My Comments: How much money do you need for a successful retirement? It depends… Unless you already KNOW how your life is going to play out, you can only play the odds. And the odds say that if you are now 65, there’s a 70% chance, based on current statistics, that you’ll need some kind …
Continue reading Health costs in retirement: 5 things you should know and plan for
My Comments: The latest budget proposal from the current White House suggests there will be a new effort to partially defund Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare. What exactly do they expect to achieve politically from this effort? Those of us already receiving Social Security benefits plus the many millions more who are aging and becoming …
Continue reading 3 Social Security Rules We Can All Agree We Hate
My Comments: My entire professional focus these days is helping people retire. To that end I’ve created two online courses that I’m marketing nationally. This article from nextavenue.org points to one of the channels I’m trying to reach. At the local level, I’m prepared to hold workshops for any organization that sees this as an …
Continue reading Retirement: Most Employers Don’t Have a Clue
My Comments: This is a long and detailed story. But if you care about the national debate about health insurance and whether it’s in our best interest to push toward a system of universal health care, this is interesting. There are basically five stakeholders in the healthcare debate. They are (1) the consumer, (2) the …
Continue reading Why Your Health Insurer Doesn’t Care About Your Big Bills
My Comments: We live where the economic model is capitalism. There is no fundamental economic incentive beyond making money for those who provide goods and services to the general public. From time to time, society has found it appropriate to create transparency or to regulate a level of transparency that effectively mitigates against financial abuse. …
Continue reading Small Fees Can Have A Big Impact On Retirement Accounts
My Comments: As with most Social Security calculations, this one is also prone to misinterpretation and mistakes made. My wife and I are an example. I claimed at my FRA (full retirement age) but my wife, 4 years younger, did not. We’re not sure why that happened but for whatever reason, she elected to file …
Continue reading How Are Spousal Benefits Calculated for Social Security?
My Comments: First my apologies for those of you who have little understanding of economics. You are clearly not alone as this article suggests. I’m reasonably well versed, having studied it since I was a college sophmore some 50 plus years ago. I consider Paul Krugman among the foremost authorities on global economics and his …
Continue reading Republicans Hate Deficits. Or at Least That’s What They Claim
My Comments: The woods are full of people attempting to help you prepare for your retirement. Almost all of them want to give you investment advice which may or may not be good advice. It’s an accepted fact that life in 21st Century America is better with more money than it is with less money. …
My Comments: For the vast majority of us, mutual funds ( and sometimes ETFs) are the default financial tool when it comes to growing our money for the future. For about 100 years now, mutual funds have evolved and spread to become ubiquitous in the world of investing money. In my opinion, Vanguard, as a …
Continue reading How a 12-year Vanguard win streak makes it the ‘Amazon of wealth management’
My Comments: These words from Nicholas Hopwood of Plymouth, Michigan, echo the lessons I teach in my online courses at Successful Retirement Secrets. The challenge for everyone who expects to someday retire is to prepare themselves without becoming obsessed with what has to happen first. He stresses, as do I, the need to fully understand …
Helping Define Your Financial Future 