sovereign wealth funds underperform the market. They are the best solution out of a field of very bad solutions for what to do when your country has been struck

sovereign wealth funds underperform the market. They are the best solution out of a field of very bad solutions for what to do when your country has been struck by the resource curse. If you were an individual it would be like winning the lottery (lots of people's lives go totally down the shitter after winning the lottery). Setting a goal for your government of setting up a sovereign welath fund would be kind of like the average individual who hasn't won the lottery making a goal of setting up a trust fund, and getting the money to do so by working at mcdonalds instead of going to college (or some other more valuable alternative). The significant difference between this individual example and the government is the government is a worse decision maker than the individual since it can only make decisions by committee (or in a dictatorship by one uninformed individual who can't possibly be aware of everything going on in his/her country). Therefore the government should stick to the happy path (taking on college debt or equivalently funding basic social services/national defense/regulatory oversight through debt instruments).