Yes it does. Value is being destroyed by the lock-down. Nest eggs are drying up. There's a lot Congress could do to stem the bleeding from a flood to a trickle

Yes it does. Value is being destroyed by the lock-down. Nest eggs are drying up. There's a lot Congress could do to stem the bleeding from a flood to a trickle, but it's not doing it. I don't think there's much individuals can do to protect themselves; folks on Wall St. are looking for the same sorts of places to stash their wealth, with much bigger teams. If someone finds a safe place, the value goes up as people buy it up. That's the point of index funds. In an ideal case, everything would lose value at about the same speed -- cash and stocks -- so a $100 index fund is still worth $100 (with obvious winners and losers within). That's inflation, but it distorts things less. Inflation hurts people with savings, but helps people with debt. There's way too much debt in the system right now, which is causing structural harm as people can't keep up with payments (be that airplane leases, mortgages, student loans, or otherwise). A little inflation right now is healthy. If your nest egg is cash, and that's worth 2/3, that's still a lot better for you than if it doesn't inflate, but the US economy collapses. So I'd accept the inflation. But there are smarter policies we could put in place if we hadn't elected politicians who were qualified, rather than ones who acted relateable. Next year doesn't look better: it's Biden v. Trump at the federal level, and likewise down the line. We needed a Warren or a Bloomberg -- someone who isn't dumb.