Holden Caulfield sought to be a 'catcher in the rye,' standing near the rye field's edge to prevent children from falling over the precipice — or, you could say, looking out for their best interests. (Photo: Shutterstock)
William F. Buckley, Jr., the popular late twentieth century philosopher, in November 1955 may have defined the ultimate duty every fiduciary strives to fulfill. The short, now famous, line within his “Publisher's Statement” that accompanied the inaugural issue of his new magazine struck a tone so brave few could argue with it and all would come to admire.
Buckley wrote of the purpose of National Review in this way: It “stands athwart history, yelling Stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so….”
It was to be the creed of his new venture, but it offers an apt metaphor for the fiduciary ideal, (see “A Fiduciary Must Confront The Fears and Fads of Market Cycles,” FiduciaryNews.com, June 11, 2019).
To paraphrase Buckley, a fiduciary must stand athwart the winds of the market yelling “Stop!” at a time when no one is inclined to do so.
No doubt the Yale-educated, former Firing Line host, and nationally syndicated columnist, who died in 2008, would appreciate this sentiment. Buckley possessed a keen and variegated intellect.
In fact, he might go further than this metaphor and suggest a purer one more derivative from literature. He would have likened the best fiduciary as the one Holden Caulfield aspired to in J. D. Salinger's “The Catcher in the Rye” published in 1951 (the same year as Buckley's own best-seller “God and Man at Yale”).
Salinger's book describes teenage angst in such a provocative manner that it was widely banned just as the first wave of the baby boomer generation was peaking as teenagers. This made the book more alluring. Again, referencing a banned book might have been an inside joke to Buckley. He might have also liked the delicious irony that, by forcing “The Catcher in the Rye” on so many high school students, the book itself became the very mainstream it intended to rebel against.
But enough literary digression. We're talking about the literary character Holden Caulfield and his relationship to what today we call “fiduciary duty.”
Holden, bless his naive soul, sought to be a “catcher in the rye.” In his mind, he would stand athwart the cliff on the edge of a field of rye where children played. It would be his duty to prevent them from falling over the edge should they stray too close to the precipice.
In other words – and these are our words, not Holden's – he would always be on guard, looking out for the best interests of the children.
“Best interests.” You see what I did there?
Retirement savers are playing the field of rye we call the market. The cliff isn't a sudden market drop, but a potentially bad decision. The fiduciary's duty is to catch investors if they stray too close to making a decision that isn't in their best interest.
In this way, the fiduciary stands athwart the winds of the market, yelling stop to the stampeding lemmings.
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Christopher Carosa
Chris Carosa has been writing a weekly article and monthly column for BenefitsPRO online and BenefitsPRO Magazine since 2011 and is a nationally recognized award-winning writer, researcher and speaker. He’s written seven books, including From Cradle to Retire: The Child IRA; Hey! What’s My Number? – How to Increase the Odds You Will Retire in Comfort; A Pizza The Action: Everything I Ever Learned About Business I Learned By Working in a Pizza Stand at the Erie County Fair; and the widely acclaimed 401(k) Fiduciary Solutions. Carosa is also Chief Contributing Editor of the authoritative trade journal FiduciaryNews.com and publisher of the Mendon-Honeoye Falls-Lima Sentinel, a weekly community newspaper he founded in 1989. Currently serving as President of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists and with more than 1,000 articles published in various publications, he appears regularly in the national media. A “parallel” entrepreneur, he actively runs a handful of businesses, including a small boutique investment adviser, providing hands-on experience for his writing. A trained astrophysicist, he also holds an MBA and has been designated a Certified Trust and Financial Advisor. Share your thoughts and story ideas with him through Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/christophercarosa/)and Twitter (https://twitter.com/ChrisCarosa).
