Advice from Suze Orman

Man, I am really out of it. I only vaguely know who Suze Orman is. But Freakonomics had her on to do Q&A, and given the Freakonomics audience, there are a lot of questions asked that are written by people like me - lots of educated, but starting late in the investment game. I encourage you to read the entire thing. It's very good. I am a big believer, btw, in stock market index funds (I'm an economist, so it's basically a requirement). With so much volatility in the stock market right now, I actually want to put more of my money in it, not less. And Orman says the same thing. You only invest in stocks for the longrun (her definition is 10-plus years), and I think despite what's happening now, you're crazy to bet against the American economy in the longrun. But right now, we're mainly focusing on building up some emergency funds, which is what everyone says one should do, so I figure I should. And not being tenured, but tenure-track, I figure it isn't improbable that I could get fired well before my tenure date, and for reasons unrelated to my research output. If this turns into a massive recession and hits incomes hard, who knows what it'll do to students paying tuition at private schools (where I am). The income elasticity of demand is probably not inelastic for a private university.