I have not had a chance to read the paper yet but when looking at long time periods like this it is important to keep in mind that a lot of the economic situation was influenced by several major changes including;
1) colonization and eventually de-colonization.
2) Industrial revolution: The transformation from agrarian economy to an industrial economy
3) Introduction of modern transportation: railways, automobiles, and airplanes
4) Introduction of electricity
5) Introduction of modern communication: telegraph, telephone, radio, and TV
6) Introduction of computers, internet, and cell phones
It is easy to forget just how much the world has changed over a few generations.
My wife's grandfather went through an amazing amount of change in his lifetime where is was in the last group of people who settled by wagon train in the late 1800's but he lived long enough to fly cross country by airplane in the 1950's.
When looking at the historical investing returns I would think that a lot of the returns are due to things like these and not just the result of investing in steady companies that naturally provide a good return on investments.
There may very well be transformative changes in the future and there is lots of speculating about what the impact of things like AI, genetic engineering, robotics, etc might have but it is a leap to assume that the impact of things like that will have the same impact on investing as something like the changes listed above.
1) colonization and eventually de-colonization.
2) Industrial revolution: The transformation from agrarian economy to an industrial economy
3) Introduction of modern transportation: railways, automobiles, and airplanes
4) Introduction of electricity
5) Introduction of modern communication: telegraph, telephone, radio, and TV
6) Introduction of computers, internet, and cell phones
It is easy to forget just how much the world has changed over a few generations.
My wife's grandfather went through an amazing amount of change in his lifetime where is was in the last group of people who settled by wagon train in the late 1800's but he lived long enough to fly cross country by airplane in the 1950's.
When looking at the historical investing returns I would think that a lot of the returns are due to things like these and not just the result of investing in steady companies that naturally provide a good return on investments.
There may very well be transformative changes in the future and there is lots of speculating about what the impact of things like AI, genetic engineering, robotics, etc might have but it is a leap to assume that the impact of things like that will have the same impact on investing as something like the changes listed above.
Statistics: Posted by Watty — Sun Jul 14, 2024 10:24 am — Replies 41 — Views 3266