theft
a pickpocket takes your wallet from your pocket and gives you nothing in return. well, nothing of tangible value anyway. clearly, this behavior is bad. and it's illegal. same thing with a con artist who swindles away your cash leaving you with nothing. clearly bad guys. so how come speculators aren't in this category? they're called wall street investors. but really. what do they actually do? they borrow your money. gamble with it. and maybe sometimes beat the other speculators. but on average, they can't. it's literally impossible. it's like paying the con artists to run cons on everyone else. in the end it's a wash. except the con artist gets paid. the speculator gets paid. which takes money from the pool. if you got rid of the pickpocket/con/speculator, there'd be more money for the non-pickpockets/non-cons/non-speculators. ie you and me. do people just not realize that the money to pay the investment managers comes from us? ie directly from the gains of our investments. it's like a tax. paid to royalty, who unlike elected politicians, has no obligation whatsoever to spend it for the benefit of anyone but themselves.