ridiculously complex financial system

Our financial system and personal finances are becomming, have become ridiculously complex; so much so that many people require the help of financial experts. And its much worse for disabled people ie. brain injured and seniors. The financial system is for everyone but increasingly only the very intelligent can figure it out and this needs to change!

And how can someone judge the expertise of someone else if they themselves don't understand it? Is anyone regulating in the Public Interest, the financial system? Keeping it streamlined, simple etc?

 

so you want communism

 

... you're absolutely right, flutterby. investing can indeed be very confusing. there are a lot of ways to get scammed. two pitfalls that come to mind for me are mutual funds and registered retirement accounts ...

... in addition to not always yielding the greatest return on your money invested, mutual funds almost always have major fees attached to them. you pay a fee to invest in them, you pay a fee when you take your money out of them and on top of that they have hidden fees which eat into your gains as well. having said that, i started with mutual funds myself and they can help beginners learn the basics of investing, as they did for me. however, i soon grew out of them and would never go back to them ...

... and the problem with registered accounts like RRSPs is the taxes you have to pay when you cash out. it's just ridiculous. and there's no way around paying either. when you withdraw from an RRSP account the bank or brokerage actually pays a huge chunk of your cash to the tax man. RRSPs are just a scheme for the government to have control of your money. i learned the hard way about having an RRSP account and i'd never invest in one again ....

 

@the mechanic, that's the point of an RRSP. It allows you to defer taxes, not get out of paying them entirely. TFSAs are better suited for your purpose.

RRSPs are probably the most poorly understood program in Canada. For those at lower income brackets, RRSPs can be a bad investment decision yet the banks still sucker people into buying them with promises of "paying less tax".