[joshuahedlund]

For me the takeaway has been the exact opposite. I was skittish about putting retirement money into the stock market circa 2010 cuz I saw ten years of no net gains and feared that was a new normal. But I was doubly wrong - I hadn't factored in dividends, and a few years later stocks were double their pre-2008 peak. The bottom ended up being a rare chance (for the still-employed majority) to quadruple those upcoming returns. Even now, another 50%-bottom from peak would be double the previous bottom. The fundamentals behind the expectations of capitalistic returns seem less shaken than ever.