Your next question, “How about if what is good for a financial professional MIGHT be good for us, retirees, too?” Let me start out by saying you have a directly opposing and competing interest with the broker who sold you the annuity, period. That broker has no fiduciary responsibility to you. Your broker’s sole responsibility is to represent and act in the best interest of the annuity company. If your broker stated before offering you advice or selling you products, “I have NO fiduciary responsibility to you. I am paid commissions from mutual fund and variable annuity companies from your transactions, not by whether or not your investments succeed or fail,” How comfortable would you feel?

For the broker to truly look after your interests while at the same time earning the best living possible is like trying to ride a horse in opposite directions at the same time. The bottom line in all of this is that your broker is not your friend, and your broker is not looking out for your best interest. The first conflict is that brokers are compensated through sales commissions. The more they sell, the more they earn. The more they recommend that you invest in products that pay a high commission, the more they earn. Their earnings are your costs, and costs are one of your portfolio’s worst enemies.

True fiduciary duty legally obligates the provider of investment advice to place the investor’s interests before any other party: the provider of investment advice, the provider’s employer, and the shareholders of the provider’s employer. If you have the perception that you were treated fairly, then I am happy for you. Another aim of mine is to get investors to examine and gain a much better understanding of the conflicts of interest in the financial services.

For you to water down the complexity of the details inherent in these financial products by comparing them to something like a certificate of deposit at bank, that is very easy for 99.99999 percent of the adult population on this planet to understand, is quite laughable. My 96-year-old great auntie understands what a CD is and how it works. She is well aware of the fact that if she withdraws the money from a CD before it expires; there will be a penalty charge. This is not news to her or any other person I’ve met in my lifetime. Yet, I have met numerous folks who have no idea what an annuity is costing them, what the hell a surrender charge is, what benefits they are paying for, etc. Many of these folks have brought written complaints against the broker who sold them the product for failing to disclose these very facts. These are not mentally challenged people. I even came across the book, Annuities for Dummies by Kerry Pechter (I have yet to find the equivalent for CD’s). The glossary of terms alone to define the many variables and nuances of annuities is quite extensive and several pages long.

I understand annuities and the like quite extensively and I don’t see how the benefits outweigh the costs. It seems like a lot of hocus pocus and a smoke screen to help separate investors from their hard earned dollars. It’s my strong belief that Investors by educating and informing themselves and placing their budget on a diet can replicate and achieve similar results without paying high upfront commissions, exorbitant internal fees, surrender charges, etc. Your unquestioned devotion to investing in annuities by trying to compare them to certificates of deposits makes me suspect you are nothing more than a shill for the brokerage industry.