And that is the problem. The rules are not fair. And never have been. Some in our societies have monopolized rule making, rule breaking, and rule bending. They also ensured that policies in government and the legal branch bend to their rules. The only bread crumbs for the commoners are sucky IPOs of companies where most value has already been extracted and most of the pie has already been divided before the public gets a chance to become the bag holder. Same with exchanges that were supposed to be equitable and fair. Never were. Can't provide liquidity in the same way the big boys can, certain access is only granted when you spend tens of millions for collocation. That should have never ever happened. Common sense could have easily prevented that but it would have not been in the interest of the elite class with its horde of lobbyists and lawyers and judges in their pockets. What we have now is a completely tilted game. We all understand that investments earn higher returns than sweat (=income), even risk adjusted, and that investments pay less taxes than sweat. While not fair we accepted it as part of capitalism. But limiting equitable access to investments and opportunities is plain wrong. In the long term it leads to a rejection by the middle class. The American experiment is incredibly short in the grand scheme of things and the danger I see is that no crypto, no abandonment of fiat, no nothing is gonna turn the car heading toward a revolution and uprising around, and all that is the result of limitless greed and the abuse of power.
The rules of the game are stated and playing is voluntary. My guess is some of you don't understand the rules or even the game itself. Keep playing.
I disagree with you. Never has there been a better time to earn lots of money than in the last 30 years. With technology it’s possible for anyone to earn. if you want to get the same deals as Blackstone, find a way to compete with them. you aren’t owed a path to riches. That’s socialism talk
Retail can make easier money than pro buy side. You're not capacity constrained and you're the risk manager.
and on the PE side you can buy a business for 1/2 the multiple the big guys do and make the same money as the MD’s at those firms do.
I think we as society are owed a fair game. Please help me do the math for the middle class even if they invested in a diversified equity portfolio via spx over the past 20 years. How did that work out for them generally cpi adjusted, plus adjusted for the above cpi increases in property taxes (assuming home ownership) and other taxation and way above cpi average house price increases. You make the flawed assumption that everyone is born with a golden spoon. Walk us through how someone in the middle class who might not have owned property but invested in equities performed over the past 20 years. I can tell you that such person by far did not get wealthy by any means. All I am arguing for is a fairer game with fairer access to opportunities. I am not proposing freebies or a socialist system in any form or fashion.
We both know that you are leaving out the most important determinant of success, an edge. Gaining an edge requires years of expertise, most don't have access to such even if they tried.
Dollar cost average into spy and reinvest dividends Exact DCA Results for SPY (Aug 2005–Aug 2025) | Total Invested | $24,000 | | Final Portfolio Value | $91,365.12 | | Total Shares Owned | 143.17 shares | | Average Cost Basis | $167.62/share | | Latest SPY Price | $638.11 | | Annualized ROI | 9.42% |
Even with those generous constant funding assumptions that's a 5% or less per annum return when adjusting for all the other cost increases and increases in taxation. That's my entire point, one makes 5-8% per annum (8% bring incredibly generous) and those that get to invest pre IPO make orders of magnitude more. The common man does not get access to play. I would love to invest in openai, anthropic, perplexity. Then I would love access to certain dating apps startups, porn distributors, vape and weed pre IPO companies. Basically all the good stuff the middle class is getting a good taste on and fixed up to hook them for good. Am happy to take the risk in a diversified portfolio.