There are many reasons why we’re extremely fortunate to live in a wealthy country like the UK in the 21st century. One of the biggest is the quality of the healthcare we now enjoy. Treatments are commonly available today which would have been inconceivable to our grandparents.
In fact, until the middle of the last century, many doctors and surgeons were more likely to harm their patients than they were to help them. So-called iatrogenic disease, or disease directly by medical intervention, used to be a big problem.
Unfortunately, there are still some professions which arguably do more harm than good today. Research by Morningstar suggests that active money management might be one of them.
Proponents of active management often cite the manager’s ability to as a positive advantage that actively managed funds have over passive ones. For example, they can buy stocks they think are undervalued or sell those they consider undervalued; they can reduce their risk exposure when they’re expecting markets to fall, or increase it when they think they’re about to rise.
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