The best way to measure your investing success is not by whether you're beating the market but by whether you've put in place a financial plan and a behavioral discipline that are likely to get you where you want to go.
A sober looks shows that just have the world gotten to be a better place after all; it is also grown a bit worse at the exact same rate.; a one step up, a one step back sort of cosmic balance between forward progress, and cultural retreat, that puts man kind on a bell curve of existence.