I was thinking the opposite: that the model of saving for retirement via investment accounts requires good returns in the early part of your career, so the smaller amounts of money you can afford to put away for your relatively smaller early career salary can compound over your career length to be enough for retirement.
What others wrote was pretty much my reasoning but a bit further, over the very long run (30+ years) markets will revert to mean performance. If you have strong gains in the first half of your career then when you are in your peak earning years, investments will be more expensive at time of purchase. As a result when you are investing the most, returns on that principle will be lower.
Most of the HN audience is privileged class by courtesy of being tech savvy. Unlike many others, most of us can keep investing even in less fortunate times when others cannot. Exactly those investments might yield extra high long term returns.
Assume for a moment that stocks are currently overvalued from a historical perspective. So it is better if they stay flat for a while and get back to normal valuations so when you buy them each month, they are not overvalued. If they were to go up in the next few years, they would become even more overvalued and you would be buying them at even more overvalued prices.
jrochkind1|3 years ago
I was thinking the opposite: that the model of saving for retirement via investment accounts requires good returns in the early part of your career, so the smaller amounts of money you can afford to put away for your relatively smaller early career salary can compound over your career length to be enough for retirement.
iforgetti|3 years ago
markvdb|3 years ago
Most of the HN audience is privileged class by courtesy of being tech savvy. Unlike many others, most of us can keep investing even in less fortunate times when others cannot. Exactly those investments might yield extra high long term returns.
francisofascii|3 years ago