Indeed, but "protecting them from themselves" is more or less the regulators' job-description, while "educating them" isn't?
I am actually thinking of the model where regulatory bodies don't just save you from the worst of yourself, they say this is what you have to do, this is what you have to be, before you can do this.
First and formost, the regulator is called a regulator for a reason !
Second, The regulator's job is *both* protection and education. Ask anyone who works in the financial sector about CPD (and why they need to do it) and authorisations (and why they need them).
The problem is, educating/authorising all the people in the financial sector is "easy" because the regulator can regulate for it, and then the various firms and their compliance departments can take care of ensuring the education happens.
If you went down the educating/authorising route for individual investors, then the regulator would need to take on a lot of the work themselves - or assure themselves of the credentials and ongoing quality of third-party training providers (because they would obviously need to ensure the training was independent and impartial). The problem is the regulator only employs so many people, and those people already have a big workload.