Subject: Re: Barron's ... oops. market not that overpriced
But barring that, which has a pinch of the "it's different this time" reasoning to it, there is no reason to think the biggest are a better bet than the others, and in fact some pretty good reasons to think they're worse.

Could it be different this time? If you think of the modern economy as a sort of hybrid between humans and machines, as productivity has increased "obviously" (really?) the machine fraction of that hybrid has been rising. AI suggests we may get a step function increase in that effect as so many tech-bros are talking about a world in which we don't have to work, where the guaranteed minimum income will actually be pretty high. But even without the step function of AI, could the mix of machine and man have gotten so machine dependent that some large techie companies just own better tech to hybridize their humans with, and it has become an enduring advantage?

To paraphrase clichéed investing wisdom, everything is always the same as it used to be, until it is different. Even the moats around newspapers is now filled with old rusting printing presses. Even IBM is an also ran. Even the stocks of widows and orphans are also-rans.

I have been contemplating selling my SP Growth ETF which has done GREAT over the last few years, and buying Equal-Weight SP which has underperformed regular SP by 35% the last few years (last 20 years actually, but moreso the last few). On the other hand, what if regression to the mean is just a thing that happens except when it doesn't?

Has it never been different this time in the past?

R: