Tough year

It is looking like this year is going to be a writeoff year. We have managed to save enough to offset all the market losses, and will probably end up the year in the positive range, but not by much. It puts us a year behind and there is no way to know if future years will be able to make up for the lost time. If you are like us, you keep track of your investments every year and track your progress towards your retirement goals. If you have done your homework, you know how much you need(or want) to have for retirement and therefore how much you need to save every month. This year isn't helping anybody's cause. It makes me wonder what could have been done to stop this mess from happening. Maybe if the housing and mortgage market had been better regulated, as they are now proposing, the real estate bubble could have been avoided and therefore the bubble would not have burst. The cascading effect of the housing market on the rest of the economy is killing all of us. I hope this nightmare ends soon and we can get back to making progress.