I believe Washington should be a more active participant focusing on the issue of why corporate shareholders and mutual fund shareholders are not given fair treatment by corporate management and mutual fund management. We need to develop a national standard of fiduciary duty to ensure that these agents, if you will, are adequately representing the principles - pension beneficiaries and mutual fund shareholders - whom they are duty bound to serve.
John C. BogleThe relationship between executive CEO pay, stock performance is tenuous and not easily unscrambled, just one of myriad factors that affect the price of a stock.
John C. BogleWhile the apostles of the new so-called "behavioral" theory present ample evidence of how often human beings make irrational financial decisions, it remains to be seen whether these decisions lead to predictable errors that create systematic mispricings upon which rational investors can readily and economically capitalize.
John C. BogleIn Las Vegas we all know that it's the croupiers who win. At the race track, it's those who control the handle who win. State lotteries, does anybody think the participants in the lottery win? No. The state wins.
John C. BogleThe general systems of money management today require people to pretend to do something they can't do and like something they don't. It's a funny business because on a net basis, the whole investment management business together gives no value added to all buyers combined. That's the way it has to work. Mutual funds charge two percent per year and then brokers switch people between funds, costing another three to four percentage points. The poor guy in the general public is getting a terrible product from the professionals.
John C. Bogle