Posts tagged as:

retirement plans

Retirement Planning: When Women Make Dangerous Assumptions

September 2, 2010

The excuse that you will simply work longer has taken  a dangerous position in the retirement plan for women that a recent TransAmerica Retirement Survey recently revealed.  Granted, this is the new recovery plan among a great deal of respondents, of both sexes.  But for the female worker, this can be the wrong approach to [...]

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The Sliced and Diced Retirement Plan

August 28, 2010

Certified Financial Planners are dicing your lifetime into five categories these days, even as psychologists spend decades trying to do the same. A recent issue of the magazine sought to describe the 20-somethings as a segment of life all their own calling them pre-adults, suggesting that they live in a time “what one sociologist calls [...]

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Luck: The Elusive Element in Retirement Planning

August 3, 2010

Roman philosopher Seneca thought that luck was the meeting of preparation and opportunity.  If that is the case, and we spend so much time preparing for retirement – or at least thinking about how to prepare for it – that we miss the opportunities that might provide us a little bit of luck. The Preparation: [...]

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Imagine Yourself as the 401(k) Plan Sponsor

August 2, 2010

From the investing trenches, it is easy to criticize your 401(k) plan.  If you have done poorly, you tend to blame the ability of the plan to provide to you the right tools to be successful, the right platform upon which to build your retirement future and do all of that with an eye on [...]

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Lifetime Payments Work Best for Women

July 27, 2010

Those who follow this site know that as a rule, I don’t like annuities. For most of us, this sort of  - and I hesitate to call it such – investment is something you purchase to guarantee income.  Part mutual fund, part insurance policy and wholly too expensive on both counts, annuities, for whatever reason [...]

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Banks, Business, and Babies

July 26, 2010

Have you ever wondered what babies have to do with retirement planning?  Surprisingly, more than you might imagine.  First off, once the idea of starting a family takes root in a young couple’s psyche, things change dramatically.  Smart couples plan for unintended consequences such as the mother not wanting to return to work, the need [...]

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Congratulations, You were Warned

July 24, 2010

The line in the Vanguard press release dated October 6th, 2009 offered the following: “We also caution against using short-term performance figures—however attractive—to guide your investment decisions.”  Why would they say such a thing after the run-up, that even they suggested was, too-far-too soon?  And could the worry that this short-term outlook would tempt the [...]

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The Co-Signer Effect

July 22, 2010

This sort of an economy puts all kinds of financial pressure on families and friends. Some family members move back into the house while other simply are unable to fly from the nest.  Interruptions in unemployment payments for long-term out-of-work family members have put a strain on 10% of the workforce.  All of these things [...]

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Retirement Planning: When Losses Turn to Lawsuits

July 21, 2010

Some people have suggested that the easiest way to determine when the next wave of litigation against brokers/advisers will begin is to mark the calendar one year after the market hits bottom.  It takes about that long experts say for the anger to well up to the point where attorneys are brought in to the [...]

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Mutual Funds: Dividend Growth vs Dividend Yield

July 16, 2010

As investors look for anything that might enhance their portfolio’s overall return, the subject of whether dividends are worth the effort have moved to the forefront.  Many current retirees and those poised to retire understand the nature of what this provides but there are subtle differences in what they actually are, the story they tell [...]

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