I’ve been alive now for 69 years. And it honestly feels crazy to write (or say) it. I don’t know what I expected. But I didn’t expect this.
In grad school I had a finance professor named Strauss. In his office he had a chart of the DOW Jones Industrial Average spanning several decades. And when I first saw it I was amazed. It’s upward slope at … perhaps 25 or 30 degrees represented the steady creation of wealth and prosperity (more on that later). And if you stood back from it the details of the highs and lows were lost. But as you walked forward? Those details started to stand out. And what you realized was that’s where the devil was.
Standing a couple of feet away you couldn’t help but notice the dramatic drop in 1929. And I remember thinking: damn! I hope I don’t retire when something like that happens.
Given where we are now? I didn’t realize then that that would be the least of my worries.
