The Fed at this point controls the whole economy and they have two options: 1. Raise interest rates and stop printing. Crazy inflation stops, but asset prices crash and we enter a major recession or depression. The end result will likely be unrest and blood in the streets. 2. Do nothing, keep printing. Inflation picks up massively. The economy keeps humming along but young people, including myself, are permanently pr…
You can try to fight the market, complain about the market, or position yourself to take advantage of it (using the best info available at the time). When everyone was doom-saying the Fed in 2009 and complaining that everything was fake valuation, a new crash was coming soon, etc. I got fed up and ignored them. Piled my retirement account into stocks. That has paid off quite well.
Also if you find an opportunity you believe in make a bet. I bet $7k on Tesla's IPO. Last week I sold less than half my holdings for $100,000 and plan to keep the remainder. Lots of people had negative things to say but I took a closer look and put my nickel down. Years ago after Apple hit me 700 it fell by around half. I bought the dips at 450, 400, 350, etc. That also did extremely well for me.
Find opportunities and make moves. Fighting the fed and the market means you'll miss huge upside - often so much upside that even when your negative prediction eventually comes true you'd have been better off holding through the downturn when all is said and done.
> All I can do at this point is raise my fist to the sky and say fuck the fed, fuck the financial system, fuck the greedy rich, fuck BlackRock, and fuck you.
Polish your resume, practice stupid useless whiteboard problems, move to the Bay Area, and work for a FAANG company. Keep the same lifestyle you have now. If you work moderately harder than average you can easily have $2m cash in the bank within 10 years or less - even after paying Bay Area cost of living.
Then start writing $20k checks to your house rep's re-election campaign. Guess what? They'll take your calls. Write $50-100k checks and your senator will too. It is surprisingly cheap (in the grand scheme of things) to buy access to political power. That's how the current system got where it is: those hedge fund managers have been writing campaign checks since they were junior associates at a big bank. As a result Congress hears from them and cares about their concerns more than the average rabble.
Anyone in Congress who doesn't do that and isn't independently wealthy either fails to get re-elected (no money to spend on events, travel, ads, ground game) or has no actual power because the party won't give them committee assignments since they aren't bringing any money in for the party's own election efforts (this is how parties enforce discipline).
Unlike most working Americans it is within the grasp of many HN readers to do this sort of thing and make an actual difference. Do you care enough to move? To change jobs?
Full disclosure: I'm just now in a position to start writing checks so I'll let you know how it works out in 10 years.