2. The Stock Market

I bought into the market once, in 1987—right before the “Black Monday” crash of October 19. The $3,000 I took out of a slow-growing insurance policy suddenly became less than $2,000.

I’ve never had the excess cash or felt the need to play the game again—but since then it has seemed to me more like a casino than a legitimate business. My brother the economist assures me that the market has a legitimate purpose—in raising capital for business development…. But he also admits that he tells students that it’s a horse race, that you bet on good safe horses, or take fliers on long-shots; that sometimes the good horses break a leg, and sometimes the long-shots win. Some know more about horses than others.

Now that I have an I-phone, I can see what’s happening to the Dow Jones anytime. And it’s been quite a ride with COVID-19. The big dip in the beginning has given way to zig-zag ups and downs, not reaching previous highs, not going deeper in the tank.

My simple-minded understanding: there’s money that has to go someplace. Confirmed by John Cassidy in the New Yorker, who found that E-Trade and TD Ameritrade more than tripled transactions this April over April, 2019.

A Cassidy friend suggested that casinos are closed and there are no sports to bet on. Dave Portnoy, the founder of Barstool Sports, confirmed that. He said that “Sports ended, and this was something that… I could do during the day.” Portnoy put three million dollars in an E-Trade account “to play around with.”

Some are out of work; many are grateful for the $1200 government checks. And some are playing the *&^%) stock market—at least until the tracks open and some kind of football season happens.

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