Stop Letting Election Hype Hijack Your Investments: The Media Won’t Tell You This

The Election Industrial Complex Wants Your Fear

Every two years, like clockwork, the financial media machine cranks up the terror. Headlines about how this election will either save or obliterate your retirement. Breathless pundits who somehow know exactly what the stock market will do depending on which party wins. It is a racket, and you are the mark.

I think of it like the adults in a Charlie Brown cartoon. Total noise. Indecipherable and completely useless. The only difference is Peanuts was honest entertainment. What passes for financial journalism during election season is neither honest nor entertaining.

Here Is What the Data Actually Says (And Why It Still Does Not Matter)

I did the work. Trump could become the eighth president since 1954 to lose both chambers of Congress to the opposing party. When that has happened historically, here is what followed for the S&P 500:

• One month out: Up 2.1% on average, six out of seven occurrences
• Three months out: Up 10.7% on average, seven out of seven occurrences
• Six months out: Up 17.5% on average, seven out of seven occurrences
• One year out: Up 15.5% on average

And here is where I part ways with every other analyst who would dangle that data in front of you like a carrot. That data means nothing. Zero. Markets could tank regardless. I don’t guess at things I cannot know, and neither should you. Anyone telling you they can is running a con.

The Structural Problem Nobody on TV Will Admit

Regardless of who wins, government spending is not stopping. It never does. That means more money printing. That means your wages, no matter how hard you grind, are losing ground to monetary inflation in real time.

Wall Street and the media are not going to tell you that because it is not a story that sells advertising or generates trading fees. But it is the truth:

• Your paycheck is being quietly devalued while you sleep
• Working harder is not a substitute for a real investment strategy
• Inflation is a wealth transfer from people who only hold cash and wages to people who own assets

Your Salary Is Not Enough and Never Will Be

My son ran the New York City Marathon recently and finished in under four hours on his first attempt. Impressive by any measure. But the winner of that same race finished in roughly two hours. Same road, same distance, completely different outcome.

That gap is what separates someone grinding away on a salary from someone whose money is actively working for them. You can run as hard as humanly possible and still lose the race to inflation if your only tool is a paycheck.

Here is what actually protects you:

• A consistent, disciplined investment strategy that does not change based on who wins an election
• Assets that have historically outpaced inflation over long time horizons
• Ignoring the media noise designed to make you panic and make moves that benefit your broker, not your future
• Understanding that no administration saves or destroys your wealth. Your decisions do.

The Bottom Line

The midterm election coverage is a Charlie Brown special for adults, except the adults speaking are somehow even less coherent than the ones in the cartoon. Financial media profits from your anxiety. Wall Street profits from your emotional trading.

Tune it out. Stay consistent. And understand that the only person responsible for your financial future is looking at you in the mirror every morning.