MarketWatch Premium: Don’t dismiss what ultra-low dividend yields are telling us: We’re in for puny returns in the stock market

Many on Wall Street argue the dividend yield has lost much or all of the value it used to have as a valuation indicator. But I disagree.

The case against the dividend yield is well-known and, on its surface, compelling.

Prior to the early 1990s, for example, the stock market’s yield rarely dropped below 3%, and an investor would have done…