[Contributed by reformedinvestor]

This is my favorite excerpt taken from the interview between Steve Kroft of 60 Minutes and Brooks Hamilton, who Kroft interviewed in his expose on 401(k)s.  Hamilton is an expert in designing retirement plans for large corporations.

“The fact is that the typical 401(k) investor is a financial novice. They don’t know a stock from a bond. And we give ‘em a list of 20 or 30 mutual funds with really, really powerful names, you know, they sound like, ‘Gee, that’s where I want to have my money,’” Hamilton said.

“What are the, generally, the quality of the mutual funds in 401(k) plans?” Kroft asked.

“Mediocre,” Hamilton replied. “I’m being real honest with you, with half the funds on the list really dogs, what people would characterize as dogs shouldn’t be on the list to start with.”

So many Americans believed that the 401(k) would be the sure-fire way to safely save for retirement.  In fact, it has been reported that 401(k) plans that have become the primary source of retirement income for 60 million Americans. Companies would match our contributions making it irresistible to sock away money in these mutual funds.  But the truth is, as exposed by 60 Minutes a few weeks ago, that companies turned to 401(k)s as a cheap alternative to offering costly pension plans.  This decision created millions of new employee investors in Wall Street – creating a boom on Wall Street and putting trillions of dollars of investable cash into the hands of unsophisticated investors.

In the 60 Minutes piece, however, experts in the field say [Read more...]