I find the number of people in this thread with views against index funds to be disturbing.
When you invest in an American stock market index fund, you get a highly diversified financial instrument at a fee that is so low that it is nearly free. You're buying into the proceeds of the strongest cultural force that is stronger in America than anywhere else in the world: greed. The force underlying your investment is that every CEO of every public company in America is working to make you richer, because if they succeed at making you richer, they've made themselves much richer in the process. You are investing in the greed of thousands of public company CEOs. When their greed pays off, you get paid off.
No American president, least of all Donald Trump, is going to stop the raw power of American greed, and that's not going to change without some kind of religious revolution of morals in a country that has become increasingly less religious over time.
I think a huge part of the problem is people's conflation of individual stock investment (which is risky), option trading (which is often gambling in the worst meaning of the word), and investing in mutual/index funds.
I've talked to bunch of people who seem to hate stocks in general.
It really feels like a bunch of people think the stock market is completely fake, gambling, and anyone who invests is directly contributing to strengthening capitalism, which is bad
The fact that like 60-70% of Americans have direct exposure to markets through IRAs and 401k's and benefits incredibly from it is an anathema.
When you invest in an American stock market index fund, you get a highly diversified financial instrument at a fee that is so low that it is nearly free. You're buying into the proceeds of the strongest cultural force that is stronger in America than anywhere else in the world: greed. The force underlying your investment is that every CEO of every public company in America is working to make you richer, because if they succeed at making you richer, they've made themselves much richer in the process. You are investing in the greed of thousands of public company CEOs. When their greed pays off, you get paid off.
No American president, least of all Donald Trump, is going to stop the raw power of American greed, and that's not going to change without some kind of religious revolution of morals in a country that has become increasingly less religious over time.