Like I said, this is nitpicky to the nth degree (and in full disclosure I advised my wife to do a target fund when she started investing). You can do much, much worse than a target fund and hardly better.
That said, I've encountered many 401k plans over the years where the target funds have very bad expense ratios (.35 or higher). Meanwhile there will be a total market fund and a bond fund sitting closer to .08 or .09.
I personally, had a 401k plan that had the choice of a target fund at .28 expense ratio or a fidelity spartan class total market with NO initial investment requirements. I was able to invest at 0.07 expense ratios when I had less than $500 in a retirement account.
So, if you have the choice at a Vanguard target fund, yeah you aren't going to do much better than that. But especially when someone else is limiting what you can invest in, it can be advantageous to go with bare index funds.
That said, I've encountered many 401k plans over the years where the target funds have very bad expense ratios (.35 or higher). Meanwhile there will be a total market fund and a bond fund sitting closer to .08 or .09.
I personally, had a 401k plan that had the choice of a target fund at .28 expense ratio or a fidelity spartan class total market with NO initial investment requirements. I was able to invest at 0.07 expense ratios when I had less than $500 in a retirement account.
So, if you have the choice at a Vanguard target fund, yeah you aren't going to do much better than that. But especially when someone else is limiting what you can invest in, it can be advantageous to go with bare index funds.