The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
why aren't all 29 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't; assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card: ▮▮▮▮▮ certainty · ▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Housel: Younger Generations Are Probably Wrong That They Won't Surpass Parents
“I think they're probably wrong about that in general. Of course, there's going to be lots of examples where that was the case, but I think they tend to, I think, I would bet that they would be wrong about that.”
Housel: Income between brothers is more correlated than height or weight
“The stat that I think is so astounding is that income among brothers is more correlated than height or weight.”
Housel: Historical Dow components outperformed rebalanced index over 100 years
“If you were to look at the Dow, I think one of the studies showed over the last hundred years, if rather than adding a new company, when one of the original components went out of business or merged, if you just left it alone, don't add anything else. Don't ta…”
Housel: Lower income brackets experienced the fastest wage growth recently
“Now, just in the last three or four years, there's been a huge growth. The segment of society whose incomes have grown the most tends to be the lower. Incomes. We're still kind of attached to this narrative of the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. But i…”
Housel: Future Generations Will Treat Cancer Diagnoses as Manageable Inconveniences
“I mean, the most, what I think is like the highest odds is that Our kids, maybe our grandkids will live in an era which being diagnosed with cancer is not, not that big a deal.”
Housel: Tokyo Maintains Affordable Housing Through Continuous High-Volume Construction
“Tokyo, gigantic city. Bigger than the city you and I are in right now in New York. Very affordable housing, relatively. Because they build. They build and build and build and build.”
Housel: Economic History Has Never Existed Without Continuous Periods of Inflation
“There is no history without inflation. It doesn't really exist. It's not really a thing.”
Housel: Earning Average Market Returns for 50 Years Beats 97% of Investors
“And the idea that let's say if I can be average for 50 years, I'll end up in the top Three percent of investors. That's probably about where it'll be. Historically has been the case that I will outperform 97% of people who tried to beat the market. Maybe it's …”
Housel: 99% of Warren Buffett's wealth accumulated after age 60
“99% of Buffett's net worth was accumulated after his sixtieth birthday.”
Housel: The Poorer People Are, the More Lottery Tickets They Buy
“And if you dig into who's buying it, it's,
Almost exclusively poor people.
They buy the vast majority of lottery tickets.
And the poorer you are, the more lottery tickets you buy.”
Housel: Income among brothers is more correlated than height or weight
“The stat that I think is so astounding is that income among brothers is more correlated than height or weight.”
Housel: 99% of Warren Buffett's Net Worth Accumulated After Age 60
“I use a stat in, in my book that 99% of Buffett's net worth was accumulated after his sixtieth birthday.”
Housel: Buffett flies private and owned beachfront property despite frugal reputation
“Buffer lives in the same house he bought when he was 26. Yes, but he also flies a private jet and had a beautiful beachfront house in Laguna Beach. These guys are not living like paupers over time.”
Housel: Real US home prices were flat from 1940s through 1990s
“Robert Schiller of Yale did a lot of analysis on this, tracking U.S. Home prices since the 1800. And in real terms, from probably the 19 forties through the 19 nineties were flat as a pancake on average across the United States.”
Housel: Real US home prices exceed 2006 housing bubble peak
“And real home prices in the U.S., I'm sure it's the same in Canada. Are much higher today than they were at the peak of the bubble in 2006 on average.”
Housel: Housing unaffordability will echo across demographics for 50-70 years
“So I think the lack of housing affordability has an impact on demographics and having kids over time that will echo for the next 50 or 70 years.”
Housel: David Senra says Ed Thorpe is the only founder whose life he would want
“Our friend David Senra, who runs the podcast Founders, has profiled, I think now, probably 350 Founders over time. And he says, I don't want to put two, don't want to put words in his mouth. I'm pretty sure he said the only founder that he has ever read their …”
Housel: A Significant Percentage of Multi-Millionaire Athletes Are Bankrupt by 30
“A very significant percentage of these people who make millions of dollars are bankrupt by the time they're 30.”
Housel: 99% of Warren Buffett's Net Worth Accumulated After Age 65
“99% of Warren Buffett's net worth was accumulated after his 65th birthday.”
Housel: New American Homes Today Are Nearly Triple 1950s Average Size
“The average new house today is almost three times the size of a house in the 19 fifties. Three times.”
Housel: The Psychology of Money Has Sold Roughly 10 Million Copies
“My first book, Psychology of Money, first print runs, 5000 copies, ends up selling about ten million and counting kind of thing.”
Housel: Americans spend roughly $100 billion annually on lottery tickets
“In America, we spend something like a hundred billion dollars a year on lottery tickets.”
Housel: Americans Spend Roughly $100B Annually on Lottery Tickets
“In America, we spend something like a hundred billion dollars a year on lottery tickets.”
Housel: Stock index funds had roughly zero percent real returns from 2000-2010
“Or even from 2000 to 2010, you had basically zero percent real returns in index funds.”
Housel: Parents DCA'd in Vanguard index funds for 40+ years without selling
“My parents are very interesting that they have dollar cost averaged in the Vanguard index funds for more than 40 years and never sold anything, ever.”
Housel: Vanderbilt fortune reached $400B equivalent and was lost in three generations
“When Cornelius Vanderbilt died, his net worth adjusted for inflation cause he died in the
Was the equivalent of four hundred billion dollars. And in three generations, there was nothing left, which is an astounding thing to think about.”
Housel: Anderson Cooper was the first Vanderbilt heir to inherit nothing
“The first Vanderbilt heir to not get any money, when all the money was exhausted, the first heir where there's nothing left was Anderson Cooper of CNN. His mother was a woman named Gloria Vanderbilt. She got kind of the last trust fund in the family.”
Housel: Kindle data shows average readers finish only 25% of bestsellers
“There was a mathematician who looked at Kindle highlight data, and he used highlights as a proxy for how far people make it in a book. And the assumption was when people stop highlighting in Kindle, they probably stopped reading. And he showed that even among …”