That's stupid.
But picking companies YOU think might succeed, either because you've used their products, have a good feeling, read a news article, worked there, read magazines on the niche industry, or a million other things, is perfectly legit.
You don't need to time the market. You can invest long-term in your picks.
You CAN time the market, if you notice patterns and feel like you can ride them.
Not everyone who isn't conservative is necessarily a child "playing" with a brokerage IRA. Some ARE beating the market.
Traditional 401k incentives line up horribly with saving for the future. And if you expect taxes to rise, an unmatched 401k might would be an on balance negative except for the tax free rebalancing you can do.
(In contract disputes, the parties' lawyers will often look for exploitable "security holes" of this kind, i.e., places where the contract's language can plausibly be interpreted in multiple ways and the choice of interpretation affects the outcome of the dispute. A big part of the job of contract drafters and reviewers is to try to spot and eliminate such weaknesses before the contract is signed, but that doesn't always happen.)
Also the recent Maine dispute over the oxford comma kind of made me understand that better.
I came up as a patent attorney; I always found it useful to create defined terms and use them (in initial caps) as needed, in the same vein as defining a variable in software.
That is not a "will". I have never had an account of any kind where it takes two business days to transfer money from one position to another.
> in that time the market can drop 30%
"Can" with what likelihood? In discussions like this (and hiring, and health care) people live to trot out very low probability worst cases couched with "can".
The fact you can't see any other way to save for retirement is also comically sad.
Here's how this works for those that haven't even bothered to read anything related to retirement planning.
You slowly move from high risk/volatile investments to those that are lower risk. Something like Bonds might work. You also have your own small hedge with things like precious metals (less than 10% typically).
One can also move their money to assets that typically appreciate but also generate reliable income (real estate for example, but annuities, etc., are options).
Hell, even read the cheat sheet and you'll know more than most people (seemingly): http://www.dummies.com/personal-finance/financial-help/perso...
The transition away from pension plans leaving people unprepared for retirement was probably a much bigger issue than the state of the stock market at retirement.