*An engineer will be standing at the finish line with a slide rule and will carefully measure the slide of prices against inflation. He will raise a checkered flag and tell everyone when the bottom is reached by using a formula.
I agree with your (sarcastic, but well-put) point here.
We can’t really precisely identify a future price. There are too many variables, as well as time lags in data, and the wild card of buyer psychology.
However, that is no excuse for being sloppy. Thanks to Rich, this site has always attracted a fair number of analytical types. After all the motto at the bottom of the page is “In God We Trust. All Others Bring Data.” Although, my bet is that if God did log in with some comments, some people (including me) would probably call bull$h!t on it and ask him to back it up with some facts.
But I digress …
I’m not saying prices won’t revert to 1998 levels. My point is that if someone is going to throw out a number, a date or a price level, they should know what that implies.
