From an excellent article by W. Michael Cox, the senior vice president and chief economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, and Richard Alm, the bank’s senior economics writer . . .
“In the early 1980s, the U.S. economy had big problems, including slow growth and high inflation. A rational response for pessimists might have been to put their money into the safe havens of gold or Treasury bills. A $10,000 initial investment in gold would now be worth $22,525; the same amount in T-Bills would be worth $37,778 (Fig. 14). Early 1980s optimists might have bet on U.S. economic progress by investing in the Dow stocks. Their initial $10,000 would now be worth $288,163—even after the financial market troubles of recent months.”