August 18, 2010
There is a very good reason why I began working at a large wire-house that has open architecture and no conflicts of interest to speak of. I use to work for one of the largest insurance companies this country has and I found there was a significant conflict of interest- my benefits being supplemented/paid for were directly tied to me providing company manufactured products to my clients. I found that doing what was right for my clients meant me having to pay for a large proportion of my health and dental insurance. Also my pension was based only on this "core production". There are many, many conflicts of interest that arose while I was working for this large insurance carrier.
I can say I always put the client interests first but I can also say that most of my old associates saw it differently. They sold the company product no matter what-even though we were allowed to sell the same exact product from a competitor at a much lower cost didn't matter to them. Most of these insurance agents are not investment advisors but they put themselves out as being so. They do the general public a disservice. This should be fixed-it's a big problem