TIPs are inflation-protected securities provided to you by the American government although rumor has it you can purchase them in France, England, Canada, or even in variety packs. Jeremy Siegel, in Stocks for the Long Run, argues they effectively replace corporate debt as a hedge against risk in your portfolio. Indeed, at an offer of 3.5 percent plus the rate of inflation, it is hard to see how one could go wrong.

Unless we deflate. In that case, I would argue buying DIPs, deflation protection, would be your best move. I plan to open my own bucket shop and securitize these nifty articles any day now. My DIPs will not give you quite the rise of government TIPs, but they could be relevant to anyone who finds himself enduring a downturn, laid off, waiting in line for toilet paper, or drinking beer on a tab. (Before the age of Amex, Visa, and Moe, a “tab” referred to a debt one kept at a business, almost always a “brick and mortar” establishment and often one that sold groceries or beer. Your tab was often recorded on lined paper from a spiral notebook by a bartender named Frank or a butcher named Joe.)

Indeed, look around you. If it seems like houses in your neighborhood are worth less than they were last year and much less than your agent assured you they would be worth, then it could be the case that deflation is relevant to you. Is your gas a buck fifty cheaper? Are your supermarkets offering “going out of business” sales? Are certain members of the S & P 500 now listed on the “pink sheet” or as penny stocks? Did your local big-box store disappear in the dark of night? Have you recently purchased a novel for a single penny or downloaded your content for less than free? Did you drop a half pence in a cup held by your agent, whom you found wearing layers and standing outside the retail environment abandoned by your local big-box store? Has your dog begun to dig up those old bones and cash them in before they lose all worth? Did you cash in your dog?

My DIPs will offer the solution to all of your deflating needs. They will come in a pack of six or twenty, and you will notice they are smooth without a hint of texture. Indeed, nothing about them excites us to inflate. No? Oh, sorry. Anyway, these new-fangled securities will be the hedge of all hedges; precious minerals cannot compare. Do you prefer to hide gold in your stockings? Why not go stocking free with DIPs; they eventually become so liquid they are traded on a big board that has a certain hidden quality. Some would argue in fact that it is so invisible, it could be the case that it does not exist. I guarantee my DIPs will bring a rise in your ultra shorts and all the peace and security you deserve for your wealth’s final resting place.

Note: This columnist’s financial wisdom is best understood within the context of four-thousand dollars lost on but thirteen shares of a favored dotcom. In anticipation of his tenth anniversary of bad investing, said columnist came close in recent months to achieving a similar fate with shares of the dreaded C  (a ticker symbol not to be confused with anyone’s unfortunate grade or disease). All the same, the author is an optimist at heart and favors cash sewn in the mattress to large purchases of weapons and canned goods. He is guardedly pessimistic on diamonds sewn in the britches and cautiously neutral on coins hidden in the left sweat sock.

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Alex Kudera

Alex Kudera's Fight For Your Long Day (Atticus Books) was drafted in a walk-in closet during a summer in Seoul, South Korea and consequently won the 2011 IPPY Gold Medal for Best Fiction from the Mid-Atlantic Region. It is an academic tragicomedy told from the perspective of an adjunct instructor, and reviews and interviews can be found online and in print in The Chronicle of Higher Education, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Inside Higher Ed, Academe, and elsewhere. His second novel, Auggie's Revenge (Beating Windward Press), and a Classroom Edition of Fight for Your Long Day (Hard Ball Press) were published in 2016. Kudera's other publications include the e-singles Frade Killed Ellen (Dutch Kills Press), The Betrayal of Times of Peace and Prosperity (Gone Dog Press), and Turquoise Truck (Mendicant Bookworks). When he's not reading or writing, he frets, fails, walks, works, and helps raise a child.

Latest posts by Alex Kudera (Posts)

• Back and Broke in Philly - June 18, 2017
• An Interview With Rebecca Schuman - April 13, 2017
• A Poor Man’s Christmas - December 25, 2016
• Excerpt from Auggie’s Revenge - December 2, 2016
• The Writer’s Parents - September 18, 2016

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