50 Years of Market Swings

Here's an interesting slide show of the S&P500 over the last half-century. One thing I noticed was the seemingly exponential growth starting in the '80s. One would have to wonder if this growth is real, or if it is at least partially an artifact of economic policies and demographics. Certainly such wealth can't be entirely a mirage, but if growth kept on a similar pace as the first 30 depicted years, we have a lot more "correcting" to do. As any prospectus worth its salt will tell you, "past performance is not an indicator of future success". It is comforting, however, to see that most declines are over in a few years and the market quickly rallies to new heights.