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Lifetime Supply

Dan Smith  |  May 20, 2026

"snak, wow, that's what I call getting the most out of retirement. You also make a good point about working with a travel agent; they see those last minute deals before the DIYers. 76/78 and still rocking the roller-coasters!"
- Dan Smith
Read more »

Inflation and Innovation

ArticleAdam M. Grossman  |  May 23, 2026

ECONOMICS IS KNOWN as “the dismal science,” and perhaps for good reason. Oftentimes it can be abstract and overly academic. There are, however, certain economic concepts that can be helpful to individual investors. Below are two that I see as especially important. When it comes to the government’s ability to control—or least influence—the economy, there are two main levers. The first is fiscal policy, which refers to Congress’s (as well as state and local governments') ability to levy taxes and to spend money.  The most well known economist associated with fiscal policy was John Maynard Keynes. During economic downturns, Keynes argued, governments shouldn’t hesitate to spend more—and to run deficits, if need be—to help reduce unemployment and lift the economy back up. This is a generally accepted concept today, but in the 1930s, in the depths of the Great Depression, it was not obvious, and many believe that policymakers’ efforts to exercise fiscal discipline by balancing the budget during the Depression ended up prolonging the misery. It wasn’t until the mid-1930s, in fact, that President Roosevelt changed his view on this question. In their correspondence, Keynes convinced Roosevelt that loosening up on fiscal discipline, though counterintuitive, was the best way to bring the economy back to health. This approach has been used in every recession since. Most recently, during the pandemic, the government issued several rounds of stimulus payments to help bolster consumer finances. Monetary policy is the government’s second key lever. Unlike fiscal policy, monetary policy is the domain of the Federal Reserve. When you hear about the government “printing money,” it’s the Fed they’re referring to. Through a unique process, the Fed is able to create dollars out of thin air and then to use those dollars to help support the economy during downturns. During the pandemic, the Fed created trillions of new dollars through this mechanism. The Fed also lowered short-term interest rates, which it controls, in a further effort to nudge consumers to open their wallets. Both fiscal and monetary policy are powerful. But as we’ve seen in recent years, each can also carry side effects.  In the case of fiscal policy, spending too much for too long can drive the deficit to unsustainable levels. This has become a persistent problem. Though it’s now been several years since the pandemic, the federal government is still running deficits of about $2 trillion per year. In round numbers, taxes bring in about $5 trillion, but spending exceeds $7 trillion. Of particular concern is the fact that more than $1 trillion of that $7 trillion must now be allocated to interest payments on all the accumulated debt. To put that in perspective, we’re now spending more on interest than on defense. Is this situation sustainable? Here’s how I think about it: Imagine an individual with an annual income of $50,000 who spends $70,000 each year, including $10,000 in credit card payments. At some point, something will need to change, but neither political party seems interested in tackling it, for the obvious reason that any solution would require either raising taxes or cutting spending. Neither would be popular, so the deficits persist. The consequence of overdoing it with monetary policy is also serious: inflation. That’s what we saw very significantly in 2021 and 2022, and that’s where monetary and fiscal policy can become intertwined. For a brief period during the pandemic, a concept known as Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) gained popularity. The argument was that countries like the United States, with very large economies, were essentially immune to inflation risk and could print money almost without limit. It turned out, though, that MMT was a theory with no basis in reality, and that deficits do matter. Since ancient times, excessive use of monetary policy has always resulted in inflation, and that was exactly what we saw as a result of the Fed’s extraordinary monetary interventions in 2020. After inflation rose to nearly 10% in 2022, the Fed was forced to reverse course and raise interest rates. That had the desired effect of slowing inflation, but it then caused another problem: Since the government has to issue new bonds practically every day, higher rates have the effect of driving up the government’s borrowing costs, which then worsens the deficit. Higher interest rates also hurt consumers, especially those looking to buy homes. This, unfortunately, describes the situation we’re in today. In an effort to combat the pandemic, the government used both of the levers that it had, but now it’s effectively out of ammunition. Federal debt held by the public just recently climbed above 100% of gross domestic product for the first time since 1946. The Wall Street Journal referred to this as “a once-unthinkable threshold.” But before we declare the situation hopeless, it’s important to look at a separate concept in economics.  In 1942, Harvard economist Joseph Schumpeter released a book titled Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy. Among the concepts Schumpeter proposed was the notion of “creative destruction.” The idea—central to capitalist systems—was that entrepreneurs could always be counted on to move technology forward. At the same time, this meant that older technologies and companies would regularly find themselves pushed aside by new innovations. Importantly, though, Schumpeter argued that the net effect would be greatly positive. The evidence in favor of Schumpeter is all around us. Horse-and-buggy companies went out of business when the automobile was invented. Pony Express gave way to the telegram, then to the telephone. Typewriter manufacturers are mostly gone. And so on. And yet, despite all these changes, unemployment is under 5%, the economy is larger than it’s ever been, and income-per-capita is at an all-time high. What’s the relationship between Schumpeter’s theory and the earlier discussion about the government’s debt situation? You may recall that in the late-1990s, the federal government surprised observers when it began to run budget surpluses after years of deficits. How did things suddenly improve? Most attribute it to the productivity boom and stock market rally set in motion by the popularization of the internet. It's too early to know whether artificial intelligence will deliver the same economic benefits in the coming years as the web did 30 years ago. But as investors, this history is important to keep in mind. It’s a reminder that, in making financial decisions, we should be careful about reacting to economic forecasts. To be sure, the government’s financial health doesn’t look great, but as history has shown, this could change.   Adam M. Grossman is the founder of Mayport, a fixed-fee wealth management firm. Sign up for Adam's Daily Ideas email, follow him on X @AdamMGrossman and check out his earlier articles.
Read more »

Time to scrap IRAs, 401k, 403b and all the rest

R Quinn  |  May 21, 2026

"I'm ambivalent about the IRMAA "problem." First, the amount of tax we pay is a reward for our success, not punishment. Second, the amount of Medicare I have used in the 12 years I have been retired far exceeds what I have paid in premiums. My wife and I succeeded in our retirement savings and are grateful that we are financially comfortable and able to give to charity and help our family while we are still alive. We are especially grateful to have good health insurance when so many Americans have too little or none at all."
- UofODuck
Read more »

Where’s My Refund?

ArticleMike Zaccardi  |  Mar 19, 2020

WE LOVE TO procrastinate. Have you done your taxes yet? IRS data show that nearly a quarter of Americans wait until the last two weeks of tax season to file. It often feels like that nagging task that grows more arduous each year, though the result for many is a juicy refund. The average federal tax refund is more than $2,800, so it can pay to get your taxes done sooner rather than later. To be sure, instead of making an interest-free loan to Uncle Sam, it would be more rational to reduce the amount of federal income tax withheld during the year by giving our employers a revised Form W-4. We could then take the extra money in our paycheck and stash it in, say, a high-yield savings account, where we could earn interest, albeit at a paltry 1½% or so—and that rate is likely to shrink in the months ahead. But most of us don’t operate that way. We like the forced savings that comes with having too much tax withheld. We like getting that large refund each spring. Chalk it up to mental accounting. How are we using our tax refunds? Among those surveyed by GOBankingRates, 27% say they’ll use their refund to pay down debt. That makes sense. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York reports that Americans with a credit report are, on average, in debt to the tune of almost $52,000. While my official title at work is market research analyst, I also conduct retirement and savings workshops for my colleagues, where I talk about a priority pyramid. First, contribute to the 401(k) up to the company match. After that, contribute to our company’s health savings account (HSA) up to the match. Next, pay off high interest rate debt. Getting that free money from the employer match is great. But I know paying off debt can also feel like a huge win. Some other solid uses for your tax refund:
  • Contribute to a Roth IRA. You can do that not only for 2020, but also for 2019, by taking advantage of the prior-year contribution rule.
  • Put money in an HSA beyond what’s needed to get the employer match. As with an IRA, you can make your 2019 contribution up until April 15, 2020.
  • Shore up your emergency fund—a smart move given the risk of layoffs right now.
Finally, here are three tips if you haven’t yet filed:
  • Shop around for the best tax preparation site for your circumstances—which won’t necessarily be the cheapest.
  • If you have a complicated situation, see a professional. Don’t skimp. The last thing you want is a nasty-gram from the IRS.
  • To prevent identity theft, file electronically and use direct deposit. The IRS issues most refunds within 21 days of electronic filing.
Mike Zaccardi is a portfolio manager at an energy trading firm and a finance instructor at the University of North Florida. He also works as a consultant to financial advisors on an hourly basis, helping with portfolio analysis and financial planning. Mike is a Chartered Financial Analyst and Chartered Market Technician, and has passed the coursework for the Certified Financial Planner program. His previous articles include Scratching That Itch, Good as Gold and Keep On Keepin' On. Follow Mike on Twitter @MikeZaccardi, connect with him via LinkedIn and email him at MikeCZaccardi@gmail.com. [xyz-ihs snippet="Donate"]
Read more »

Should Retirees Get a Temporary Flat Tax Window on IRA and 401(k) Withdrawals?

Jeff Peck  |  May 18, 2026

"Michael, taxable distributions today, are because of the deal we made with  the  devil years ago. The devil said “I’ll give you  a pass on tax now, but you have to start paying it back when you're 73 (or 70.5 or 75).  I’m thinking of the old V-8 juice commercials; slapping myself on the forehead, saying “wow, I could have had a Roth”. "
- Dan Smith
Read more »

351 Exchange – Tax-Free Transfer of Individual Stocks to an ETF

Ed Kadala  |  Oct 16, 2025

"Exchange Funds – Dollar Mentor The above is the summary of a small-group discussion on 351 ETFs. Our non-profit for investment education has a monthly group discussion on various investment/finance topics, and 351 ETFs was discussed last March."
- Sanjib Saha
Read more »

The Art of Spending Money

Jeff Peck  |  May 17, 2026

"Having recently retired, I’m spending on experiences. I’m still frugal when purchasing food and clothing (love shopping second hand stores), but don’t think twice about spending money on family experiences. My one son lives in New Orleans and I will be buying 7 Saints / Packers tickets for a December game ($4k) in NOLA that brings my two sons and their families together (the other son and family and I live in Pennsylvania) to enjoy a shared love of football and have an early Christmas together with the grandkids. Another purchase I have made recently with no regrets? A prescription to Wegovy (the pill). Not covered by insurance of course and costs me $300 a month. Insurance is only willing to pay after you go into cardiac arrest. I have high cholesterol, had to start taking blood pressure medication in the last year, moved into the “pre-diabetic” zone, and was near an obese BMI. I started taking Wegovy in January and have lost 25 lbs. Ten more pounds to go and I’ll be “normal” weight and weigh as much as I did in high school. I have so much more energy, I drink less alcohol, and feel and look great. I know i’ll be taking that pill for life…best damn money I ever have, and will continue, to spend. And I get to save the insurance company future health care costs! LOL."
- Joe D'Alessandro
Read more »

My Father: The Peace He Never Found

Andrew Clements  |  May 20, 2026

"One never stops thinking about what events and circumstances made our parents the people that they were. Those things are part of an ongoing mystery that we can't help thinking about. Over time, we discover things, or gain wisdom, and those help us unravel our relationships with them a bit. I wish I had the time now to ask my own parents all the questions I've uncovered since they died. But I can live with that. I know they loved their children, and did the best they could with the tools they had."
- Martin McCue
Read more »

Deeply Rooted

ArticleMark Crothers  |  May 23, 2026

JUNE MARKS THREE years since my mum passed from complications of vascular dementia. It was a tough couple of years, watching her mind slowly fail and her world shrink a little more with each passing month. Anyone who has cared for a loved one in the late stages of dementia will know how difficult and disjointed even the simplest conversation becomes. The loops, the confusion, the frustration of trying to redirect someone you love from a thought they can no longer find their way out of. Mum had been comfortable, if lonely, in retirement. She was a widow for twenty-five years, and she often said with genuine surprise in her voice that she was better off financially than at any other point in her life. Not having to worry about money was a relief she never took for granted. But here's the thing: she never really thought about money either. She wasn't driven by possessions or status. She had what she needed, she was grateful, and she got on with living. Money was background noise to her, not the tune she danced to. What surprised me most came in her final year, when she was deeply confused and often entirely detached from reality. Among all the things her mind could have snagged on, the one conversation loop she returned to with unsettling clarity was money. She was convinced she had none. It made her anxious in a way that was painful to witness, a raw, childlike insecurity that seemed to rise from somewhere far deeper than conscious thought. I would reassure her, calmly and repeatedly, that her savings were healthy and there was absolutely nothing to worry about. I would joke about her bank balance making me jealous and she needed to go on a shopping spree. Sometimes it settled her. Often it didn't last more than a few minutes before the worry surfaced again. The memory care unit understandably discouraged residents from keeping personal cash, but I often broke that rule. Whenever I visited and could see that familiar agitation building, I'd press a few low value bills into her hand. Nothing significant, just the texture of something real. It worked in a way that words alone couldn't compete with. She'd look down at the money, close her fingers around it, and the tension would ease from her shoulders. She felt safe again, at least for a little while. Although, we often moved on to worrying about finding a purse to stash the bills in. For a woman who gave so little thought to money and nothing to status, I found it striking, strange even, that financial anxiety was what surfaced when the rational layers of her mind were stripped away. It made me think about what dementia actually reveals. It doesn't invent fears, it sometimes uncovers them. The fog clears away the learned, the sophisticated, the socially conditioned, and leaves something older and more fundamental underneath. At the time, I read up on this anxiety, there's some neuroscience behind it. Emotional memory, the kind wired to survival and feeling rather than fact, is stored differently in the brain and tends to be far more resilient. Dementia strips back the rational layers first. What it sometimes leaves behind is older, deeper, and harder to reach. In my mum's case, that something was the primal need to feel secure. She had grown up shaped by post-war austerity, widowhood, and years of careful budgeting on a single income. She would have been a young woman when rationing finally ended. In the world she grew up in, money wasn't abstract: it was coal for the fire and food on the table, shoes that lasted another winter without needing replacing. I think that connection between having and feeling safe wasn't a conclusion she'd reasoned her way to. It was lived, year after year, until it settled somewhere beneath thought entirely. Security and money had become inseparable, written into her long before she ever had reason to question it. I've thought about this a lot since we lost her. The concept of financial security isn't just something we think about, it seems to be something we feel, right down in the oldest parts of ourselves. It runs beneath logic, beneath personality, beneath even memory. My mum could and did forget my name on a bad day, but she could not shake the feeling that not having money meant not being safe. That instinct had been laid down so early and reinforced so consistently across a lifetime that dementia, for all its cruelty, couldn't fully reach it. To me, it says something profound about how deeply rooted our relationship with money really is. It seems to be wrapped around the core of our being. Losing my mum the way I did, piece by piece and conversation by conversation, was one of the hardest things I've been through. But in the heartbreak, she gave me this unexpected insight, pressed into my mind just as firmly as I had secretly pressed those bills into hers. Beneath everything we build and believe and become, there are feelings so fundamental they outlast nearly everything else. She reminded me that understanding our relationship with money isn't just a financial exercise, it's a deeply human one. Maybe it goes some way to explaining why we make choices that are sometimes irrational. And she did it, characteristically, without ever meaning to teach me a thing.
Mark Crothers is a retired small business owner from the UK with a keen interest in personal finance and simple living. Married to his high school sweetheart, with daughters and grandchildren, he knows the importance of building a secure financial future. With an aversion to social media, he prefers to spend his time on his main passions: reading, scratch cooking, racket sports, and hiking.
Read more »

The Financial Stress a Simple Document Could Have Prevented

Lucretia Ryan  |  May 23, 2026

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Country Club Venture Capital 

Mark Crothers  |  May 17, 2026

"I have a friend who is a professional poker player. I have a similar investment in her. She uses my capital to enter tournaments and I share proceeds with her 50/50. She uses her own money for cash games. Many professional poker players have “syndicates” like golfers do."
- haliday11
Read more »

A Time to Save

D.J.  |  May 21, 2026

"reading bogle and malkiel will make you investing gurus. its that simple"
- Kenneth Tobin
Read more »

Lifetime Supply

Dan Smith  |  May 20, 2026

"snak, wow, that's what I call getting the most out of retirement. You also make a good point about working with a travel agent; they see those last minute deals before the DIYers. 76/78 and still rocking the roller-coasters!"
- Dan Smith
Read more »

Inflation and Innovation

ArticleAdam M. Grossman  |  May 23, 2026

ECONOMICS IS KNOWN as “the dismal science,” and perhaps for good reason. Oftentimes it can be abstract and overly academic. There are, however, certain economic concepts that can be helpful to individual investors. Below are two that I see as especially important. When it comes to the government’s ability to control—or least influence—the economy, there are two main levers. The first is fiscal policy, which refers to Congress’s (as well as state and local governments') ability to levy taxes and to spend money.  The most well known economist associated with fiscal policy was John Maynard Keynes. During economic downturns, Keynes argued, governments shouldn’t hesitate to spend more—and to run deficits, if need be—to help reduce unemployment and lift the economy back up. This is a generally accepted concept today, but in the 1930s, in the depths of the Great Depression, it was not obvious, and many believe that policymakers’ efforts to exercise fiscal discipline by balancing the budget during the Depression ended up prolonging the misery. It wasn’t until the mid-1930s, in fact, that President Roosevelt changed his view on this question. In their correspondence, Keynes convinced Roosevelt that loosening up on fiscal discipline, though counterintuitive, was the best way to bring the economy back to health. This approach has been used in every recession since. Most recently, during the pandemic, the government issued several rounds of stimulus payments to help bolster consumer finances. Monetary policy is the government’s second key lever. Unlike fiscal policy, monetary policy is the domain of the Federal Reserve. When you hear about the government “printing money,” it’s the Fed they’re referring to. Through a unique process, the Fed is able to create dollars out of thin air and then to use those dollars to help support the economy during downturns. During the pandemic, the Fed created trillions of new dollars through this mechanism. The Fed also lowered short-term interest rates, which it controls, in a further effort to nudge consumers to open their wallets. Both fiscal and monetary policy are powerful. But as we’ve seen in recent years, each can also carry side effects.  In the case of fiscal policy, spending too much for too long can drive the deficit to unsustainable levels. This has become a persistent problem. Though it’s now been several years since the pandemic, the federal government is still running deficits of about $2 trillion per year. In round numbers, taxes bring in about $5 trillion, but spending exceeds $7 trillion. Of particular concern is the fact that more than $1 trillion of that $7 trillion must now be allocated to interest payments on all the accumulated debt. To put that in perspective, we’re now spending more on interest than on defense. Is this situation sustainable? Here’s how I think about it: Imagine an individual with an annual income of $50,000 who spends $70,000 each year, including $10,000 in credit card payments. At some point, something will need to change, but neither political party seems interested in tackling it, for the obvious reason that any solution would require either raising taxes or cutting spending. Neither would be popular, so the deficits persist. The consequence of overdoing it with monetary policy is also serious: inflation. That’s what we saw very significantly in 2021 and 2022, and that’s where monetary and fiscal policy can become intertwined. For a brief period during the pandemic, a concept known as Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) gained popularity. The argument was that countries like the United States, with very large economies, were essentially immune to inflation risk and could print money almost without limit. It turned out, though, that MMT was a theory with no basis in reality, and that deficits do matter. Since ancient times, excessive use of monetary policy has always resulted in inflation, and that was exactly what we saw as a result of the Fed’s extraordinary monetary interventions in 2020. After inflation rose to nearly 10% in 2022, the Fed was forced to reverse course and raise interest rates. That had the desired effect of slowing inflation, but it then caused another problem: Since the government has to issue new bonds practically every day, higher rates have the effect of driving up the government’s borrowing costs, which then worsens the deficit. Higher interest rates also hurt consumers, especially those looking to buy homes. This, unfortunately, describes the situation we’re in today. In an effort to combat the pandemic, the government used both of the levers that it had, but now it’s effectively out of ammunition. Federal debt held by the public just recently climbed above 100% of gross domestic product for the first time since 1946. The Wall Street Journal referred to this as “a once-unthinkable threshold.” But before we declare the situation hopeless, it’s important to look at a separate concept in economics.  In 1942, Harvard economist Joseph Schumpeter released a book titled Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy. Among the concepts Schumpeter proposed was the notion of “creative destruction.” The idea—central to capitalist systems—was that entrepreneurs could always be counted on to move technology forward. At the same time, this meant that older technologies and companies would regularly find themselves pushed aside by new innovations. Importantly, though, Schumpeter argued that the net effect would be greatly positive. The evidence in favor of Schumpeter is all around us. Horse-and-buggy companies went out of business when the automobile was invented. Pony Express gave way to the telegram, then to the telephone. Typewriter manufacturers are mostly gone. And so on. And yet, despite all these changes, unemployment is under 5%, the economy is larger than it’s ever been, and income-per-capita is at an all-time high. What’s the relationship between Schumpeter’s theory and the earlier discussion about the government’s debt situation? You may recall that in the late-1990s, the federal government surprised observers when it began to run budget surpluses after years of deficits. How did things suddenly improve? Most attribute it to the productivity boom and stock market rally set in motion by the popularization of the internet. It's too early to know whether artificial intelligence will deliver the same economic benefits in the coming years as the web did 30 years ago. But as investors, this history is important to keep in mind. It’s a reminder that, in making financial decisions, we should be careful about reacting to economic forecasts. To be sure, the government’s financial health doesn’t look great, but as history has shown, this could change.   Adam M. Grossman is the founder of Mayport, a fixed-fee wealth management firm. Sign up for Adam's Daily Ideas email, follow him on X @AdamMGrossman and check out his earlier articles.
Read more »

Time to scrap IRAs, 401k, 403b and all the rest

R Quinn  |  May 21, 2026

"I'm ambivalent about the IRMAA "problem." First, the amount of tax we pay is a reward for our success, not punishment. Second, the amount of Medicare I have used in the 12 years I have been retired far exceeds what I have paid in premiums. My wife and I succeeded in our retirement savings and are grateful that we are financially comfortable and able to give to charity and help our family while we are still alive. We are especially grateful to have good health insurance when so many Americans have too little or none at all."
- UofODuck
Read more »

Where’s My Refund?

ArticleMike Zaccardi  |  Mar 19, 2020

WE LOVE TO procrastinate. Have you done your taxes yet? IRS data show that nearly a quarter of Americans wait until the last two weeks of tax season to file. It often feels like that nagging task that grows more arduous each year, though the result for many is a juicy refund. The average federal tax refund is more than $2,800, so it can pay to get your taxes done sooner rather than later. To be sure, instead of making an interest-free loan to Uncle Sam, it would be more rational to reduce the amount of federal income tax withheld during the year by giving our employers a revised Form W-4. We could then take the extra money in our paycheck and stash it in, say, a high-yield savings account, where we could earn interest, albeit at a paltry 1½% or so—and that rate is likely to shrink in the months ahead. But most of us don’t operate that way. We like the forced savings that comes with having too much tax withheld. We like getting that large refund each spring. Chalk it up to mental accounting. How are we using our tax refunds? Among those surveyed by GOBankingRates, 27% say they’ll use their refund to pay down debt. That makes sense. The Federal Reserve Bank of New York reports that Americans with a credit report are, on average, in debt to the tune of almost $52,000. While my official title at work is market research analyst, I also conduct retirement and savings workshops for my colleagues, where I talk about a priority pyramid. First, contribute to the 401(k) up to the company match. After that, contribute to our company’s health savings account (HSA) up to the match. Next, pay off high interest rate debt. Getting that free money from the employer match is great. But I know paying off debt can also feel like a huge win. Some other solid uses for your tax refund:
  • Contribute to a Roth IRA. You can do that not only for 2020, but also for 2019, by taking advantage of the prior-year contribution rule.
  • Put money in an HSA beyond what’s needed to get the employer match. As with an IRA, you can make your 2019 contribution up until April 15, 2020.
  • Shore up your emergency fund—a smart move given the risk of layoffs right now.
Finally, here are three tips if you haven’t yet filed:
  • Shop around for the best tax preparation site for your circumstances—which won’t necessarily be the cheapest.
  • If you have a complicated situation, see a professional. Don’t skimp. The last thing you want is a nasty-gram from the IRS.
  • To prevent identity theft, file electronically and use direct deposit. The IRS issues most refunds within 21 days of electronic filing.
Mike Zaccardi is a portfolio manager at an energy trading firm and a finance instructor at the University of North Florida. He also works as a consultant to financial advisors on an hourly basis, helping with portfolio analysis and financial planning. Mike is a Chartered Financial Analyst and Chartered Market Technician, and has passed the coursework for the Certified Financial Planner program. His previous articles include Scratching That Itch, Good as Gold and Keep On Keepin' On. Follow Mike on Twitter @MikeZaccardi, connect with him via LinkedIn and email him at MikeCZaccardi@gmail.com. [xyz-ihs snippet="Donate"]
Read more »

Should Retirees Get a Temporary Flat Tax Window on IRA and 401(k) Withdrawals?

Jeff Peck  |  May 18, 2026

"Michael, taxable distributions today, are because of the deal we made with  the  devil years ago. The devil said “I’ll give you  a pass on tax now, but you have to start paying it back when you're 73 (or 70.5 or 75).  I’m thinking of the old V-8 juice commercials; slapping myself on the forehead, saying “wow, I could have had a Roth”. "
- Dan Smith
Read more »

351 Exchange – Tax-Free Transfer of Individual Stocks to an ETF

Ed Kadala  |  Oct 16, 2025

"Exchange Funds – Dollar Mentor The above is the summary of a small-group discussion on 351 ETFs. Our non-profit for investment education has a monthly group discussion on various investment/finance topics, and 351 ETFs was discussed last March."
- Sanjib Saha
Read more »

The Art of Spending Money

Jeff Peck  |  May 17, 2026

"Having recently retired, I’m spending on experiences. I’m still frugal when purchasing food and clothing (love shopping second hand stores), but don’t think twice about spending money on family experiences. My one son lives in New Orleans and I will be buying 7 Saints / Packers tickets for a December game ($4k) in NOLA that brings my two sons and their families together (the other son and family and I live in Pennsylvania) to enjoy a shared love of football and have an early Christmas together with the grandkids. Another purchase I have made recently with no regrets? A prescription to Wegovy (the pill). Not covered by insurance of course and costs me $300 a month. Insurance is only willing to pay after you go into cardiac arrest. I have high cholesterol, had to start taking blood pressure medication in the last year, moved into the “pre-diabetic” zone, and was near an obese BMI. I started taking Wegovy in January and have lost 25 lbs. Ten more pounds to go and I’ll be “normal” weight and weigh as much as I did in high school. I have so much more energy, I drink less alcohol, and feel and look great. I know i’ll be taking that pill for life…best damn money I ever have, and will continue, to spend. And I get to save the insurance company future health care costs! LOL."
- Joe D'Alessandro
Read more »

My Father: The Peace He Never Found

Andrew Clements  |  May 20, 2026

"One never stops thinking about what events and circumstances made our parents the people that they were. Those things are part of an ongoing mystery that we can't help thinking about. Over time, we discover things, or gain wisdom, and those help us unravel our relationships with them a bit. I wish I had the time now to ask my own parents all the questions I've uncovered since they died. But I can live with that. I know they loved their children, and did the best they could with the tools they had."
- Martin McCue
Read more »

Deeply Rooted

ArticleMark Crothers  |  May 23, 2026

JUNE MARKS THREE years since my mum passed from complications of vascular dementia. It was a tough couple of years, watching her mind slowly fail and her world shrink a little more with each passing month. Anyone who has cared for a loved one in the late stages of dementia will know how difficult and disjointed even the simplest conversation becomes. The loops, the confusion, the frustration of trying to redirect someone you love from a thought they can no longer find their way out of. Mum had been comfortable, if lonely, in retirement. She was a widow for twenty-five years, and she often said with genuine surprise in her voice that she was better off financially than at any other point in her life. Not having to worry about money was a relief she never took for granted. But here's the thing: she never really thought about money either. She wasn't driven by possessions or status. She had what she needed, she was grateful, and she got on with living. Money was background noise to her, not the tune she danced to. What surprised me most came in her final year, when she was deeply confused and often entirely detached from reality. Among all the things her mind could have snagged on, the one conversation loop she returned to with unsettling clarity was money. She was convinced she had none. It made her anxious in a way that was painful to witness, a raw, childlike insecurity that seemed to rise from somewhere far deeper than conscious thought. I would reassure her, calmly and repeatedly, that her savings were healthy and there was absolutely nothing to worry about. I would joke about her bank balance making me jealous and she needed to go on a shopping spree. Sometimes it settled her. Often it didn't last more than a few minutes before the worry surfaced again. The memory care unit understandably discouraged residents from keeping personal cash, but I often broke that rule. Whenever I visited and could see that familiar agitation building, I'd press a few low value bills into her hand. Nothing significant, just the texture of something real. It worked in a way that words alone couldn't compete with. She'd look down at the money, close her fingers around it, and the tension would ease from her shoulders. She felt safe again, at least for a little while. Although, we often moved on to worrying about finding a purse to stash the bills in. For a woman who gave so little thought to money and nothing to status, I found it striking, strange even, that financial anxiety was what surfaced when the rational layers of her mind were stripped away. It made me think about what dementia actually reveals. It doesn't invent fears, it sometimes uncovers them. The fog clears away the learned, the sophisticated, the socially conditioned, and leaves something older and more fundamental underneath. At the time, I read up on this anxiety, there's some neuroscience behind it. Emotional memory, the kind wired to survival and feeling rather than fact, is stored differently in the brain and tends to be far more resilient. Dementia strips back the rational layers first. What it sometimes leaves behind is older, deeper, and harder to reach. In my mum's case, that something was the primal need to feel secure. She had grown up shaped by post-war austerity, widowhood, and years of careful budgeting on a single income. She would have been a young woman when rationing finally ended. In the world she grew up in, money wasn't abstract: it was coal for the fire and food on the table, shoes that lasted another winter without needing replacing. I think that connection between having and feeling safe wasn't a conclusion she'd reasoned her way to. It was lived, year after year, until it settled somewhere beneath thought entirely. Security and money had become inseparable, written into her long before she ever had reason to question it. I've thought about this a lot since we lost her. The concept of financial security isn't just something we think about, it seems to be something we feel, right down in the oldest parts of ourselves. It runs beneath logic, beneath personality, beneath even memory. My mum could and did forget my name on a bad day, but she could not shake the feeling that not having money meant not being safe. That instinct had been laid down so early and reinforced so consistently across a lifetime that dementia, for all its cruelty, couldn't fully reach it. To me, it says something profound about how deeply rooted our relationship with money really is. It seems to be wrapped around the core of our being. Losing my mum the way I did, piece by piece and conversation by conversation, was one of the hardest things I've been through. But in the heartbreak, she gave me this unexpected insight, pressed into my mind just as firmly as I had secretly pressed those bills into hers. Beneath everything we build and believe and become, there are feelings so fundamental they outlast nearly everything else. She reminded me that understanding our relationship with money isn't just a financial exercise, it's a deeply human one. Maybe it goes some way to explaining why we make choices that are sometimes irrational. And she did it, characteristically, without ever meaning to teach me a thing.
Mark Crothers is a retired small business owner from the UK with a keen interest in personal finance and simple living. Married to his high school sweetheart, with daughters and grandchildren, he knows the importance of building a secure financial future. With an aversion to social media, he prefers to spend his time on his main passions: reading, scratch cooking, racket sports, and hiking.
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NO. 33: WE'RE SWAYED by anecdotes, not statistics. The numbers tell us we’re more likely to be killed in a car accident than a plane crash, and yet we’re far more nervous about flying than driving. Plane disasters garner big headlines, and such stories stick in our mind. Ditto for investment narratives, like the hyped-up stock story or the scary market prediction.

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CHECK WHO YOU have named as beneficiaries. Your retirement accounts, life insurance and any trusts will typically pass to the beneficiaries specified on those assets and not to the people named in your will. If your family situation has changed, or you simply don’t remember who you have listed, take a few minutes to review your beneficiary designations.

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NO. 17: IT’S OBVIOUS—in retrospect. Looking back, we forget about all the financial uncertainty that existed at the time. Instead, what happened in the economy and the financial markets seems all too predictable. This so-called hindsight bias encourages us to act on today’s investment forecasts and it could lead us to make overly bold financial bets.

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Spotlight: Family

How Nosey Are You?

Edmund Marsh   |  Jun 30, 2024

Last week, my family hosted my wife’s niece and family from California. The parents in this family are both in their 40s.
Prior to their visit, we resolved to ask them what plans they had made for their retirement. On their first evening with us, we were encouraged to learn they each had a pension, and were also saving additional money for retirement through their employer-sponsored plans. That was as far as the financial conversation got,

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Took Courage

Dennis Friedman   |  Mar 21, 2024

I ALWAYS THOUGHT my father was a brave man. It wasn’t just because he served in World War II. It had to do with a few incidents that I witnessed.
I’ll never forget when my dad and I went to McDonald’s for a late evening meal. I was probably in the eighth grade. I believe my mother was working late that night. It must have been a Friday because a lot of teenagers were hanging out in the parking lot.

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Getting Roasted

John Yeigh   |  Nov 27, 2024

“YOU WILL ROTH!”
“But Dad, I’m only 10.”
“Evan, it is never too early to start saving. Besides, this gives you 70-plus years of compounding.”
“Yes, Dad, but didn’t you tell me last week that I need a job and earned income to contribute to a Roth?”
“We can arrange to get you a paycheck. I’ll get a friend or neighbor to hire you. What would you like to do?”
“I like to play soccer.”
“Evan,

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When They’re 64

Jonathan Clements   |  May 16, 2025

WHEN MY TWO CHILDREN were ages nine and five, I opened Vanguard Group variable annuities for them. No, variable annuities aren’t my favorite investment. Far from it. Indeed, I don’t think they’re anybody’s favorite investment vehicle, unless you happen to be an insurance agent angling for a big commission.
Still, tax-deferred annuities differ from other retirement accounts in one crucial way: You don’t need earned income to fund the account. That means it’s possible to open a tax-deferred annuity for a toddler,

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One family, two very different life experiences

R Quinn   |  Dec 10, 2024

An eighteen year old girl married her high school sweetheart who had dropped out of high school to join the army. They lived on an army base. Shortly they had a baby. They were transferred to another post.
Not many months after settling in at the new base he receives orders for the first of three tours in Vietnam. The young lady and child move in with her parents while he is in Vietnam. 
Upon his final tour,

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Talking to your kids about money

bbbobbins   |  Oct 11, 2024

Ran across this. Not HD content or indeed probably the average HDer being discussed but interesting on the general problems faced by over 60s
https://sherwood.news/personal-finance/boomers-money-secrets-millennial-gen-z-troubles/
I’ve always thought inheritance would eventually be the only way many of their grandkids would achieve real financial security but it seems some may be passing on a millstone in legacy.
 

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Spotlight: Connor

Numbers Game

Richard Connor   |  Apr 10, 2020

IT’S TAX SEASON—NOT something many of us look forward to. Although HumbleDollar’s readers may be ready and willing to tackle their own taxes, many others approach Form 1040 with dread. I've seen that firsthand. This has been my second year as a certified volunteer tax counselor for the AARP Foundation’s Tax-Aide program, which offers free tax preparation for low-to-moderate income taxpayers, especially those age 50 and older. Earlier this year, Tax-Aide was providing this service at nearly 5,000 locations nationwide, but the program has been shut down because of the coronavirus. With the extension of the filing deadline from April 15 to July 15, AARP will  attempt to restart the service as soon as it's allowed. Last year, as a new volunteer, I had three or four days of training and had to pass three tests. This certified me as an advanced counselor, qualified both to complete tax returns and to check returns generated by other counselors. In 2019, I worked three days a week at two different centers. My first year was an eye-opening experience. Although I was comfortable doing my family’s tax returns, and familiar with TurboTax software, doing a complete stranger’s return was stressful. Most of the clients were senior citizens with modest incomes. Many were widowed. Some were even my neighbors. I quickly realized there were areas of the tax code I’d never encountered, but which were important to my clients. Many of these provisions apply as we head into retirement and get into our 60s. Others are more important to lower income taxpayers, as well as those with elderly parents. For example, Pennsylvania has a tax forgiveness provision for lower income taxpayers. Depending on your income and family size, you may qualify for a refund or reduction of your Pennsylvania income tax liability. But the software we…
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Park Place

Richard Connor   |  Jul 31, 2021

OUR SOUTH JERSEY beach town transforms from empty to overrun during the summer. This past July 4th weekend was one of the busiest many of us had ever experienced. On these occasions, parking spaces go from a mass-produced commodity to the rarest of diamonds. We had company for the weekend, so we had to park four cars instead of the usual three. Before the weekend, we grabbed a desirable spot in front of our house and vowed never to move it. I carefully squeezed our remaining two cars into our two rear parking spots, leaving just enough room for a third car to park perpendicular, blocking the other two cars. All weekend, we kept an eye on the street, just in case a prime spot opened up. When one did, my wife grabbed one car and tried to snag it, only to be outdone by a passing SUV. We were crushed. Looking back, it’s hard to believe how much time and energy we spent worrying about parking—and how much pride we felt over successfully managing the parking situation. But then I think about how I stocked up at the beginning of the pandemic, including buying cases of paper goods, hundreds of coffee K-Cups and freezers full of meat. Clearly, perceived scarcity creates economic stress—and decision-making often suffers when we feel stressed. Was my reaction appropriate? Maybe organizing our weekend parking didn’t require a plan comparable to the Apollo program. It’s worth examining our behavior in such situations, especially those that are of so little consequence. That brings me to a second question. Was our perception of the scarcity accurate? There were shortages of some important items at the beginning of pandemic and it is indeed tough to park in our beach town on summer weekends. But was it as bad…
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What Number?

Richard Connor   |  Sep 19, 2019

A DECADE AGO, a large financial firm ran a clever advertising campaign that showed people going about their everyday lives carrying a bright orange six- or seven-figure sum that represented their number—how much money they needed to retire. It was clever because we humans like to simplify—and sometimes oversimplify—complicated issues. It’s one of our cognitive biases. I spent almost 40 years in aerospace engineering. I did a lot of detailed engineering analyses, calculating expected performance numbers, which could then be compared to a particular project’s requirements. Government agencies frequently provide guidance on how to perform these analyses and what results are acceptable. Even though this was “rocket science” in the popular sense, the process was—in many ways—straightforward. The physics were well understood and, more important, we had a good grasp of the problems we were trying to solve. My love of analysis is one of the things that attracted me to financial planning. My engineering expertise seemed like a great fit for doing complex retirement projections. I could even use my background in so-called Monte Carlo analysis. At work, we used Monte Carlo techniques to analyze complex thermal radiation problems, but in finance it’s used to look at how a portfolio might fare in countless market scenarios. Indeed, I was sufficiently jazzed about financial planning that, several years ago, I purchased sophisticated commercial planning software. I was excited to build a “professional” grade model to assess our retirement readiness and evaluate alternative scenarios. In preparation, my wife and I discussed our vision for retirement. I used that information to build a matrix of scenarios, varying a large number of parameters like inflation, retirement dates, vacation budgets, Social Security claiming strategies and long-term-care options. Housing in retirement was a key subject. We own our primary home, plus a vacation home at…
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Thank you, IRS!

Rick Connor   |  Nov 17, 2024

As we rapidly approach the end of the year our thoughts naturally turn to family, friends, holidays gatherings, gifts, traditional foods, decorations, and …. Year-end tax planning. There are lots of articles that point out the X things you should do at year-end to simplify, optimize, and minimize your taxes. That’s not what this post is about.  In this post I want to highlight one of the best government-led programs I’m aware of – the IRS’ Voluntary Income Tax Assistance, or VITA, program. Through the VITA program, the IRS partners with organizations, large and small, and across the country, to provide free basic tax returns. Partner organizations range from United Way to local churches. They focus on helping seniors, those with incomes below $67,000, the disabled, and taxpayers with limited English skills. One of the largest partners is the AARP Foundation’s TaxAide program. They sponsor nearly 3,500 locations nationwide. Importantly, you don’t have to be retired, a senior, or an AARP member to use this program. Their website provides guidance on the information you need to bring and a location guide for their sites. The volunteers who prepare the free tax returns are well trained and pass yearly certification tests. In my experience, they are some of the smartest and most caring people I’ve met. It’s been inspiring to see how hard the volunteer tax preparers will work to help their neighbors. One of the best things about the program is that each tax return is prepared by a certified person, and then independently checked by an experienced preparer. Although the program is intended for lower incomes, I’ve never seen anyone turned down. If you know someone who would benefit from this program, please encourage them to seek out the service. If you happen to be a math/finance geek who…
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How do you check your tax return? Bill P comes through

Rick Connor   |  Mar 3, 2025

I came across an interesting tax return the other day while volunteering at a local AARP TaxAide center. This is my 7th year doing free tax returns and I’m still learning. In this case, I didn’t prepare the return; I was the quality reviewer and did the outtake with the client. The client was a retired single woman in her mid-70s. Her income was modest and she didn’t have any fancy or complicated investments. What made her case interesting was her near obsession with making sure that she paid zero tax for the year, and the steps she was willing to take to make sure she accomplished her goal. Here are the facts of her case. Interest = $121 Dividends (all qualified) = $620 IRA Distribution (all taxable) = $6,312 Pension (all taxable) = $9,847 Social Security (SS) benefit = $18,116 Her gross income, excluding SS, was $16,900. Her standard deduction is $16,500. This left her with $400 of taxable income. But this also put her just over the $25,000 limit when calculating if any of her SS benefits were taxable. Her “provisional income,” equal to her gross income plus half her SS benefit, was $25,958.  Half of the $958 excess, or $479, was taxable. This resulted in $879 of taxable income. At a 10% marginal tax rate, you would expect a tax bill of $88. But recall that $620 of her income was from qualified dividends. This income is eligible for the long-term capital gains (LTCG) rate. Since she is in the lowest marginal income tax bracket, that rate is 0%. This sheltered $620 of her $879 of taxable income from any tax. This made her tax bill approximately $25. The client had anticipated that she was close to owing some income tax, so she made a preemptive sale…
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Would you leave a note?

Rick Connor   |  Jul 17, 2024

ONE OF THE biggest health risks seniors face recently happened to me. I tripped in a parking lot and fell. It was a pretty serious fall. I hurt my left shoulder, left wrist, right elbow and right knee. There was a lot of scraping on the asphalt and lots of blood. To add insult to injury, the left side of my head hit the right taillight of a Subaru, smashing the lens and running a nice pair of sunglasses. Ironically, I had my yearly Medicare wellness visit with my new primary doctor the next morning. Instead of a wellness check, my doctor did a thorough physical, including x-rays of my right knee. The radiologist was concerned about a couple of areas, so my primary contacted the orthopedic surgeon who did my knee replacement, and I had an appointment with him in 2 days. He said the implant was fine, but I had some nasty contusions. The good news, there was no permanent damage and I’m pretty much off the injured reserve list. There is still a little elbow and knee tenderness. The final injury was financial. The fall took place in a very public parking lot in downtown Red Bank, NJ. Many people came to my aid, brought water and napkins to staunch the blood. My wife did a great job of cleaning me up and getting me on my feet. But no one claimed ownership of the damaged car. Once Vicky was sure I was OK she asked if we should leave a note on the car. I immediately agreed and she went into the adjacent Irish pub and got a pen and a napkin. She left a note with my name and number on the windshield. A few days later I received a call from Niall, a Limerick…
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