Retirement Watch Weekly
Simple Low-Cost Estate Planning Ways to Help Grandchildren
For many of my readers, helping the grandkids is a high priority after ensuring their Estate Planning affords their own financial independence. There are so many ways to help beyond making cash gifts and setting up Uniform Gifts/Trusts to Minors Accounts. In fact, those two widely-used methods often are far from the best ways to help. […]
Social Security for 2014 Set
The announcement of the latest Consumer Price Index locks in the Social Security numbers for 2014. Retirement benefits will rise 1.5% (compared with a 1.7% increase for 2013), and taxes on salaries and self-employment income will rise by by 2.9%, with the top income subject to the tax being $117,000. Details are here. While the […]
More on Fama and Shiller – Efficient versus Inefficient Markets
Eugene Fama and Robert Shiller were two of the three recipients of the 2013 Nobel for Economic Science. That prompted a lot of people to say that the prize committee was having some fun by naming two people with opposing theories. Fama was an early champion of efficient markets, while Shiller contends markets can be […]
The Desert Island Investment Portfolio
Most investors trade too often. One reason they don’t buy and hold is that their portfolios aren’t properly diversified. Another reason is that they pay too much attention to the headlines and short-term trends instead of putting those aside and focusing on the longer term. Here’s a good discussion of that process, including research indicating […]
Is Gold Overvalued?
The problem many investors have with gold is that it is very difficult to analyze its fundamentals. It doesn’t pay income, have a book value, or even have much industrial use. It’s hard to point to what moves gold prices. In response to this, a couple of recent papers recently addressed gold’s price. Two sets […]
Best 529 College Savings Plans
Morningstar is out with its annual ranking of section 529 college savings plans. These are plans that qualify for a slew of tax benefits under section 529 of the tax code. I’ve written about the plans in detail in the past. They’re great estate planning tools and provide an excellent way to sock money away […]
The Generational Social Security Rip Off
A couple of years ago we had a movement ranting about income inequality among the best and worst-paid in the U.S. The new movement, being pioneered by billionaire former hedge fund manager Stanley Druckenmiller, is to focus on the inequality between older and younger generations. Specificially, Druckenmiller talks about his generation and previous ones receive […]
Beware Mutual Fund Return Data
We’re in one of those periods when you have to be very careful when evaluating mutual fund performance data. Most funds report three-year and five-year data. Tha means the data won’t include the pre-crisis period and includes only returns from the bottom or near it. It also consists of returns that were influenced by the […]
