Better understanding how your financial representatives are paid can at least lay the groundwork for better understanding to prevent another financial crisis.

FORBES: Your Financial Advisor's Payday: Are Commissions Contrary to Your Financial Well-Being?

In one of the only long television interviews that he has given since becoming governor of the Bank of England, Sir Mervyn King told me the financial crisis had helped him get a keener understanding of Keynes' analysis of the 1930s.

BBC: Masters of money: John Maynard Keynes

Then the crisis came and the financial world was sent scrambling for understanding.

FORBES: Christmas, Kurtosis, Fat Tails, Black Swans And Risk Management, Pt. 2