August 12, 2010
Hello,
You already have great choices and alternatives like Vanguard, Fidelity, ETFs for low cost investing. If you are a do it yourselfer this can work.
An informed decision is what matters. If customers know the costs, let the customer decide just like everything else.
You can pay more for special seats at a sports event or less for other seats, pay more for drinks and food there or stay home. Same with movies, go to the movie or pay per view, rent a dvd or netflix. Same with taxes, get the forms for yourself, turbotax or have a CPA do it. Same with an attorney, use legalzoom or use an attorney. Same with books, buy the book or go to the library. How much more money do movie stars, sports figures, lawyers, accountants, public servants etc. get paid now versus 20 or 30 years ago?
Do you want to force everyone to stay home for the games, movies, go to the library for the books because it is cheaper? Customers can make informed decisions. How about a public servants pay vs. private? Many studies show that private pay is a lot less, should contracts be canceled and your pay and all public employees be paid at the level of the cheapest person willing to do the same work at the private level? If we focus on cost, nothing else matters. Why should anyone make more than the president?
How are any other fee based arrangements different, like managed money, trust accounts, investment management accounts? Why should anyone be paid on fee based arrangements then?
We need informed customers, who can make their own choices about the kind of service and arrangements they want to pay for.
How many other products and services you buy show the markup and or profit margins already transparent by prospectus, internet information services like Morningstar etc?
We can make decisions for ourselves.
Don