The point about the hot tubs was meant to illustrate one of the sources of rising college tuition that has nothing to do with education. In order to attract higher income students, whose parents will pay the full tuition, colleges ( including public colleges) have spent lavishly on climbing walls, luxurious dorms, saunas, locally sourced all organic expensive food that no middle class family could afford.
Any school that doesn't looses "customers" whose parents can write checks for $50,000 plus a year.
When I went to the University of Texas in the 1970s we ate enchiladas and meatloaf. Now even the kids there get kale, organic sprouts, six desert stations, all you can eat fresh midnight cookies etc.
There was one University I read about a few years ago that decided to lower their tuition to attract more applicants. In fact their applications fell dramatically because applicants thought they might not get all the services other schools were offering.
It is an arms race that has little to do with the quality of the education, but the image and amenities.

@Mark
I was struck by the Barron's article on TSLA 1/8/23
https://www.barrons.com/articles/buy-tesla-stock-price-pick-51673047775
"It helps that Tesla is expected to generate the most free cash flow among auto makers in 2023, some $12.2 billion, up from $9 billion in 2022. Toyota, the second-most-valuable auto company, is expected to generate free cash flow of about $10 billion this year and next. "
So I held my nose and bought a little. It is up from $121 to $177

I moved a Vanguard account to Schwab last summer, disgusted by their lousy service.
Since then I have been unable to log into the account getting instead a "reestablish online access" which didnt work.
Messaging Vanguard says it will take 7 to 10 days to respond!
So I held my nose and called. Surprise surprise I got a nice guy in the Philippines in less than 5 minutes who fixed the online access issue ( it took half an hour) . They also transferred me to another guy who told me my tax forms will be available by mid February.
While I am not going to move money to Vanguard, maybe they have heard the furor and are spending some money to improve service

@LewisBraham
At least in Southwestern Connecticut, Electric Boat is desperate to hire "blue collar" technically trained industrial workers to build subs. They subsidize the training programs in high school and guarantee a job if student finishes program. Unlike the Cape, where you can charge $350 to put in a toilet ( personal experience) people can afford to live in SW CT.
A lot of the CHIPS act and Inflation Reduction Act is directed exactly at building those training programs in Red States
https://www.brookings.edu/research/with-high-tech-manufacturing-plants-promising-good-jobs-in-ohio-workforce-developers-race-to-get-ready/
How US compares to the rest of the world in College expenses
https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2018/09/why-is-college-so-expensive-in-america/569884/
"All told, including the contributions of individual families and the government (in the form of student loans, grants, and other assistance), Americans spend about $30,000 per student a year—nearly twice as much as the average developed country. “The U.S. is in a class of its own,” says Andreas Schleicher, the director for education and skills at the OECD, and he does not mean this as a compliment. “Spending per student is exorbitant, and it has virtually no relationship to the value that students could possibly get in exchange.”
For example, U.S. colleges spend, relative to other countries, a startling amount of money on their nonteaching staff, according to the OECD data."
That doesn't include the climbing gyms, hot tubs and locally sourced organic food the students demand!

My experiences. At Fidelity same as above. Quicker phone help with more seasoned reps with Premium. Dedicated rep disappeared. With Etrade surprise ,surprise, surprise. A dedicated rep who has a direct # and calls back usually within 15 min. He handles any questions, problems etc to make my "experience" more satisfying with Etrade. I believe this is available with a minimum 50K account. No portfolio advice as this is a self directed account. Vanguard has children answering the phones. Firstrade and Wellstrade have no dedicated reps even with large self directed accounts. Ally Invest is sad. Anyone else with a different assessment of these?

Recalling from the peak Covid period of time; which affects my dating of some events. We had an individual assigned to our accounts; if we needed/wanted to have a direct contact at a Fido business office within our region. He did call 2 times to introduce himself and express he could help us with any questions/services.
We were not involved in any Private Client or advisor services. I suspect he was assigned to us based upon our asset base with Fido. There were about 10 others at his office in similar positions.
He was shown as our contact when logged into the web site. My best recall guess is that this was the 2019-2021 period and then he was no longer shown as our contact. I don't know whether Fido stopped the practice, or because we never contacted him for any services.
@Soupkitchen et al
Fidelity hiring 1,000's
I suspect you'll have contact with some 'newbies', I've never encountered a circumstance, however; when a rep. who couldn't fully help, didn't immediately escalate my call to the proper person of knowledge.

There is also of course the PPP business loan forgiveness hypocrisy from the 2020 bailouts:
https://statesman.com/story/news/politics/politifact/2022/09/06/fact-check-ppp-loans-forgiven-republicans-matt-gaetz-marjorie-taylor-greene/65470173007/ It's OK for Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene to get their business loans forgiven, but not students.
There are also ancillary benefits to society overall from an educated populace: less crime, better understanding of the political process and an educated workforce to compete with other nations. It isn't just me, me, me as Crash suggested, although a degree is pretty much essential now to be in the middle class. Ironically, there are states today that spend more tax dollars on prisons than they do on public schools and their university systems.

@Devo : Thanks for your info. Can you tell me what drove the adjusted NAV from $51.22 01/01/2020 to $54.38 at the end of Aug. 2020 as no dividends were paid during this time period.
Thank you, Derf

Two sectors where prices have grown the fastest for many years are two which IMHO should be accessible to all: education and health care.

From an 1887 letter from the Commissioner of the Department of Education, referencing Thomas Jefferson's Notes on Virginia, Query XIV:

Jefferson devised an ingenious plan whereby the boys of best talent, the sons of the people, might be discovered and sent forward, although poor, to preparatory colleges, and finally to the University of Virginia. Such a plan is now in practical operation in the, State of New York, in connection with Cornell University, which accepted the agricultural college land grant upon the condition of free education to talented graduates of local high schools and academies, and also prevails in many other States, where young men receive the benefits of the higher education, without charge for tuition, at the State universities and agricultural land-grant colleges. Natural selection and the survival of the fittest are great needs in American schools, colleges, and universities. Jefferson's ideas, if they should ever be realized throughout the country, will deliver us on the one hand from the over-education of mediocrity, and on the other from the under-education of genius. It is the duty of democracy to evolve from itself the highest talent, not only for government and administration, but for the advancement of science and the arts.

Thomas Jefferson and the University of Virginia (1888)
Jefferson posited that for the benefit of society, education should be available to everyone up to their ability level or further if willing to pay.
In a recently concluded college course in rhetoric, we were split into groups to debate the merits of free tuition (the topic I suggested for debate). There are valid, and many invalid, arguments on both sides. While I was assigned to the anti-free tuition group, personally I side with TJ.

Most indexes peaked in 01/2022 although SP500-value peaked in 04/2022 and it is near its peak. Chart also shows SP500-growth (still down a lot), SP500 (down) and equal-weight SP500 (down only some).
Chart 1-Yr (Live)
Charts 01/2022- , Image https://i.ibb.co/v3tkp6B/Screenshot-2023-01-27-07-56-20.png

About -15.4% off on the S&P 500 from the high of 4796.5 set in January 22.
Possibly what @Junkster referenced … S&P Value Index:
Ticker SVX - “We measure value stocks using three factors: the ratios of book value, earnings, and sales to price. S&P Style Indices divide the complete market capitalization of each parent index into growth and value segments. Constituents are drawn from the S&P 500®.”
Source

Since November, oversea funds are making bigger move upward than those of S&P500. Weaker dollar is helping funds without currency hedging.
Mild winter weather slow energy sector’s advance. The defensive sectors such as utilities and consumer staples are lagging behind. Quite a reversal from last year.
Biggest surprise are the bonds that are advancing across the board as if rate hike is near the top.
If this is bear rally, they are pretty broad.

It’s been a decent run past month or two. I realize most don’t pay much heed to the DJI. But I’ll note it’s near 34 K - Not too far below where it topped out in early 2022 - around 37 K if I recall. Of course the S&P and NASDAQ still deep in the weeds. Curiously, EM has turned around after getting blown away in 2022. DODEX +10% YTD.
And thanks Yogi for the update.

I saw somewhere where the S@P Value Index is but 3.5% from its all time highs. Haven’t verified though if true. The moves off the October lows in equities and the October/ November lows in bonds have been eye catching and seemingly something much more than a bear market rally. And talk about trend persistency, most bond funds in the Preferred category have been up everyday this month.

While I have my own issues with student loan forgiveness, I can understand the perspective of Millennials and Gen Zs who think it’s hypocritical that many in the older generation were perfectly fine with two massive government taxpayer funded bailouts of financial markets in 2008-09 and 2020 in which the younger generations have little invested because in part they are laden with student debt. Not to mention the fact that in some cases I imagine they are indebted to the very banks that were bailed out with taxpayer dollars in 2009. That is on top of the bailouts “small businesses” got in 2020, which the government defines as any company with less than 500 employees—many large companies qualified.
And finally, the cost of tuition is astonishing today even at public universities, when the older generations had much more affordable educations. The average cost of attendance for a student living on campus at a public 4-year in-state institution is $25,707 per year or $102,828 over 4 years. Out-of-state students pay $43,421 per year or $173,684 over 4 years. Private, nonprofit university students pay $54,501 per year or $218,004 over 4 years. This in a country where tuition at public universities was once exceedingly low and in certain cases free. It is also true that it is extremely difficult for anyone to have a middle class life today without a college degree when this was not the case in earlier generations. Well-paying Industrial blue collar jobs that don’t require a degree have largely disappeared in 2023. So kids have to go to college and they end up in debt because of it.

I received the same email as well.
A couple of oddities about the Vanguard fund:
- Vanguard doesn't show its annual report on the fund page
(You can find it at the SEC here; search for multi-sector)
- On the page linked to by Yogi, the fund is described as " investing in 3 different sector allocations (IG, HY, and EM)"; developed markets aren't mentioned.
-- Contrast this with FADMX. Prospectus says: "four general investment categories: high yield securities, U.S. Government and investment-grade securities, emerging market securities, and foreign developed market securities.".
-- Or PONAX, whose prospectus speaks of investing in debt located "in the United States and non-U.S. countries, including emerging market countries."
FWIW, FADMX's foreign holdings are about 3/4 EM, 1/4 DM, while VMSIX's are split pretty evenly between EM and DM.

VMSIX / VMSAX is a newer low-cost (10/2021- ; ER 0.40%/0.30%) multisector bond fund from VG. It had restricted availability so far and had a bad 2022, like other multisector bond funds. The AUM is $22.5 million only and the data on it are sparse. Now that it will be generally available, its AUM may pick up. It would need a longer record for comparison with FADMX, PONAX / PIMIX, etc.
https://investor.vanguard.com/investor-resources-education/news/introducing-the-vanguard-multisector-income-bond-fund

https://marketwatch.com/story/the-economy-and-the-stock-market-tends-to-do-better-under-democrats-11611158787
https://kiplinger.com/investing/602714/best-and-worst-presidents-according-to-the-stock-market
By the way, if he knows it, it must just kill Trump that the annualized return for the stock market was 13.8% under Obama versus Trump's 13.7%.

Here is the registration filing the ETF:
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/923184/000119312523015189/d442407d485apos.htm

For the week ending on 1/25/23, bearish became the top sentiment (36.7%; above average) & bullish remained the bottom sentiment (28.4%; below average); neutral became the middle sentiment (35.0%; above average); Bull-Bear Spread was -8.3% (below average). Investor concerns: Inflation (moderating but high); supply-chain disruptions; economy; the Fed (higher rates longer); dollar; crypto ice-age; market volatility (VIX, VXN, MOVE); Russia-Ukraine war (48+ weeks); geopolitical. For the Survey week (Thursday-Wednesday), stocks were up, bonds down, oil up, gold up, dollar down. Notably, this Survey changed direction so soon (in 4 weeks). #AAII #Sentiment #Markets
https://ybbpersonalfinance.proboards.com/thread/141/aaii-sentiment-survey-weekly?page=8&scrollTo=912