Opinion in " to invest or not to invest"

I agree with Unique that it is time to invest, but I do not think that is realistic for a middle-class. Throughout the 100 years of history in the U.S stock market, the U.S stock market keeps going up and down over 100 years. Thus, investors simply forecast the current crashed stock market would go up and be stable in the future, but they do not know exactly when would that happen occurs. However, I think that theory is only works for people who are available to invest for the long-term. The reason is that as the investors forecast the future stock market, the stock market would go up, but the time is matter. Thus, even though people who have little or no spare money to invest know they would get great returns in the future if they invest into the stock market, it is hard for them to take that action. If people have little spare money to invest, they want to have the returns in the short period of time because a longer time they invest into the stock market, their volatility in financial management would be a higher. In other words, the longer they put their spare money into the stock market; there is less possibility to solve their financial problems. Thus, I think it is not realistic for the most of middle class.
Most of people who want to invest now do not know where to invest. In addition, some investors would recommend investing in gold. When the stock market is unstable, people tend to invest into commodities, such as gold, oranges, and apples. In addition, as we all know gold is limited, so people think the price of gold would never go down. People simply buy actual gold, and re-sell them when the price of gold is higher. Or people buy mutual funds that are related to gold mining companies. However, I want to notice that the gold investments also have risks. First, if people try to buy actual gold, it contains additional 10% of fees to buy actual gold. The cost is a high compared to buy stocks. Next, a volatility of gold price is high. In March 2008, the price of gold per ounce was $1000, but the price fall down to $700 in October 2008. The 30% of gold price was gone down in 7 months. Thus, people should notice that price of gold could be down. Last, the returns in the mutual funds that are related to gold mining companies are also affected by foreign currencies. The reason is that the size of mutual funds is relatively small, so the most of brokers of that funds also invest internationally. Therefore, I would recommend to people to consider seriously before they invest in gold.




http://www.fool.com/investing/dividends-income/2008/10/24/invest-without-the-stress.aspx

http://goldprice.org/gold-price-history.html

http://uniquebl0gs.blogspot.com/2009/04/to-invest-or-not-to-invest.html