by link 6 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
A JW family member tells me that dealing in stocks and shares = placing capital at risk in the hope of obtaining financial reward without working.He claims that it is therefore unchristian.
Is this view correct? Apart from stocks and bonds donated to it, is there any evidence that the Society uses subscriptions to deal on the markets?
Any info. on this would be very helpful to me.
Thanks
link
i dont think you'll find the WTS saying that it's unchristian. they'll probably say thats its about how you view it, not whether you do it. although i think it is a gamble.
Investing in stocks is not a gamble if you know what you are doing, or if you put your money in a mutual fund where the fund manager knows what he is doing. Value investing is relatively safe, and produces a long term increase better than the market averages. Investing wisely over the long term, ten years or more, has no risk and is not a gamble at all. JWs who say that such investing is a gamble, simply don't know what they are talking about.
larc,
Many thanks. This seems to clear the matter up nicely although it does beg the question, why work?
link
Link, you ask why work? I don't. I took early retirement, which was possible because of a long term retirement plan, and the kind of investing I described.
well you could say the same thing for professional betting. some people earn a living doing just that! so obviously they aint gambling because they know how to play the game.
You'd want to work because:
Any capital gains are taxed, then since it's your income you get taxed again. Mutual funds should return on average 8% so you'd need to have 300-400k invested to make around 30k before taxes.
The stock market is low risk - what's high risk is day trading, individual company investing, and short term investing. Mutual funds are designed to lower risk by having shares in a number of different sectors of the market. The trend of the market is always "UP" if you look at the history.
TT
