Well, I had never played with the consistent market growth option, but now I realize what it is. It's literally a fixed rate of return, in your scenario, a 0% return on equity and fixed income and 3% inflation - year in and year out. And that's why there is only one line on the results chart, even if you enter some positive return. Unless you're literally putting your money under a mattress, I don't believe there are any real (30 year) fixed rate of return investments. Even if equity and fixed income returns 0% overall, they will flucuate from year to year.
At any rate, I used your consistent market growth 0% market growth -0% fixed income -3% inflation scenario and the 100% success threshold 30 year withdrawal rate was 1.98%. This literally models putting your money under your mattress in a 3% inflation environment! IMO, the consistent market growth option shouldn't be used to model any real world scenario except under the mattress.
If you actually plan to invest in equities and fixed income but you want to model a net 0% return to be "most conservative/cautious", I think you'd have to select the fourth Your Portfolio option, random performance, and enter 0% portfolio return, 10% standard deviation (default, unless you believe otherwise) and 3% inflation. That results a 100% success threshold 30 year withdrawal rate of about 0.9%! OUCH!
I hadn't thought about it, but that says if you expect a 0% distribution portfolio return, you are indeed better off putting your money under your mattress instead of investing at all (based on 100% success WR's).
However, in your example you also have an appreciating asset in Soc Security which will improve your WR result.
And if we have 0% portfolio returns and 3% inflation for 30 years, we are all in big trouble...
