I mean… somebody has to be the bagholders for all their reckless financial speculation.
Sure as shit isn’t gonna be them.
Crypto and Private equity need bag holders with deep pockets and little oversight of their money to keep the pyramid scheme going. Targeting 401ks and passive investors will fill that need… for now.
this is part of why retiring from the stock market is a scam
It’s a great racket to make sure people’s retirement is tied to something that rich people’s wealth relies on, so people will not vote to make rich people less rich because it hurts their retirement.
They don’t want us to retire, they want to literally work us to death. Cheaply as possible I might add.
401(k)s were always a wealth extraction vehicle for the wealthy, they just want a bigger cut now. A pension was an earned and guaranteed benefit. A 401(k) is a gamble for bootraps fetishists.
This is all about having a bigger pool of marks to be left holding the bag when the AI bubble pops. I think capital knows by now that regular retail investors aren’t going to buy the hype enough to buy them out right before the burst, so they need to force them to do so to make sure they keep their money. It’s the same bullshit that had SpaceX trying to get listed on the index funds, only bigger.
TL;DR - They want to allow riskier and more expensive investments into 401(k) accounts.
Many 401(k) options can be pretty crappy as it is now, and as boring as it can be, we need to ensure we understand what we’re signing up for if we don’t expect to be screwed, just as in any other financial situation. Learn the basics of investment saving, set up your own brokerage account, and do a regular sweep of your funds into your personal low fee account as frequently as your employer plan lets you.
Yes, it sucks that they are attempting to remove guardrails, but this shouldn’t be anything new for anyone with a retirement account. If you don’t understand what you are investing in, you’ve already likely failed yourself. Everyone should at minimum be able to understand the terms of your 401(k) policy, know what different asset classes are, and know what expense ratios are. Getting informed keeps us safe. Trusting an employer or financial product salesman is not the way to go.
For anyone wanting to start on basics, from simple to more involved:
Yeah, they’re not “doing” anything to our 401(k)s. Allowing riskier funds to be added and reducing the liability for the people offering those funds is scummy but if someone can’t be bothered to inform themselves my sympathy is limited. When you start a new plan you get about half a tree’s worth of prospectuses, and they are also available online. If you can’t be bothered to learn, just dump it into an index tracker or one of those age based ones that slowly transitions from socks to bonds as you age. If you put a significant amount of money into some risky get-rich-quick scheme: I’m not going to say you deserve it, but I’m not interested in hearing you cry about it.
When do worship services end, when the singing starts or whenever you’re done with the holier-than-thou, limited sympathy shtick for every man, woman, and child not taking the time out of their attention starved lives to read every 500 page thick prospectus? What about every Form 10-K? Let’s just grind the whole dang world to a halt so that everyone can be forced to read all the EULAs, terms of service, company handbooks, and warranty terms for every single thing that touches our lives. “You’re a citizen of this city in this state in this country? Ok recite every single ordinance and law of each from memory bro.” Most Christians haven’t even read the whole Bible, are they still Christians? Are they still called Christians? What about the Bhagavad Gita, did you make sure everyone who offers incense at a shrine has read the entire thing? Do you even speak English if you can’t recite the entirety of Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales?” Let’s calm tf down. Professional investors don’t even read the prospectus. If you want to give ppl the limited-sympathy, r/iamverysmart treatment then mandatory voting would be a more productive place to start but even that has some serious issues too. Isn’t there enough suffering and injustice in the world that we don’t have to look for reasons to justify misfortune when it happens to others with petty “well if they can’t inform themselves I can’t be bothered to have sympathy for my fellow human beings” statements?
I’m sure there are genuine WallStreetBets types that would be thrilled to have some of these zanier options available. I’ve known some reasonably fiscally intelligent people put money into gold, crypto mining funds, supposed collectibles, etc. A company wishing to give people what they want, even if it is stupid, is something that makes sense in that context. I wouldn’t put these things quite up to Nigerian prince levels of scammy, but if someone asked me if they were good investments picks, it’d be an easy no from me.
I have no issue with them being barred from being options in 401(k)s, because even if you do know all the ins and outs of trading these things, a 401(k) is a personal pension plan, and since that is supposed to be your personal safety net, I don’t support people making that safety not of questionable quality ropes, but I also know people foolish with money are going to do so no matter how foolproof you try to make something. I’m mid 40s and almost 100% in all stocks, which some people would consider overly risky, but I am comfortable with it. If someone wants to be what I consider greedy, it’s still within their right to bet on crazy stuff. I’d be mad if 401(k) money could only go into treasuries to be super safe.
There’s always risk in every part of the market, and I think we as a society do a disservice to people not teaching better financial literacy early in life when it can have the greatest impact, but what foolish stuff we spend it on should still really only be our own business. With that said though, now that places are auto-enrolling people into 401(k)s, anyone who would auto-enroll someone into a higher than average risk fund is a prick and should be punished.
Yeah, different things work for different people. I’m retired and 100% stocks, but that’s because I have a pension and my house is paid off and if shit really hits the fan I can just withdraw less, or even zero, for a few years and it’ll only impact my luxury and travel spending.
I do think there should be some guardrails, but you’re right, they shouldn’t be too restrictive, people should have the choice.
As for auto enrolling in these funds; that definitely should be prohibited. Until someone makes a selection it should go into secured bonds, just like a settlement fund with a brokerage. That at least gives them the opportunity to become informed, and if they don’t take that opportunity, that’s on them.
You certainly sound like you did many things right along the way!
My grandfather taught me about the barebones bits when I got my first job at 16 and he started my Roth for me at the time. I didn’t care so much about it then, but by my mid 20s I was doing ok enough to start learning more and take a more active (for a Boglehead!😅) position on things right around the financial crisis, which I think benefitted me as I watched the money I had left untouched and largely forgotten about disappear, but then shortly after got to watch it come back with a vengeance for a long time, so it taught me to ride things out.
I’m about to get my mortgage down in the 5 figures, so that milestone is starting to actually feel in sight. My wife went back to school recently and has a great job now, and my personal investments are worth more than my house at this point, so I’m pretty pleased with myself considering I’ve never been a high earner.
I see we both picked up downvotes, and I can understand even at what I’d consider a healthy modest net worth, that this is still out of reach for far too many, so I wish people would talk rather than just be silently pissy. I’m not here to gloat about anything or say this rule change is great. Anyone who actually read what I said should be able to get that. But no matter our position, we can almost always find some small way to improve our situation, it just starts with education. Can’t please everyone though!
I had a little early exposure myself. A math class in junior high had a project where we invested fake money over the semester. When my dad learned of this he opened me a brokerage account and put a little money in so I was doing it for real and took the opportunity to give me some basic education. My results were…mixed, but I learned a lot. (This was the late 80s so he actually had to get on the phone every time I wanted to trade.) So I paid more attention than my peers as soon as I got my “real” job after college, this allowed me to retire as soon as I earned a pension in my late 40s. My wife thought it was weird how much I was into it when we met in our mid 20s but she says she’s very appreciative now.
Losing that 6th figure from the mortgage is huge. I remember how good that felt, congrats on the milestone!
I don’t know how long you’ve been on Lemmy but discussing sound strategies for living in a capitalist system (which most of us have no control over) instead of screaming about how everything is designed to make us wage slaves for life and ensure we die pennyless (they may be right, but many people avoid that fate and I would like to be one of them) is always going to pick up some downvotes. God help us if someone decides it’s interesting enough to post a screenshot on “the triad” and they decide to hop on their alts and come over. Comes with the territory.
Wow, that was great your dad did all that to help you learn! My wife isn’t much into it, but she at least knows it’s a good thing. When I met her, she was basically broke and had trashed credit and got her car repo-ed. It turned out she had some underlying mental health things exacerbated by 2 significant deaths in the family, so after getting her back on track with that, I helped her get her finances back in order, and then she was able to go back to school and is now doing better than I am! 😅
There are all kinds of investments really. I funded her a secured credit card and supported her while she was recovering and while she was in school and interning, cosigned so she could get a reliable car for all that, and now her credit score is over 800, she got her own new car and gave me her 3 year old one I helped her get, and she’s putting a good amount into her retirement savings and pays for all our travel and dining. It’s not a luxurious life, but it’s more than enough. A lot of people probably would have seen that as a risky investment!
I’ve been here for 3 years and mainly just talk owls and wildlife rehab, but I was curious what the OPs article was about and wanted to give people a brief overview since I know many respond just to the headline and I wanted to show it wasn’t all that sinister. I was just talking to someone else here this morning I kind of feel alienated from just about all political movements, but I acknowledge I live in a capitalist society, so that’s the game I’m stuck in right now, so I’m going to play that to the best of my abilities. I don’t have to cherish it, but it’s the hand I’ve drawn. Complaining nets me nothing. Making the most of what I do have, in a way I feel is moral, is the best I can do. I’ve got to look out for myself and my wife because no one else will if things ever go bad. If all my educational and helpful posts haven’t convinced people I’m at least a smidge on the decent side, nothing is going to convince them. I’m just here to chat with people, not convert them to some belief system.
Seconding Bogleheads’ general advice. I’ve recomended The Investment Answer, which gives broadly the same advice.
From looking at the 5 points in the summary, it sounds like similar advice. It’s been all I needed to do realistically well for myself, and once you set things up, if you’ve been honest with yourself in your risk levels, you set it and forget it for a couple decades, since so many sites let you automate everything.
It really doesn’t need to be hard, I think a lot of people think it’s going to be and just flat out don’t want to learn, even when I try to ELI5 to them. I’m honest with them and will show them my balance and holdings to show I’m not blowing smoke, but I don’t know if anyone but my wife and ex have ever listened, and even then I think it was just so they didn’t need to listen to it anymore. 🙄
They want us to die penniless. First they strap young people with tens of thousands in student loan debt, suppress wages, raise taxes and prices higher and higher, heavily promote video games and turn citizens into Dopamine junkies, then transition them to rigged gambling and prediction market apps, do massive targeted advertising timed precisely to the consumers’ personal aspirations, making them irresistible, etc, over an entire lifetime.
It’s all designed to extract every last penny out of our pockets by the time we’re old. And just in case you had enough money to put aside into a safe retirement fund, so that you’d have a nest egg, even if you burned through everything else, now they want to get their mitts on that, and steal that, too.
They aren’t moistachiod villains, actively plotting people’s misery for their joy.
They’re simply making choices that are good for them personally, as anyone would. They aren’t thinking of any broader externalities and effects on people they’ve never met.
These people ARE cartoonish villains because that is literally their entire cultural frame of reference. They are profoundly ignorant, none more than their Fuhrer himself. None of these people paid attention in school, they all beat up some nerd to do their homework. Obvious morons like Trump and Hegseth got their entire educations from TV and movies, and their entire political education from the Conservative Propaganda Machine.
They are cartoonish buffoons, but they think they look tough. It’s obviously very frustrating for them that we don’t take their fearsomeness seriously.
I can agree with those in political office.
But I’m more refering to the common $100Millionare +. They generally aren’t trying to screw people for the fun of it. They just do what’s good for them, without thinking much of the externalities. In my experience most people work the same way. Once you point out the negative effects they’re causing, they’ll change what they do, in that instance at least. Then quickly go back to ignoring and forgetting the problem, because it’s not their problem.
Few are cartoon villains; few are thinking of externalities. But the people pushing for this change know what they’re doing. They are actively plotting wealth transfer from the working class to the capitalist class.
Those who suffer from conspiracy phobia are fond of saying: “Do you actually think there’s a group of people sitting around in a room plotting things?” For some reason that image is assumed to be so patently absurd as to invite only disclaimers. But where else would people of power get together – on park benches or carousels? Indeed, they meet in rooms: corporate boardrooms, Pentagon command rooms, at the Bohemian Grove, in the choice dining rooms at the best restaurants, resorts, hotels, and estates, in the many conference rooms at the White House, the NSA, the CIA, or wherever. And, yes, they consciously plot – though they call it “planning” and “strategizing” – and they do so in great secrecy, often resisting all efforts at public disclosure. No one confabulates and plans more than political and corporate elites and their hired specialists. To make the world safe for those who own it, politically active elements of the owning class have created a national security state that expends billions of dollars and enlists the efforts of vast numbers of people.
— Michael Parenti
that’s not fair, these days they plot via insecure chatrooms, from the comfort of their luxury yachts or whatever.
“as anyone would”
I guess altruism is a made up thing?
Well it is, just like greed is a made up thing.
In a proper world, altruism wouldn’t exist.
It only does because nature is uncairing, and society can be cruel.But being made up doesn’t matter to my point. People can create a problem with one hand, while trying to fix it with another, having never noticed the connection.
I would’ve been fine with your comment if you hadn’t included that. I don’t doubt these people are trying to act in their own self interests.
But when you say “as anyone would” it implies everyone is horribly selfish and never takes other people into account when making decisions ever and this is just accepted common knowledge, which it isn’t.
Anyone and everyone are very different things.
Yes, the words are different, but the meaning was effectively the same. “People are inherently selfish and we all know this”
I wasn’t saying selfish. More myopic, or ignorant.
Animals are altruistic. Just search for _____ saves person. You will find lots of instances of animals saving humans. Not just dogs and cats either. Ravens, crows, pigeons, elephants dolphins, beluga, and humpbacks are all well documented displaying protective behaviors when predators are around humans that they know.
It’s not just animals that are altruistic, i maintain that life as a concept is fundamentally cooperative.
At its most basic you can just reduce it to “fighting and competing wastes energy, whereas actively cooperating can make things more efficient or straight up unlock new resources”.I mean just look at our own gut flora: The microorganisms that cooperate with us (to the degree that we’d die without them) actively do things to prevent other nasty microorganisms from taking hold. Or how tons of plants and fungi communicate with each other and even share nutrients.
Cooperation is so utterly fucking bog standard that we gloss over 90% of it and it takes an individual basically killing itself to save another for us to realize it’s happening.While that is all true, I didn’t think the previous commenter would find many stories titled “ameoba saves man,” or the like.
that’s kinda my point, they’re just constantly keeping you alive, and no one even thinks about it
Of course they do. Altruism was made up by all social species. A few others even copied it.
are you implying other animals saw social species be altruistic and… decided to be altruistic for fun?
What pedantic definitions to be as reductive as possible. You are not a good person.
What a thought stopping dismissal, to be as righteous as possible.
You don’t know what makes a good person.We dont accept the premise of assholes here
It’s clear you lot think you don’t fart.
That’s why they want the change. If you lose the money in your 401(k), it is not gone. It’s just that someone else has it. If you retire in poverty, someone else has an additional Ferrari.
That’s an over-simplification of the mechanics of wealth transfer, but yes, wealth transfer is their goal here, and they know what they’re doing, so it will work if they get their way, which they may given how captured our government is by the Epstein class.
