Retirement

New Jersey, the only state to have a pension funded status worse than Illinois’s (according to Pew’s 2020 compilation based on 2018 data), is quite pleased with itself because, as the state announced in a recent press release, “State Treasurer Elizabeth Maher Muoio announced that the Treasury Department today kicked off the start of the

By Barbara Field, Next Avenue The U.S. Chamber of Commerce reported last summer that female-owned small businesses were “disproportionately affected by the coronavirus pandemic and corresponding economic crisis.” The prediction for growth and revenue looked depressing. But these three women, all over 50, bucked the statistics by embracing digital technology and pivoting their businesses. During the

Retirement plan design can make or break an employee’s ability to maintain their standard of living in retirement. Over the past several decades, many private sector companies implemented a complete overhaul in retirement plan design, shifting from defined benefit pensions to 401(k)-style defined contribution accounts.  Originally designed to supplement rather than replace pensions, 401(k) plans

Rep Tom Suozzi (D-NY) has introduced a bill to create a public, catastrophic, long-term care insurance program. The monthly cash benefit, initially about $3,600 and indexed for inflation, would be funded with a modest increase in the payroll tax of 0.3 percent for workers and 0.3 percent for employers, or roughly $300-a-year for a median

Goal-based financial planning isn’t a new concept. Neither is diversification.  We know that we’ve historically used life insurance as a risk management tool that helps with income replacement during your working years. But life insurance also plays an important role in a diversified and comprehensive financial plan. It’s important to first establish your goals, then

People worry about money in good times and in bad. Surveys, pre-COVID, typically found that about seven-in-ten people were stressed about money at any given time. The impact of the pandemic on this stress? It exacerbated an issue that many of us already lived with. Between the worry over health and general well-being of the

If you have a 401(k) at work, you’re probably familiar with the standard advice about such plans: make sure to contribute enough to receive any employer match and make the maximum contribution if you’re able. But some employers offer both a traditional 401(k) and a Roth 401(k), and it can be difficult to determine if

From my perspective as investment counsel focusing on retirees, I want to see everyone paying themselves first by automating the savings process. And, the further retirement is away from today, the more impact those saved dollars have when invested properly. Of course, things can intervene, like losing a job, or being hit with the unexpected

 I’m willing to bet your retirement plan includes a lot of numbers: a list of estimated expenses, an asset allocation strategy, a timeline of withdrawals, inflation and return assumptions, and a plan for healthcare tossed in there just for fun. Chances are your plan is primarily focused on the math, how you will spend your

Earlier this month, the forensic investigation of the $90 billion-plus State Teachers Retirement System of Ohio commissioned by the Ohio Retired Teachers Association and performed by my firm, was completed. The damning preliminary findings have now been reported to Ohio legislators, regulators and law enforcement. The report concluded the state pension has long abandoned transparency;

This will not be an easy request, but can we, for a moment, put aside our furor and frustration with billionaires who used Roth IRAs as their personal tax-free piggybanks? It’s hard not to get riled up about a billionaire who managed to put a couple grand into a Roth IRA and have it now

Recent tales from the Crypto world remind casual investors of the risk of speculating All of a sudden, it’s raining cryptocurrency. In other words, they are coming down in price the way rain falls in the tropics. Bitcoin is the most well-known, sort of the Band-Aid brand of this new crew of digital monetary species.

If you’ve watched your parents or older relatives age into their final years, you might have witnessed a decline in their ability to manage their money. As they got older, they became more vulnerable to financial losses due to making mistakes, exploitation by unethical family or friends, or financial fraud. Substantial research confirms this risk.

Most estate planning lawyers are conscientious and do their jobs as expected. But some seem to forget that in the real world all family members don’t get along so well. A mistake we keep seeing at AgingParents.com, where we offer advice to families with elders is that lawyers put disconnected and even hostile adult children

Climate change is a huge challenge globally.  The Society of Actuaries (SOA) conducts research on a wide variety of risks and their impact on retirement planning for various stakeholders. Two recent SOA research projects that focused on households and on big societal issues include Financial Perspectives on Aging and Retirement Across the Generations and The 14th Annual Survey

We are a few weeks away from the arrival of advance Child Tax Credit (CTC) payments (July 15). If your family is potentially eligible for the payments, you might have already received a letter from IRS about the CTC. To guide you, here are the answers to five important questions to ask. ADVERTISEMENT 1. How

Earlier this week, the media reported that life expectancy in the U.S. had declined by nearly two years between 2018 and 2020, primarily due to the pandemic. The news was more disturbing for people of color: For African Americans, life expectancy declined by 3.3 years and by 3.9 years for Hispanic Americans. Does this mean

By Chaya Milchtein, Next Avenue Car insurance rates rose by a stunning 16.9% in May, overall, after going up 6.4% in April, according to the Consumer Price Index. So, this is an apt time to look for ways to save money on your auto insurance premiums. And if you’ve been driving less lately, due to working remotely

By Kerry Hannon, Next Avenue Two years ago, Edgar Maxion, 54, stepped away from his position as chief facilities officer at Stanford University. After more than two decades in facilities and construction management, he was burned out. “I was doing eight projects at once,” he said. “I wasn’t seeing straight. I couldn’t even sleep at night.”

By Tracey Y. Smith, Next Avenue Watching “In the Heights,” the hot summer movie launching in theaters and on HBO Max this week, you’ll see the effervescent 66-year-old dancer Lillian Colón. This is the first big film for Colón, a native New Yorker and Puerto Rican who became the first Latina Radio City Rockette in 1987. The