[pig4bill]

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The average young person doesn't have enough money to diversify into bonds. The commission charge on a few thousand dollars in bonds takes a big bite out of the yield.

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I'm really not trying to convince anyone to buy bonds, but this is not much of a reason to stay away from bonds. Plenty of bond ETFs via iShares alone that have very low expense ratios and very low transactions costs depending on your broker.

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ETF's are like a bond fund, the interest is reflected in the total tield? Not that I would want a bond anyway, but there's no way I would want any part of a fund. At least with a bond, I can't lose any of the principal unless they default.

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And honestly, it is someone with a small amount of savings that most needs to reduce variance. Not so much if you have backup emergency borrowing options (parents, friends, etc.), but if you really don't have much of a cushion, 100% stocks is a bad idea.

It is also occurring to me that the last couple of years have been atypical in that you can get the same yield from savings or money market funds as you can from bonds, but normally bonds are giving you an extra percent or two.

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If I'm going to have any fixed income, it better be safe as hell. So no corporates, government only. The difference, even many years ago, between govt bond yield and money market yield was not worth the loss of flexibility and commission costs.

I'm not saying nobody should have bonds either, but you were asking why there seems to be little interest in them. I gave you one reason - too much additional risk for too little additional value.