Past Results Do Not Guarantee

Dateline: Anytown USA: OpEd: Reflection: Past Results do not guarantee future performance." OpEd; "Past results do not guarantee future performance." If you do not remember this phrase, you are probably too young to read this post. In virtually every mutual fund brochure or prospectus for a unit trust of whatever investment, there is the caution...... after of course the investment representative has gone over the wonderful result if..... in theoretical terms..... you had invested ....$1....at the Crash of 1929 and invested that in this particular investment....you would have had the wonderful result listed above....." and after speaking of those wonderful theoretical results, there is the caution about ...."Past Results do not guarantee future performance..." Recently, in Anytown, USA, in our own school projections for future school demand for facilities, whether we looked at population projection or building permit historical data, nobody wanted to read the warning----"Past results do not guarantee future performance." Even in the Anytown City budget, the city financial consultant, stated that "proceeding forward with no further General Obligation debt, the future seems to be no problem with debt capacity." The problem, of course------- 5 million in dreams that were penciled in on the capital investment budget for the year around 2009. It seems we always, as human beings, want the pro forma future not to include the unfortunate expenses of the reality of the things on the horizon.