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Here is something to think about from one of our local financial writers.
Ignorance and unrealistic expectations could spell disaster for many investors.
As consumers, it pays to know what the people trying to sell us stuff think of us.
Such as, we are ignorant and impatient. Full of unrealistic and ever-growing expectations. Undisciplined and headed for disaster unless we change our ways.
That is what many financial advisers -- those who sell us financial products and advice -- are saying about us these days.
No need to get worked up about it, though, because they are right.
"Investors overestimate their knowledge in investments, and their expectations are way out of line," Patricia J. Abram, senior vice president and national sales manager for American Skandia, told a gathering of financial advisers last week. "Put together the ignorance with the expectations, and you have a formula for disaster."
Too bad Abram's talk was just for the advisers, though. I wish the public had heard her talk about our spiraling expectations and our impatience. How we want everything right now -- overnight delivery, fast Internet access, instant results, buy now, pay later. And how we are not saving nearly enough because we think the stock market will do our savings for us.
A survey by Louis Harris & Associates she cited, for example, found 56 percent of investors think stocks will return at least 14 percent a year over the next decade, and 29 percent think it will be even more than that.
"Expectations are out of line," Abram said, considering the average return of stocks since 1926 has been between 11 percent and 12 percent a year.
We expect a lot but we don't know nearly enough to justify our confidence. Abram referred to a survey by The Vanguard Group of mutual funds that shows how little we know.
In the Vanguard survey, less than one half of 1,555 mutual fund investors could answer at least 10 out of 20 multiple-choice questions dealing with basic investment concepts.
Only one in five investors got as many as 14 questions, or 70 percent, right. And this test was given not to the general public, but to people who have their own money at risk in mutual funds.
Here is another example: The employer-sponsored 401(k) plan has become the savings vehicle of choice for working Americans, yet 48 percent of plan participants, according to a recent survey by the firm Sanford C. Berstein, "haven't heard a thing" about their plan or seen any educational materials since the enrollment meeting, Abram said.
"That's scary," she said. And another 23 percent are getting their information about 401(k)s from the media, while only 10 percent get it from a financial adviser affiliated with their plan. "That's even more scary," Abram said.
Another problem, she said, is that we know we need to save but don't have the discipline to do it.
Abram played a video clip by B. Douglas Bernheim, a professor of economics at Stanford University who has studied the saving habits of Baby Boomers since 1992. He estimates that Boomers will need to save three times as much money as they are saving now to maintain their standard of living in retirement if Social Security benefits are not reduced. If benefits are cut by 35 percent, Boomers will have to save five times as much; if eliminated entirely, nine times as much.
"There is a general recognition among Baby Boomers that they are not saving enough," Bernheim told me in a telephone interview. "There is also a general belief they could save more. But they are not doing it."
In other words, we need something or somebody to prompt us to save and invest wisely, and to recognize the consequences if we don't. Abram's message to the advisers is that to succeed they will have to offer clients more than just financial products or plans.
"I don't believe we are in the financial business," Abram told them. "I believe we are in the communications business. Our job is to educate, communicate, motivate."
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