For decades Americans have been starved of interest income on savings in order to maintain high corporate profit margins. During this timeframe, ordinary people have turned increasingly to high risk investments in order to earn a paltry return. The Federal Reserve’s policy of guaranteeing a rising stock market has slowly desensitized mainstream Americans to the enormous risk they are taking. To get a 2% return on a stock dividend, it is necessary to risk losing perhaps half of your investment in one day. That kind of decline is not unthinkable given a market that is admittedly rigged by government.