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More generally, consumers have been fleeced and left out to dry over the past 10 year economic cycle. Take a look at a graph of the S&P500 from 2009-2017, then

More generally, consumers have been fleeced and left out to dry over the past 10 year economic cycle. Take a look at a graph of the S&P500 from 2009-2017, then look at consumer interest rates of 0.5% (in a 'high yield' savings or CD account). It simply makes no sense. We simply cannot build wealth any longer. Baby boomers had CD rates of >10% [0]. Think about that for a moment. [0] http://www.forecast-chart.com/rate-cd-interest.html http://www.forecast-chart.com/rate-cd-interest.html

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
usefulcat 9y ago
> Baby boomers had CD rates of >10% [0]. Think about that for a moment. My aunt and uncle (who happen to be baby boomers) bought their first house in the early '80s when inflation was rampant. Their first mortgage had something like an 18% rate. It should be obvious that a 10% CD rate is worthless if inflation is nearly as high or higher.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > It should be obvious that a 10% CD rate is worthless if inflation is nearly as high or higher. Well, yes, that would be useless, but that's not what happened for most of the time with high CD ratee. The period of CD rates ranging from just under 10% to over 17% in the 1978-1984, saw inflation peak at 14.8% and spend much of the time below 5%. Recently CD interest rates are not only low but for many years below inflation most of the time; in the period of high interest rates and high inflation, CD rates were still above inflation.
dgudkov 9y ago
This is one of the most disturbing charts I've seen recently. Especially with the 45yr history.