‘Never bet against America’: Scott Bessent endorses Warren Buffett’s forgotten rule for getting rich — use it now

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Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has spent decades navigating financial markets, including a long career as a hedge fund manager.

But when Mike Rowe asked him to boil all that experience down to one financial truth every American should understand, Bessent didn’t recommend a hot stock, a complicated trading strategy or a shortcut to riches.

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“Gauge your personal risk level,” Bessent told Rowe during an episode of The Way I Heard It (1). “So a young person should take more financial risk than somebody our age.”

“The worst thing you can do is to get out over your skis,” he added.

But Bessent’s broader message was even simpler: Building wealth is a long game.

He made the point with a joke.

“People used to come up to me and say, ‘Well, how do I make money fast?’ I said, ‘Rob a bank,’” he recalled.

Why? Because markets are unpredictable in the short run.

“The market might go up, it might go down, it might stay the same, but over time it goes up.”

Then Bessent invoked perhaps the most famous long-term investor of all.

“As Warren Buffett said, never bet against America,” he said.

Buffett has indeed used that phrase repeatedly. In Berkshire Hathaway’s 2021 shareholder letter (2), he pointed to America’s extraordinary long-term economic progress, recalling that when he first dipped into the stock market in 1942, the Dow Jones Industrial Average stood at just 99. His takeaway: “Never bet against America.”

Part of what makes that advice stand out is how rarely it’s framed this way today. Much of the mainstream financial conversation revolves around what to buy, when to buy it and where markets are headed next.

Bessent’s message is almost the opposite: Stop obsessing over the next move, understand how much risk you can stomach and give your investments enough time to compound. It may not sound as exciting as the latest stock tip, but that patience is exactly what Buffett has spent decades preaching.

So what does playing the long game actually look like in practice? It can be simpler than you might expect.

Read More: Millionaires under 43 hold only 25% of their wealth in stocks. Here’s where their money is actually going

Start simple with Buffett’s favorite bet

For investors just getting started, simplicity can be a powerful advantage.

Buffett has long argued that most people don’t need to constantly hunt for the next winning stock. Instead, he has repeatedly championed a straightforward strategy: Invest in the S&P 500.

“In my view, for most people, the best thing to do is own the S&P 500 index fund,” Buffett has famously stated (3). This approach gives investors exposure to 500 of America’s largest companies across a wide range of industries, providing instant diversification without the need for constant monitoring or active trading.

The beauty of this approach is its accessibility — anyone, regardless of wealth, can take advantage of it. Even small amounts can grow over time with tools like Acorns, a popular app that automatically invests your spare change.

Signing up for Acorns takes just minutes: Link your cards and Acorns will round up each purchase to the nearest dollar, investing the difference — your spare change — into a diversified portfolio.

With Acorns, you can invest in an S&P 500 ETF with as little as $5 — and, if you sign up today with a recurring investment, Acorns will add a $20 bonus to help you begin your investment journey.

Put your portfolio on autopilot

Bessent also stressed that long-term investing requires emotional discipline.

“You don’t want to panic at the bottom. You don’t want to be euphoric at the top,” he

said.

“The main thing is it’s a long game. It’s a very, very long game.”

And playing that long game doesn’t have to be complicated. Many people simply want an easy way to grow their money, stay on track for retirement and avoid constantly tinkering with their portfolio whenever markets move.

If you prefer a hands-off, tech-forward approach to building wealth, Vanguard’s Digital Advisor puts the investing expertise of one of the world’s largest asset managers right at your fingertips.

It takes the guesswork out of investing by building a personalized portfolio for you using Vanguard’s well-known low-cost ETFs and mutual funds — then keeps things running smoothly with automatic rebalancing.

The platform also offers guidance on saving for retirement and lets you set additional goals as your life evolves.

It can even help you think through debt repayment strategies, potentially freeing up more cash to invest toward your long-term plans.

With a minimum investment of just $100, it’s an easy way to get started with professionally guided investing.

For every $10,000 in an all-index portfolio, you’ll pay approximately $15 to $16 per year.*

You can even test-drive the Vanguard experience with no advisory fees for the first 90 days.

*All investing is subject to risk, including the possible loss of the money you invest.

When the long game gets more complicated

Eventually, investing may stop being just a question of what to buy.

As your wealth grows, you may be juggling retirement accounts, taxes and taxable investments, real estate and related planning, insurance and competing financial goals — all while trying to figure out exactly how much risk makes sense for you.

That’s when Bessent’s seemingly simple advice to “gauge your personal risk level” can become much harder to put into practice.

A 30-year-old building a retirement portfolio may have very different needs from someone approaching retirement in the next few years, drawing income from investments or trying to preserve wealth for the next generation.

In these situations, working with a financial advisor can help you weigh those tradeoffs and avoid costly mistakes.

If you have a portfolio of $250,000 or more, platforms like WiserAdvisor can connect you with vetted professionals who specialize in this kind of planning.

Simply answer a few questions about your savings, retirement timeline and overall investment portfolio.

From there, WiserAdvisor reviews its network to match you — for free — with up to three vetted, reputable advisors aligned with your specific needs.

You can then schedule no-obligation consultations with your matches to determine who is the best fit for your long-term goals.

WiserAdvisor is a matching service and does not provide financial advice directly. All matched advisors are third parties and specific financial results are not guaranteed.

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YouTube (1); Berkshire Hathaway (2); CNBC (3)

This article provides information only and should not be construed as advice. It is provided without warranty of any kind.