<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>hsitz</author><text>Another way of thinking about it is:  on average, stock value over the long term (20+ years) is very likely to be in range of, say, 5%&amp;#x2F;year, plus or minus (actual number is not that important for our purpose here), after adjusting for inflation.  If stocks have been on a recent runup, gaining, say, 50% or 100% over a period of a few years, then they are very likely to grow more slowly than average (i.e., revert to the mean) over the coming years.  If you buy during period of  inflated prices you will realize a lower than average return if you&amp;#x27;re holding over the long term.&lt;p&gt;Robert Shiller (Yale finance professor, of Case&amp;#x2F;Shiller housing index) likes to make the following analogy.  Predicting the stock market is basically the opposite of predicting weather.  With weather our short-term predictions can be fairly accurate, but our long term predictions are very poor.  With the stock market it&amp;#x27;s the reverse, short-term predictions are worthless, but long term predictions are generally fairly accurate.</text><parent_chain><item><author>valuearb</author><text>Buffett had a good quote about it once that I can&amp;#x27;t find now, but essentially during most of your life you will be a net buyer of stocks. Only at the end, during your retirement, will you be a net seller and only then will you want high prices.&lt;p&gt;Until then, the less you pay for your stock purchases, the better your long term gains will be.</text></item><item><author>dvfjsdhgfv</author><text>&amp;gt; Obviously, either way a decline in the stock market indexes is good news for almost everyone. I&amp;#x27;m hoping for a real crash as I need to save lots more money, not just for my retirement but also for my kids college.&lt;p&gt;Could you elaborate?</text></item><item><author>valuearb</author><text>I hate to be nitpicking about good news, but the S&amp;amp;P 500 is down less than 7% from it&amp;#x27;s peak, that&amp;#x27;s hardly a crash. Especially after gaining 26% over the previous year. And, after increasing over 90% the last 5 years.&lt;p&gt;Obviously, either way a decline in the stock market indexes is good news for almost everyone. I&amp;#x27;m hoping for a real crash as I need to save lots more money, not just for my retirement but also for my kids college.</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Dow plunges 1000 points</title><url>https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/04/us-stocks-interest-rates-futures.html</url></story>
<instructions>Your goal is to analyze the following comment and estimate how highly it will be upvoted by the Hacker News community.</instructions><comment><author>JoshTriplett</author><text>I once heard it described as &amp;quot;the market is on sale right now&amp;quot;.</text><parent_chain><item><author>valuearb</author><text>Buffett had a good quote about it once that I can&amp;#x27;t find now, but essentially during most of your life you will be a net buyer of stocks. Only at the end, during your retirement, will you be a net seller and only then will you want high prices.&lt;p&gt;Until then, the less you pay for your stock purchases, the better your long term gains will be.</text></item><item><author>dvfjsdhgfv</author><text>&amp;gt; Obviously, either way a decline in the stock market indexes is good news for almost everyone. I&amp;#x27;m hoping for a real crash as I need to save lots more money, not just for my retirement but also for my kids college.&lt;p&gt;Could you elaborate?</text></item><item><author>valuearb</author><text>I hate to be nitpicking about good news, but the S&amp;amp;P 500 is down less than 7% from it&amp;#x27;s peak, that&amp;#x27;s hardly a crash. Especially after gaining 26% over the previous year. And, after increasing over 90% the last 5 years.&lt;p&gt;Obviously, either way a decline in the stock market indexes is good news for almost everyone. I&amp;#x27;m hoping for a real crash as I need to save lots more money, not just for my retirement but also for my kids college.</text></item></parent_chain></comment><story><title>Dow plunges 1000 points</title><url>https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/04/us-stocks-interest-rates-futures.html</url></story>