Investors would have been better off sweeping their money into the Vanguard Index 500 fund and going to the beach.

Tax-efficient funds like the Vanguard Index 500 fund are easy to find and it is highly likely that they will be tax efficient in the future.

The Vanguard Index 500, for example, ranked 26th out of 75 before and after taxes.

Say an investor put $3,000 into the Vanguard Index 500, and it returned 8 percent a year for 10 years.

The fund is up 26.6 percent so far this year, versus 28.1 percent for the Vanguard Index 500, the biggest of the index funds.

Your best bet is the lowest-cost version, the Vanguard Index 500, because expenses cut into your return.

"The Meridian fund rather than the Vanguard Index 500."

The largest, Vanguard Index 500, was behind by only eight-hundredths of 1 percent.

Since every fund has expenses, shareholders in the Vanguard Index 500 fund saw a slightly lower return of 9.71 percent.

The Vanguard Index 500 also charges $10 annually to accounts with less than $10,000.