Retirement Watch Weekly
The Long Lasting Benefits Of Retirement
Two researchers at Clemson University, where I spent my undergraduate years, concluded that retirement brings long-term happiness and better health to most people. There are exceptions of course, but their studies found that most people benefit from retiring, and the benefits last. “Unlike happiness, improvements in health are realized over time. Because health typically changes […]
Bob’s Journal
Investors soon will be reminded that index investing isn’t the same as passive investing. Standard & Poor’s and MSCI, the leading constructors of market indexes, will be overhauling their indexes. This isn’t the typical periodic change in which they move a few stocks in and out of the indexes. Instead, the firms are overhauling the […]
What The Next Financial Crisis and Stock Market Crash Will Be Like
Here’s one view of what the next financial crisis could be like. It’s from the chief quantitative investor at J.P. Morgan and is part of a series of essays the bank is putting out to mark the 10th anniversary of the financial crisis. He forecasts the crisis is likely to be more volatile and worse […]
Nursing Homes Could Be Hitting Hard Times
A lot of long-term care has shifted to home care and assisted living facilities, taking business away from traditional nursing homes. The nursing homes are starting to feel some financial pain. This article describes how a Massachusetts nursing home is in such serious financial trouble that it stopped paying premiums for employees’ health care, though […]
How to Incorporate a “Portfolio Transition” in your Estate Planning
Have you ever considered how your investment portfolio and other assets will be managed in the future and how to adress this during your Estate Planning process? Odds are — after you’re no longer managing the assets — nothing good is going to happen. Now that may sound awfully negative… but I’ve discovered that too […]
Bob’s Journal
There has been quite a divergence between U.S. stock indexes and international indexes. Leading up to the correction in early 2016, U.S. stocks were far ahead of stocks from most other countries. After the correction, overseas stocks surged ahead of their U.S. counterparts. Latin American stocks were particularly strong. In the first part of 2017, […]
Government Pensions And Muni Bonds
There have been a lot of reports the last few years detailing the level of underfunding in state and local government pension funds. Most of these focus on how much money taxpayers will need to come up with in the future to make up the shortfalls. But lately there’s been another focus. Some argue that […]
How Much Have Americans Saved for Retirement?
This article discusses a recent analysis that shows how much people in various income groups have in savings. The results aren’t too surprising, though I would have guessed that the median savings of the top 1% was much higher. The average savings in retirement, money market deposit, checking and savings and certificate of deposit accounts […]
