I first heard about the book ?FREAKONOMICS? a couple months ago, but was reminded of it again this last week by John.
We were talking about a lot of things and it came up that he had
listened to the audio publication of the book and he asked me what I
thought. I hadn?t heard much about it so I decided to pick it up and
look through it. I got it at the airport a couple days later on my way
out of town and had read the entire thing within a couple days. I was
impressed by the book and would recommend it to anybody interested in
learning what school teachers and sumo wrestler?s have in common, or
why your real estate agent might not be working in your best interest
(like that is a big surprise anyways)
What I thought was most
interesting is the feelings it brought to me as I thought about my own
life and the experiences I have had with building a business and
raising my family. I began to look at situations differently and try to
figure out why people do what they do. Is it for my good, their good or
the good of all parties involved? I am interested to see what else the
authors have to write about and will keep following them by reading
their blog.
Freakonomics
made me think about my business and all the people that I interact with
on a daily basis from clients to home offices. Economics is a funny
thing in that not a lot of people understand it. It is especially
alarming to me that the financial advisors and planning industry is
terribly misinforming the general public about what they should be
doing financially. Most financial planners, much like stock brokers,
real estate agents, life insurance agents, mortgage brokers and
countless other ?professionals? are misleading their clients in ways
that are seriously detrimental to their financial health. There is so
much garbage out there that is flat out wrong that it is no wonder
there is so much consumer debt and lack of education out there.
Unfortunately there just isn?t time right now to dispel some of the
myths of traditional financial planning, but I will begin to
illustrate, from an economic point of view, so of the fallacies that
are hurting the American public. Some of the problems that I have in
mind are taxable compound interest, ?Buy Term and Invest the
Difference?, Credit Card Debt, Term and Permanent Insurance, Dollar
Cost Averaging, 15 year Mortgage?s just to name a few.
