The Rational Reminder Podcast · Thursday, August 27, 2026
David Booth explained that empirical work, backed by robust data, suggests that professional money managers struggle to consistently outperform the market after fees. He emphasized that while beliefs are important, data is essential for winning arguments in the investment world.
“Maybe markets are efficient. How about that? The market does such a good job of setting prices that professional investors even don't seem to be able to do better than that.”
“You can make any argument you want. And if you don't have data, you're arguing beliefs. Which is fine, you need to have beliefs.”
“But in a debate, you want to have data. This is the data.”