After Two Of The Greatest Bull Markets In US History, Why Are Boomers So Broke?

Authored by Lance Roberts via RealInvestmentAdvice.com,

Last week, Jeff Desjardins of Visual Capitalist wrote in a post:

“While it’s true that putting your money on the line is never easy the historical record of the stock market is virtually irrefutable: U.S. markets have consistently performed over long holding periods, even going back to the 19th century.”

This goes back to Wall Street’s suggestion of “buy and holding” investments because over 10- and 20-year holding periods, investors always win.

There are two major problems with this myth.

First, on an inflation-adjusted, total return basis, long-term holding periods regularly produce near zero or negative return periods.

Secondly, given that most individuals don’t start seriously saving for retirement until later on in life (as our earlier years are consumed with getting married, buying a house, raising kids, etc.,) a 10- or 20-year period of near zero or negative returns can devastate retirement planning goals.

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Kim Jong-Un Can’t Afford To Pay For His “Singapore Summit” Hotel Room

Via ZeroHedge

Trump managed to do what no other US president has ever achieve, in getting North Korea’s president Kim Jong Un to sit down and negotiate the country’s denuclearization. And now comes the hard part: paying for Kim Jong Un’s hotel in Singapore, the location of the historic June 12 summit.

Because while US event planners are working day and night with their North Korean counterparts to set up a summit designed to bring an end to Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons program at an island resort off the coast of Singapore, a rather “awkward” logistical issue has emerged: who’s going to pay for Kim Jong Un’s hotel stay?

As the Washington Post reports, the “prideful but cash-poor pariah state” has demanded that a foreign country foot the bill at its preferred lodging: the Fullerton, “a magnificent neoclassical hotel near the mouth of the Singapore River, where just one presidential suite costs more than $6,000 per night.”

https://www.zerohedge.com/sites/default/files/inline-images/fullerton%20hotel.jpg?itok=O20Zr4-O

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Oklahoma Sucks. Don’t Move There

Anticipating the Bunny Killer’s response …. yeah, NJ sucks ass also. But, at least we pay our teachers. Ms. Freud and I often discuss where we will move when my parents transition to The Great Beyond.  We’re starting to realize there is no perfect place in ‘Murica for us. I guess we’ll just have to settle for a place called  “at-least-this-place-isn’t-as-shitty-as-other-shitholes”. Like OK and NJ.

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Oklahoma schools go on 4-day weeks so teachers can work at Walmart on Mondays to make rent

In 1992, Oklahoma passed a ballot initiative saying that the state could only raise taxes with a three quarters majority in the state assembly, creating a one-way ratchet where every tax cut becomes effectively permanent, including the sweetheart deals cut for frackers and the deep cuts to taxes on the wealthiest residents of the state.

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IS TRUMP REALLY WORTH $10 BILLION?

Guest Post by Doug Litowitz

Trump Change: Is Donald Trump Broke?

Editor’s Note: Alpha Pages contributor Doug Litowitz raises a speculative contrarian position on Donald Trump’s exact worth, based on what was released to the FEC.  The bottom line is that no one knows Trump’s net worth, but the speculation usually starts in the billions.  Doug Litowitz explores the opposite possibility, namely that Trump is, in relative terms, broke. This is solely his speculation and is not meant as a factual statement but a possibility that has been ignored in the mainstream press.

I’ve just slogged through all ninety-two pages of Donald Trump’s financial disclosure submission to the Federal Election Commission, and I can’t make heads or tails of it.

I cannot tell how much Trump is worth, if anything. His empire, if he has one, is as mysterious as his haircut, and as impervious as his skyscraper in Chicago – a gigantic phallic mirror named after himself.

In terms of real, lasting assets – is Donald Trump worth roughly $10 billion?

The mainstream press erred horrendously by taking seriously Trump’s disclosure to the FEC, by asking reporters to sit down with the document and try to understand it on its own terms, so to speak. This approach yielded nothing but exhaustion and bewilderment. No one dared speculate that Trump’s purpose in disclosing so much was to disclose so little. It was a 52-Card Pickup, a maze of trees without a forest. The assets – some as small as the single-digit thousands – pile up like obsessive compulsive do-dads in the claustrophobic home of a hoarder. The range of projects goes beyond greed and passes into desperation. High rise buildings and golf courses are one thing, but the list of assets quickly degrades into obscure wineries, Israeli vodka and energy drinks, a mattress and clothing line, television shows, a pension from the screen actors guild, bottled water, book royalties, speaking gigs, and endless inchoate and impossible to value ‘marks’ (i.e. trademarks) and positions in partnerships that have his own name.

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