UpTrajectory Review

James Glassman's Kiplinger piece makes a case that small business owners, long conditioned to treat stocks as the only serious investment vehicle, should reconsider bonds now that yields have climbed to levels unseen in two decades. The 10-year Treasury yield has multiplied eightfold in six years, and 30-year bonds recently offered 5.3% — a figure that competes seriously with the S&P 500's historical 10% average, especially when you account for the fact that stocks have delivered losses in six calendar years since 2000, including a 37% collapse. Glassman's argument is not that stocks are obsolete; it is that the binary framing — growth versus safety — no longer reflects a market where fixed income actually pays.

For a small business owner, this is not an abstract portfolio question. Most operators hold concentrated risk already: their income, their equity, and often their real estate all depend on the same enterprise. When bonds yielded under 1%, diversification into fixed income felt like a guaranteed loss to inflation. At 5% or better, a Treasury ladder becomes a genuine counterweight — a place to park operating reserves, tax set-asides, or sale proceeds without watching purchasing power evaporate. Glassman does not address this directly, but the implication is clear: if your business is your growth engine, your personal portfolio does not need to replicate that risk profile.

The most useful insight in the piece is the historical framing. Glassman traces the long decline in rates from 16% in September 1981 to below 1% in summer 2020, and suggests we may now be in the early stages of a sustained reversal. That is a contested call — plenty of economists expect rates to fall as inflation cools — but the structural evidence he cites is hard to dismiss. Federal debt has ballooned past $40 trillion, interest costs now exceed defense spending, and even tech companies that once shunned debt are borrowing heavily. Demand for capital is rising across every sector, and lenders are demanding more to part with their money.

Where we are skeptical is the inflation math. Glassman notes that even 3% inflation cuts $100 of purchasing power to $74 over a decade, which is accurate, but he treats 3% as a floor rather than a possibility. If inflation settles closer to 2%, the real return on a 5.3% long bond becomes quite attractive. If it stays sticky at 4% or higher, that same bond locks in a loss. The piece does not help readers think through that scenario, nor does it distinguish between locking in long-duration yields now versus building a ladder that rolls over as rates rise. For a business owner with unpredictable cash needs, that distinction matters enormously.

The practical move Glassman endorses — own both stocks and bonds — is sound but incomplete. What he does not say is that the right bond allocation depends on your business cycle. If you are capital-intensive and may need to draw on reserves for equipment or expansion, short-duration Treasuries or T-bill ladders preserve optionality. If you are in a mature, cash-generative phase, longer maturities at today's yields may be worth the duration risk. Either way, the era of treating cash as a default is over. Money market funds and T-bills now pay meaningfully, and sitting idle in a business checking account is an active decision to lose ground.

Watch the Fed's next moves and the trajectory of the 10-year yield, not just the headline rate but the real yield after inflation expectations. If long rates push higher, the window to lock in 5%+ on quality bonds widens. If they fall, today's buyers will look prescient. Either way, the conversation with your accountant or financial advisor should shift from whether to hold bonds to which bonds, what duration, and in what account. The piece is a useful prompt, but the execution details — tax placement, laddering, duration matching — are where the actual value lies.

“The yield on a 10-year Treasury note has increased by a factor of eight in just six years.” — Kiplinger

Takeaway: With Treasuries yielding 5% or more, small business owners should treat bonds as a serious portfolio anchor, not an afterthought.