I'm Charlie Sykes.

Welcome back to the To the Contrary podcast.

We're trying to just make it make sense, make it seem like mildly coherent.

Who better to talk to about that than our good friend, Justin Wolfer's, who rejoins us.

Justin, thanks for coming back on the podcast.

Great joy, Charlie.

I don't know what's going on, mate.

It looks like you might have gray hair and I might be losing hair.

That might tell us something about whether we're succeeding at making it make sense,

mate.

See, I think if your hair's not graying or falling out, then you're not paying attention.

I mean, it really, it's a lovely state of affairs, wouldn't it?

It would be a lovely state of affairs.

So, again, make it make sense to me, things that, whether we should worry about them or not. Okay, so there's this

scary chart floating around. You've probably seen this showing that the stock market is up 70%

over the last three years while job openings are down about 30%. People are starting to recognize

that there seems to be a little bit of a gap between the

irrational exuberance of the stock market and the economy on the ground. How do you see it?

Does this concern you? Should this concern those of us who have 401ks?

Okay, great question. Boy, there's so much to say. Okay. First of all, you said you're worried. If I saw a chart showing stocks pointing north, that sounds like something to celebrate. I'm going to start. So remember, I'm not here to tell a political story. I'm here to try and understand the data.

Stocks are a bet on our economic future, right?

Because when you buy a stock, you're basically owning the future profits of the firm you

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