I think one lesson we have to learn is that there's a lot more risk than we're giving credit to, a lot more what economist calls systematic risk.

Recall that people like to do what most people think it is right to do; recall too that people like to do what most people actually do.

I don't go by the ratings. I buy wine that tastes good. Statistically, anybody's ability to predict what will be a good wine a decade from now is limited.

If people just put away what's left at the end of the month, that's a recipe for failure.

Why tie to gold? Why not 1982 Bordeaux?

Rip Van Winkle would be the ideal stock market investor: Rip could invest in the market before his nap and when he woke up 20 years later, he'd be happy. He would have been asleep through all the ups and downs in between. But few investors resemble Mr. Van Winkle. The more often an investor counts his money - or looks at the value of his mutual funds in the newspaper - the lower his risk tolerance.

One simple step firms can take is make sure that people that are getting paid a lot of money, say more than a million or two, that a big chunk of that money is deferred. That's going to change the whole ballgame.