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Comment by pmg102 | Hacker News Reader

You're giving a 15% growth rate with zero volatility? That isn't going to teach many important lessons.

How about offering a range of rates with volatility increasing as rate increases. Then they can think about the benefit of guaranteed return vs the benefit of long-term growth, or a combination of both.

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OP: I think introducing volatility (which you can just model with one percentage variable and a sinusoidal multiplier based on this: 100% volatility means if your "real" balance was going to be $100 today, it varies between $0 and $200 ; 10% volatility means you're fluctuating between $90 and $110) is also a good idea in teaching kids to refrain from the impulse of withdrawing the money just because today's daily gain is in the red.

Another add to the feature request list :)

The biggest challenge with pensions is convincing people in their 20s to invest in high risk/high return investments. This is usually the right strategy because of the long time horizon of several decades until they will need to crystallise losses/gains.

However if they see their pension balance fall in a big correction, they can panic and move to less volatile investments, thus reducing their long term gains.

You can theorize all you want but the best way to learn to cope with this is for it to happen to you so it would be great to include it in the simulation!

I think an even better option would be to show diversification. You could have some part in a higher risk volatile thing and another part that shows steadier positive growth. Get people to decided how much of each to mix. One of the most important lessons is that all your eggs don't need to be and usually should not be in one basket.

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