Stock Market Slide? Things Get Bad, You Can Always Sell a Yacht.

By Fred Bruning

April 20, 2025

How’s the 401(k)?

“Don’t look,” said Wink, my wife.

“Scary.”

“Health risk.”

More than 60 percent of Americans own stocks one way or the other, according to the Gallup polling outfit, and that includes a quarter of the population earning less than $40,000.

Recent tariff weirdness made Wall Street plunge like the first drop on the clanky, old Cyclone ride, Coney Island – tried it once at 17; haven’t recovered – and while there were a couple of bullish days, too, the losses have been wicked.

This does not appear to alarm certain high-concept heavyweights in Washington, D.C., who say, don’t worry, a little pain for incomprehensible gain.

One policy maker even snapped that everyone should stop making a fuss about retirement account losses because ancients don’t bother to check their 401(k) plans very much anyway and I wondered if he was talking about golden-agers located above ground or those relaxing in the family plot.

Don’t check their accounts? What do you think we’re researching on our computers – plate tectonics or the history of the Hershey bar? Get real, rulers of the universe. Just once.

But let’s face it, power brokers are, by definition, a wealthy bunch and so a few catastrophic weeks are likely no particular concern.

It is difficult to imagine, oh, let’s say, Elon Musk, canceling dinner at some swank restaurant and settling for Chick-fil-A until things calm down.

Also, I look across the water at the millionaire’s side of the harbor – ours is mostly converted summer bungalows from when Long Island was just a breezy summer retreat for sweltering, blue-collar city folks – and see that his yacht is back in the water.

He has two, the plus-size, and then a smaller version that maybe is just to keep the kids busy, but, whatever, I bet he’s not walking around the house wondering if this is the year he can replace his elderly Subaru hatchback or afford a heat pump to air condition the second floor.

I don’t want to complain because in a country where millions have trouble coping with an unexpected bill of $400, according to the Federal Reserve, we’re doing ok. Small-time but not on the brink of disaster.

Still, I worry about money and am baffled by the stock market, which seems to me best explained by the double-talker Dr. Irwin Corey, who once said, “When your IQ rises to 28, sell.”

In the 60s, Winky and I visited her sister, Carol, and brother-in-law, Milt, at their A-frame vacation home in Wisconsin.

Milt, a Chicago ad executive, was on his way to becoming a millionaire – He made it! And then he did it again! More than once! – and we debated capitalist treachery and corporate tax breaks.

“Why should I pay for your martini?” I asked Milt.

“What’s good for business is good for America – even you,” he said.

Upon leaving – decked out, most likely, in bell-bottoms and tie-dyed t-shirts – we flashed peace signs and autographed the A-frame guest book.

“We’ll be back after the revolution,” we said. “To stay.”

I mention the conversation with Milt to show how unlikely it would be that one day I would be sweating the Dow Jones, S&P and NASDAQ.

But, years ago, when the company 401(k) plan got started, management urged us to take part, and a good thing, too. At this point, that little bundle makes all the difference.

Oh, there were moments when I did my best to blow the whole thing.

The firm posted corporate performance on bulletin boards. Numbers looked big.

“Maybe we should put everything in company stock,” I told Wink.

“Do you know what you’re doing?”

“Right up there on the bulletin board.”

Our next quarterly statement showed serious losses. I spoke to someone who understood such things.

She asked if the results I found so enticing were in parentheses.

“Yep, why?”

“Losses, not gains. Nice move.”

Some people weren’t meant to have much money, and that’s us.

Unknown cosmic forces are at work.

No matter, these are worrisome days.

“I looked,” I told Wink recently, confessing a peek at our portfolio.

We were down – historically, thanks to brilliant minds in Washington, D.C.

“Warned you,” said Wink.

So much for the Subaru.

Previous Invisible Ink posts at: https://fredbruning.substack.com/archive