The Fiduciary Rule

[Arkady]

I'd missed this bit of Paul Ryan's anti-poverty plan:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox...aughing_at_paul_ryan_s_anti_poverty_plan.html

Basically, he wants to get rid of the fiduciary rule, so that investment advisers can go back to steering their clients to high-fee investment options that are profitable to the advisers but drain the clients. If advisers are expected to act as fiduciaries, they have a duty to look out for those they're advising, but Ryan would prefer they be free to act like "Trump University" salesmen, steering customers wrong to make a buck.

Here's a bit of free investment advice for anyone who is interested. One word: VTI.

VTI is the exchange symbol for the Vanguard Total Stock exchange traded fund. You can buy it through any low-cost online broker (some charge as little as $4.50 for a trade). Costs are negligible (0.05% net expense ratio). You buy and sell it like a stock so you can sell during the day and have your money cleared quickly if you need it in a hurry. It's tax efficient. And it's diversified, since it mirrors the CRSP US total market index, meaning about 4000 companies are represented, proportionally to their size. If you'd bought $1000 of it when Obama took office, it would be worth about $2600 today.

If you want to have fun with investing, you can get a lot more specialized than that. But if you're just looking for a low-cost way to put the stock market to work for you, without having to think about it a lot, a dollar-cost-average approach built on VTI will do it. If your financial adviser is instead steering you to something actively managed, chances are he's looking out for himself, not you.... and Ryan wants to make sure he can keep doing so.

 

[ObamacareForever]

I'd missed this bit of Paul Ryan's anti-poverty plan:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox...aughing_at_paul_ryan_s_anti_poverty_plan.html

Basically, he wants to get rid of the fiduciary rule, so that investment advisers can go back to steering their clients to high-fee investment options that are profitable to the advisers but drain the clients. If advisers are expected to act as fiduciaries, they have a duty to look out for those they're advising, but Ryan would prefer they be free to act like "Trump University" salesmen, steering customers wrong to make a buck.

Here's a bit of free investment advice for anyone who is interested. One word: VTI.

VTI is the exchange symbol for the Vanguard Total Stock exchange traded fund. You can buy it through any low-cost online broker (some charge as little as $4.50 for a trade). Costs are negligible (0.05% net expense ratio). You buy and sell it like a stock so you can sell during the day and have your money cleared quickly if you need it in a hurry. It's tax efficient. And it's diversified, since it mirrors the CRSP US total market index, meaning about 4000 companies are represented, proportionally to their size. If you'd bought $1000 of it when Obama took office, it would be worth about $2600 today.

If you want to have fun with investing, you can get a lot more specialized than that. But if you're just looking for a low-cost way to put the stock market to work for you, without having to think about it a lot, a dollar-cost-average approach built on VTI will do it. If your financial adviser is instead steering you to something actively managed, chances are he's looking out for himself, not you.... and Ryan wants to make sure he can keep doing so.

I really do respect the idea of Paul Ryan. I appreciate the fact he runs on the merits his ideas instead of name-calling and childish ad hominem attacks that the Trumpets are prone to do.
That being said, the merits of his ideas are not very good. It by no means revolutionairy or controversial to cut the waste and ineffeciencies out of welfare programs. He's just not coming up with specific wastes or ineffeciencies to cut out.
It wasn't really a anti-poverty plan. It was just a plan to reduce government spending and a vague one at that, it had nothing in it to actually combat poverty.

 

[Drumcollie]

I'd missed this bit of Paul Ryan's anti-poverty plan:

http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox...aughing_at_paul_ryan_s_anti_poverty_plan.html

Basically, he wants to get rid of the fiduciary rule, so that investment advisers can go back to steering their clients to high-fee investment options that are profitable to the advisers but drain the clients. If advisers are expected to act as fiduciaries, they have a duty to look out for those they're advising, but Ryan would prefer they be free to act like "Trump University" salesmen, steering customers wrong to make a buck.

Here's a bit of free investment advice for anyone who is interested. One word: VTI.

VTI is the exchange symbol for the Vanguard Total Stock exchange traded fund. You can buy it through any low-cost online broker (some charge as little as $4.50 for a trade). Costs are negligible (0.05% net expense ratio). You buy and sell it like a stock so you can sell during the day and have your money cleared quickly if you need it in a hurry. It's tax efficient. And it's diversified, since it mirrors the CRSP US total market index, meaning about 4000 companies are represented, proportionally to their size. If you'd bought $1000 of it when Obama took office, it would be worth about $2600 today.

If you want to have fun with investing, you can get a lot more specialized than that. But if you're just looking for a low-cost way to put the stock market to work for you, without having to think about it a lot, a dollar-cost-average approach built on VTI will do it. If your financial adviser is instead steering you to something actively managed, chances are he's looking out for himself, not you.... and Ryan wants to make sure he can keep doing so.

Well Paul Ryan can introduce a bill but this whole conversation...being a dig at Paul Ryan is a farce. The idea that a law can be repealed requires the Congress to pass the bill in the House or Senate and the n Congress crafts a bill for the President to sign..If Paul Ryan can get the Fiduciary rule to be removed..it would require the President's approval...

1. Do you think Obama would approve and sign this bill?

2. Will there be a bill crafted before Obama leaves office?

3. If Bankster/Wall Streeter Hillary Clinton gets elected...would this be one of her payoffs to Wall Street?

If helping Wall Street becomes an option for Obama or Hillary...they will jump at the chance...if this Bill passes this term, it will be on Obama.

 

[Arkady]

He's just not coming up with specific wastes or ineffeciencies to cut out.

That's why Krugman has dismissed him as a con-man. His budgets rely on "magic asterisks." Basically, he cuts taxes for the rich and insists he'll more than make up for it by cutting spending, but he doesn't have the balls to get specific about which spending he'll cut. Absolutely everyone agrees we should cut wasteful spending, so saying you'll cut wasteful spending is easy. But we disagree on what spending is wasteful, and that's where the hard work comes in. Ryan doesn't seem to be interested in doing the hard work, when he knows that'll just alienate those who see as crucial something he regards as wasteful.

 

[Arkady]

1. Do you think Obama would approve and sign this bill?

I assume that Ryan is hoping he can tack such a provision onto an otherwise popular bill and get it through that way -- for example, hike the earned income tax credit (one of the few things where you could get bipartisan support), but put a rider on it to get rid of the fiduciary rule, with the idea Obama (or his successor) wouldn't dare veto.