I’m a Liberal Because…

As a senior citizen, I’m reminded daily that I’m running out of time to make something happen. I no longer have the energy to be angry about what happened in the past, who is to blame, and explore what might have been. I want to spend my remaining time and energy pushing for what I …

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Here’s what you need to know about Medicare if you’re still working

My Comments: Despite the appeal of retirement, no one is ready to admit that the transition from “working for money” to “money working for you” will be easy. The cost of health care as you get older has the potential to cause your retirement plans to come unglued. To keep that from happening, Medicare is …

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The ‘Great Bull’ market is ‘dead,’ and here’s what’s next, Bank of America predicts

My Comments: For most of my adult life, the major player among brokerage firms in the US was Merrill Lynch. Actually I remember it as Merrill Lynch Pierce Fenner and Smith. Then the crash happened in the fall of 2008 and Bank of America acquired ML on 1/1/2009. The cynic in me said that BoA …

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The Fiduciary Rule Is Dead. What’s an Investor to Do Now?

My Comments: Under the Obama administration, a long awaited and necessary step was taken to introduce rules that protected consumers of investment advice. It created a fiduciary standard for licensed financial professionals that formalized a ‘best interest’ mindset for professionals when working with clients. Very soon after Trump became president, he announced this idea was …

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10 things I’ve learned 10 years after I finished medical school

Friday’s Random Thoughts: I’ve long argued that the health care system in America is a mess. (How Did Health Care Get to Be Such a Mess?) These next words from Kevin Tolliver, a physician with a strong exposure to economics and finance, is a welcome addition to the debate. It’s taken a long time to …

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Trade Wars: Stop Hyperventilating, It’s All About the Dollar

My Comments: Since this article first appeared several months ago, the current administration has doubled down on the idea of import tariffs. For some reason, it thinks that trade wars are what is needed to ‘Make America Great Again’. A reverse analogy that comes to mind are the gas price conflicts that used to appear …

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Social Security’s future

My Comments: Followers of my comments know that I’ve talked in the past about how to fix the projected ‘crisis’ of the Social Security system. I remember the last one, and in 1983 it was fixed. At least for the time being. What happened then was the upper threshold of income subject to what we …

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What’s Next For Investments???

My Comments: You have not heard much from me lately. That's because I've been spending hours and hours building an internet course on retirement planning. I'm not there yet but soon will be. Keep following this blog and you'll get an announcement when it's ready. In the meantime, we're at the end of Quarter 1 …

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How your 401(k) can survive and thrive in the next bear market

My Comments: Some of you reading this have money in 401(k)s and 403(b)s and cannot simply remove it and place it somewhere safer. Which means you’re completely exposed to the vagaries of the markets and you can only hope for the best. I learned long ago that HOPE is not an effective investment strategy. So …

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Guess How Many Seniors Say Life Is Worse in Retirement

My Comments: After 40 plus years as a financial/retirement planner, I’ve lost count of the number of people who, as they approach retirement, ask whether they’ll have enough money. Or the corollary, when will they run out? If you expect to have a successful retirement, ie one where you run out of life before you …

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