country that is "on the rise"?

Why does it have to be a western country?

> I don't wanna invest in China as that could be throwing money into a black hole.

There are countries other than just Western countries and China: namely, African countries and SEA countries.

There are more signs that the American economic power is just really ramping up.

Like what for example?

For example, the fastest growing economy in my lifetime last year.

It's true that 2021 saw the highest rate of GDP growth in 30 years, but that came immediately after the largest GDP decline in 30 years during 2020. So that can be explained as an aberration due to the pandemic shutdowns and subsequent rebound:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/188165/annual-gdp-growth...

At any rate, GDP growth is currently negative for 2022 and China's economy is still projected to overtake the U.S. in a matter of years.

How long is your lifetime? Does it start with a 2 by any chance?

Are you bad at math or history?

Why does it need to be collapse or all time highs? Stagnation and decay seem entirely possible. Negative real returns seem entirely possible when bonds had negative nominal returns.

Long term your best bet is still stocks. Stocks naturally resist inflation- when inflation goes up earnings will go up with them. The current P/E is high but it's not insanely high. Sure, stocks can still go down 10% or 20% (or 30% or 40% though less likely) but your cash is also going to get eroded by that much over the next few years and at least you have a productive investment.

Whether real estate is worthwhile depends on your local markets. In some parts of Europe it might be. If you need a place to live, and you think the prices are reasonable (e.g. it's a market that hasn't seen crazy prices due to QE and low rates) and you can afford it then I'd definitely consider keeping in mind that it's also a long term play, not a short term one. If it's purely investment property the calculation is different.

> Sure, stocks can still go down 10% or 20% (or 30% or 40% though less likely) but your cash is also going to get eroded by that much over the next few years and at least you have a productive investment.

The current trend is that stocks are going down in dollar value, not just in real value after adjusting for inflation. Are you saying you expect that to reverse?

Ofcourse it will reverse. Sure, the P/E is on the high side and so the expected returns won't be as good as they can be but hey, you're already 20% down (or more in real terms). If we we're going to see 8% inflation over the next few years then sitting in cash is going to see your money get erased. Bond rates are still way too low. Housing is somewhat inflation resistant but it has also been terribly inflated. So stocks look like the best option right now, if we go more down they'll be even better ;)

EDIT: Just to be more specific, I'm pretty sure that in ~5 years you'll at least maintain your real value and in 10 years you'll have a decent real return. Pretty decent probability anyways. In 10 years you'll beat the 10 year bond and the housing market (or gold, or cash or bitcoin). I'm sure some sectors will over-perform and some will under.

I'm not convinced the current trend is going to go particularly negative from a 2+ year perspective. Things got super overheated in 2020-2021 but demand is still strong, so I wouldn't be surprised if things level back off after the steam is let out.

Real estate is going to be gutted - increasing mortgage rates (already have been happening) will decimate qualified buyers. Decreasing prices will further decimate those willing to Hail Mary with cash offers hoping to get something after years of frustration.

But the effective, on-the-ground housing shortage is going to continue to keep demand for housing extremely high in almost all areas with reasonable economic options or amenity migration destinations.

The only reason there is a housing shortage is because there is an excess of jobs and money in that place.

Which is changing. Houses in sunnyvale went from 750k-1m and impossible to find one for sale to 350k (yes really!) and on the market for years around ‘08.

> "an excess of jobs and money in that place"

Nope. For one thing, there's the largest generation of the 20th century at peak retirement, cashing out of family houses that have gained huge amounts of value, and looking to move to amenity-rich locations.

For another thing, the investment industry, short of other options, has started buying houses to rent them (short or long term), squeezing supply and driving up prices in many markets.

For another thing, short term rentals (AirBnb, VRBO etc.) have had profound impacts on the availability of property in heavily visited areas (in fact, it's not so much absolute visitation rates, but vists-per-resident that characterizes this).

Other factors too. That doesn't mean the market can't crash, but it will be something very different from what happened in 2008.

> cashing out of family houses that have gained huge amounts of value, and looking to move to amenity-rich locations.

They can only cash out if people are willing to buy. And fewer people will be willing to buy (at least at the prices the retirees want) with interest rates going up.

So the retirees will either put off their plans for a while in the hopes that things will recover, or will accept lower prices for their homes.

> For another thing, short term rentals (AirBnb, VRBO etc.) have had profound impacts on the availability of property in heavily visited areas

Is this true? Last I was reading about this (a few months ago), the number of housing units in San Francisco listed on Airbnb was around 8k, which is around 2%. Meanwhile, a report from this February estimated that over 40,000 residential units (10% of total) in SF were sitting empty in 2019 (and that number has likely been growing over the past 3 years, as it has been since 2013). Why are we all upset about short-term rentals when so many real estate speculators are sitting on more than 4x as many vacant properties?

> Why are we all upset about short-term rentals when so many real estate speculators are sitting on more than 4x as many vacant properties?

I would guess partly because almost all of the short-term rentals represent either (a) previously long term rentals that are no longer available to people who live and work in that location or (b) new construction that doesn't address housing shortages.

All of the effects you name are only happening because of inflated values driven by cheap money. Literally every, single, one of them.

Sorry, I find this ridiculous.

The boomers heading into retirement situation is a reflection of 40-50 years of economic policy and has no connection with recent "cheap money".

Actual investment in single family and apartment housing is almost entirely tied to its low risk/return ratio compared with (the perception of a lack of) other options for investment at this time. The money sloshing around for investment is as much as function of the effective privatization of retirement funding as anything else.

The short term rental market is in part the perfect expression of how a relativel small number of wealthy individuals can totally distort a market to follow their own preferences, and reflects income/wealth inequality and lack of regulatory enforcement (they're freakin' B&B's people!) as much as anything else.

Cheap money has almost nothing to do with any of them.

The ‘cheap money’ issue isn’t a short term one. It’s been steadily dropping with only minor hiccups since the mid 80’s - about 40 years ago. The last time the US had a inflation hit, at that time due to the Oil crisis.

Mostly to keep juicing the economy, which has steadily been needing it more and more to grow/less responsive to stimulus.

Folks I know who have done the AirBnB route were often getting mortgages and buying properties to let out, using the short term cash flows to pay the (low interest rate) mortgage.

Which makes sense as an investment, because the mortgage was cheap (cheap money) compared to current cash flows.

It has become more and more pervasive, until it stopped being able to make money due to saturation. Younger folks traveling around during Covid using AirBNBs helped (they were trying to avoid lockdowns and ‘dirtier’ hotels), but not sure how it is going to play out now.

Anyone who had a 30 year mortgage they got then is going to do pretty fine though as long as they have cash flow.

Fair points, all.

> an excess of jobs and money

And speculation.

Bay Area has the highest price to rent ratios in the US. Rent really hasn't changed that much since 2020 and if the betting stops it'd make sense to go back to 2020 prices (which is like a 50% "crash" in parts of the Bay)

I would so much welcome a 50% crash but I’m afraid we’ll never ever see it in the Bay Area. There are just too many people, job or not, in a very strong financial position.

I’m sitting on $600k+ cash for a down payment and if I see townhouses correcting I’ll snatch one up immediately. And I am a very small fish compared to the wealth that’s around.

My personal bet is that the Bay Area will just stay at 0% growth until the market recovers.

Possible, we’ll see.

A lot of speculators also bought assuming increasing property values, so if it’s flat for 5 years or whatever, then that’s going to nuke their gains. Meanwhile they’re paying out real cash every month.

The return from a mortgage-free rental is not bad in most places. Property value increases in nice, but not critical for such "speculation".

Yup, good point!

The rental market in many previously hot areas (SF, South Bay) has taken a hit, but not sure where it will land long term.

Medium term there is a LOT less pressure with a lot of techies having relocated and remote work being accepted.

Don’t forget though that anyone who is a ‘bigger fish’ (looking to invest many millions or half a billion or so) in a high inflation environment is going to be looking for as sure a bet they can with as high a return they can.

And since money isn’t as cheap anymore, those are easier to find and get.

So while it may not be bad returns, it may be bad returns compared to something else (a new business, for instance).

Wouldn't this demand be priced into existing housing prices though (and thus not be worth acting on)?

That governs rent. But what we've seen with COVID is huge jumps in price to rent ratios.

It'll make housing even more expensive in 10 years as builders will be decimated like in 2008, we won't build housing for half a decade, and a new generation will look for housing while boomers sit on their 80% vacant 4bd houses they paid 1/5 of the current market price for.

>> It'll make housing even more expensive in 10 years as builders will be decimated like in 2008, we won't build housing for half a decade

This is already happening in the Midwest. Builders have stalled or trying to wait out this supply side shortage - the prices of all building materials have skyrocketed because of it and just in an adjacent neighborhood where they had torn down three houses, the lots are all vacant now and for sale. Builders who had planned to build huge mansions all pulled out and are now just selling the lots.

This has also had a ripple effect on down the amount of houses up for sale. My wife and I decided not to move and have remodeled our entire main floor and are now working on the bathrooms. We're staying put. I heard on a weekend real estate show they were saying two months ago, that out of the 15,000 houses/condo's/townhomes available, when you start to filter out townhomes and condos, then take out all the million dollar and above houses? You're left with less than 200 single and multi-family homes on the market. An absolute staggering number.

A lot of people on both sides are trying to wait this out. But like you said, its going to have some serious long-term consequences for everybody.

In another 10 years most of the boomers will be dead.

Wrong.

71 million alive in 2019 of 76 million born[0]. If the oldest boomer is 76 now, their life expectancy is over 10 years[1]. Most boomers have more years life expectancy than that i.e. most boomers will live longer than 10 years. And in a couple one will live longer, perhaps not releasing a house.

Aside: most people mentioning “boomers” normally are saying something offensive - similar to making inane stereotypical comments about disabled people as an example. The term is very American-centric, and in my country the word mostly is used offensively. We mostly don’t know what gen__ means either.

Edit: 25% of boomers don’t own a home. Today, white millennials are almost three times as likely as Black millennials to own their homes. If you are white, then every time you make a comment about a group that has it better off than you, lookout behind you. Goes double for complaints about the wealthy if you live in the US: you are the wealthy from the point of view of most people in the world.

Disclaimer: I am not a boomer.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_boomers

[1] https://www.ssa.gov/oact/STATS/table4c6.html

That’s not how life expectancy works.

You're arguing that those who survived this long will survive more than 10 years. I mean, yes, but

1) food in this economy is still delicious so heart disease is still the cause of 50% of deaths, and

2) humans only have one copy of p53 from each parent, so everyone dies of cancer if Heart disease or <random> doesn't get them first.

Given 1 and 2, the boomers are on their way out. My mom (born 1953) might make it another 20 years, but my dad (born 1945) is living on borrowed time (20 pk-yr history and cancer).

It is how actuarial tables work. Baby boomers in 2032 will be between 68 and 86 years old, and mortality increases rapidly up to and including those years.

[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1464018/]

I've invested through bull and bear markets in the last 15 years.

I’ve always put most of my money into ETFs, mainly S&P500. It has served me well so far.

Just be prepared to be down with your portfolio for some time.

Serious question: Instead of riding the ETFs down, what if I sell investments now and move to cash/gold? Cash would lose value at the rate of inflation, while ETFs can drop 30-40% more if the FED makes mistakes.

I don’t we see another 30-40% loss, 20% the most. We’re already at a point where you could argue that an overreaction has happened.

But hey, it’s the future, so no one can really say anything about it :) I at least am gonna see through this one.

Have useful, rare skills. Preferably in a more tangible field (doctors will get through this better than VR graphics programmers).

I am bullish for software developers. Since 2001 I have not been fired or laid off. I have been able to get a job within 4 weeks the whole time. (Probably 1 week if not fussy and just need money). Software is still eating the world, it just might have a bit of constipation during this period.

Developers can save companies money - handy in a recession. Developers can sell their skills globally (that has negatives too though...). And if a software company is still running it needs developers to fix the bugs, support the system.

I sure hope so because I'm out here reading Stroustrup and CLRS to start a career at 30. But it really seems like there's a glut of tech companies with investment capital paying people 300k to make apps for stuff that's trivial. Juicero tier stuff, all over the place. I worry it will collapse and SWE is gonna be your run of the mill 45k job from then on.

>> But it really seems like there's a glut of tech companies with investment capital paying people 300k to make apps for stuff that's trivial.

I work for one of the largest health care companies in the world. In the US, there are only three or four major health care companies and they're all massive. My company has repeatedly said its too big to move as fast as smaller startups who are coming in and disrupting one niche of the entire market.

For example, we have something like 4-5 different billing systems, none of which are able to talk to each other. They're monolithic, they're 10 years past what you would consider "legacy" software. So in comes all these companies building billing apps for health care companies. My company? We can't compete, so we're constantly buying other companies, and integrating their tech into our company.

Today in Health Care, startups with good ideas and good products? They're not lasting and are being bought up at a record pace. My company? Bought 15 companies last quarter, we're on pace to buy more this quarter. So instead of creating and building this tech in-house? They're just buying up these smaller startups and using their technology instead.

My advice? Build a decent product/app/platform for a niche area in Health Care and you'd be surprised how fast one of these companies will be knocking on your door.

If I have no involvement or experience in Health Care, how do I identify a niche where such a product will be helpful?

I'd take one of these issues and start doing some research.

https://www.medifind.com/news/post/problems-us-healthcare-sy...

Then start researching that particular topic. Take something like Healthcare Billing, and all the issues with it:

https://www.collaboratemd.com/blog/the-top-10-challenges-ass...

Then you take one of those issues and see if you can find a problem worth fixing. Develop a program or application around solving that particular problem. I'd also start looking at attending healthcare conferences and focusing on that issue and going to see what industry people are complaining about and see if you can get more insight from them. Start networking with people at the conferences.

It wouldn't take long to get an inside track through networking and research to find a niche where you can build something that will really get a companies attention.

I don't think so.. good software engineers are still somewhat rare and you need good ones to not blow up your code base once it reaches a certain size/complexity. Any high school kid can make a website, but if you want your app to grow for 3 or more years, it has to be built well-ish.

Good devs are only really needed by good companies. Majority of companies are not FAANG. Everyone else will take whatever trash they can find and those companies will probably pursue downward pricing pressure.

You could apply for jobs in businesses that are not affected by economic vagaries, or government jobs, or jobs at counter-cyclical businesses like debt collection.

Then don't work for juicero

invest in your education and personal development if you are young. start a startup. invest in your career. have children and invest in them. this is all real economic growth; money number is fake right now. if you are old and need financial security, invest your time in learning about future relevant sectors like energy, climate, bio. commodities. toilet paper. trash bags.

Sounds like the right time to buy stocks? Assets likely won't stay dead for the next forty years.

I would be very scared to hold Euros. Either CHF or USD, or a mix. It is paradoxically better to hold cash than to invest in equity, bonds or real estate.

This is interesting. Can you elaborate a bit: - What do you expect to happen with EUR? - Why do you think USD or CHF are safer to hold than say, gold?

This is a concise explanation, ignore the clickbait title. https://youtu.be/BbU7LkzV79g