It's a fair point. And even short of "going to zero" the Nikkei didn't recover its 1989 high until last year. 35 years is a long time to get back to breakeven.
And most world indexes that sell funds based on historical returns do not factor in those going to zero events (for example, Austro-Hungary had one of the biggest stock markets in the world...until it didn't).
And capital freedom is itself extremely contingent historically. The reason why, for example, returns in the 40/50s were high in the US was because you couldn't take your money out of the country and the government told everyone to buy govt securities to pay for the war.
And what if you need to retire during those 35 years...these studies always look at infinite time periods, the human life is not infinite.
Issues on issues. Your financial knowledge has to only limited to the US after 1981 to not understand any of these points...but lots of people are making a ton of money selling this stuff.
And capital freedom is itself extremely contingent historically. The reason why, for example, returns in the 40/50s were high in the US was because you couldn't take your money out of the country and the government told everyone to buy govt securities to pay for the war.
And what if you need to retire during those 35 years...these studies always look at infinite time periods, the human life is not infinite.
Issues on issues. Your financial knowledge has to only limited to the US after 1981 to not understand any of these points...but lots of people are making a ton of money selling this stuff.