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Comment by stupidbird | Hacker News Reader

The average person is more likely to lose money day trading than gain (especially considering the time sink). It's basically boring slow gambling wrapped in the guise of The American Dream.

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The average person shouldn't day trade. I buy stocks and basically hold them for years. I've picked some losers and I've picked some winners... but overall my return over the last ~5 years is 19%.

Buying stock with dividends helps even more, now you get money back to invest into more stock :-D

If you just bought s&p or brk (arguably conservative choices) you'd have earned 60%.

Such is the name of the game :-) I have invested relatively little, I just enjoy playing and seeing if I can "win".

Everything else is in index funds.

And by not day trading you're not gambling? Let's just call it betting. What stance are you promoting that is "not betting"?

Stocks are traded everywhere in the world. What’s this have to do with The American Dream!?

The American Dream is to accumulate wealth, and often involves looking for a way to get rich quick, some people think they can do it by day trading. There's a certain American stereotype of playing stocks to become wealthy.

There are cultures where they don't dream about accumulating wealth?

Less than the extent that Americans do? absolutely. In many ways they're obsessed with it. Look how much the gambling industry makes there.

Macau's gambling revenue dwarfs Las Vegas's. None of the top 10 biggest money making casinos are in the United States.

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