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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

"I agree a good estate attorney who comes highly recommended is worth it. But I’d also recommend educating yourself especially around the tax implications. The first time I used an attorney recommended to me by my cpa the attorney didn’t set up a revocable living trust. I now have an excellent estate attorney who setup my estate and educated me and it is totally a different experience. My estate is so much better protected. The cost was totally worth it."
- Lucretia Ryan
Read more »

My Father: The Peace He Never Found

Andrew Clements  |  May 20, 2026

"Thank you for such an honest and thoughtful comment. I think many people quietly wrestle with the same fears you described, especially after decades where work, responsibility, and providing for family become such a large part of our identity. One thing writing this article taught me is that retirement itself is not the destination we sometimes imagine it to be. Financial security matters greatly, but purpose, connection, structure, and relationships matter just as much. The fact that you are already reflecting so deeply on these things tells me you are approaching retirement with a great deal of self-awareness. I suspect that awareness will ultimately serve you well. Thank you again for sharing your thoughts."
- Andrew Clements
Read more »

Percentage that “age in place”

Keith Pleas  |  May 24, 2026

Be the first to comment.
Read more »

Final Arrangements: A Learning Curve

DrLefty  |  Aug 18, 2024

"Thanks for this reminder. It’s not an easy thing to do but it must be done!"
- Nick Politakis
Read more »

Final Countdown

ArticleMichael Perry  |  Sep 15, 2021

AS I TYPE THIS, I’m less than a week from walking out the door of my workplace for the last time, bringing my second career to a close. I’m looking forward to the rest of my life. We’ve been anticipating this day and we’re more than ready. My wife is already retired. My work for a large corporation is fine, but I’m not passionate about it. While there are some positive aspects to where we currently live, the best part is the airport. We predicted some time ago that, if my job still had us here when we got to this point, we’d be calling it quits and taking our life’s possessions elsewhere. We’ve thought a lot about how we’ll support ourselves financially—what combination of pension benefit, retirement accounts, taxable accounts and Social Security benefits will carry us through the rest of our lives. Maybe that’s a topic for a future article. Short version: We’re comfortable with our situation and we have no hesitation about our decision to retire. We’ve also thought a lot about where and how to live, which is also a subject for another day. Short version again: We haven’t decided. We aren’t in as much of a hurry to move as we expected to be. One reason: We didn’t anticipate some of our close relatives would be living in Spain. There’s no telling how long they’ll be there, so—before we do anything else—we’ll spend some time with them. And who knows? In the next few years, we may make a surprise addition to our future hometown shortlist. A lot of folks find it bittersweet to leave behind fulltime work. I get it. Leaving my first career in the military was like that. But this time, I’m happy to say it’s all sweet.
Read more »

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

Jeff Peck  |  May 18, 2026

"This seems like a great idea for those of us that find ourselves in a position in which our retirement income is higher than anticipated (poor planning?). Having better, cheaper access to that money could make those seniors lives easier. David Bach has a good idea but I do not think there is likely to be support where it matters, in Congress, as it is a tax cut."
- T Roberts
Read more »

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

R Quinn  |  May 21, 2026

"So I am contributing money I've already been taxed on...then being taxed on it again when I take it out? No tax-free treatment on contributions? I dunno...double taxation seems a bit unfair. Simple or not."
- Mike May
Read more »

Country Club Venture Capital 

Mark Crothers  |  May 17, 2026

"My girls were singers, not dancers. In high school, my older daughter got into the madrigal choir, which required a renaissance costume. I paid $1500 for a local seamstress to make it for her. This was back in 2004! I was quite relieved when her younger sister chose the jazz choir instead. That outfit only cost $200."
- DrLefty
Read more »

Taste Bud Training

Mark Crothers  |  May 22, 2026

"We did a chauffeured foodie tour in the region and went to a Balsamico farm (?) which included lunch for just the two of us. In addition we went to a Lambrusco winery which is the grape they use to make Balsamico, as well as a Reggiano parmasean (I affectionately call it Reggie) facility. To see the wheels stacked floor to ceiling was amazing."
- David Lancaster
Read more »

A Time to Save

D.J.  |  May 21, 2026

"I hope your grandchildren listen to your wise recommendations, William. We can’t control all life throws at us, but we can do our best to save and stay invested in the market so compounding can perform its magic."
- D.J.
Read more »

The reality of Social Security and Medicare- My real life experience.

R Quinn  |  May 4, 2026

"This sounds like NY state. My father retired in 1990 but had his premiums reimbursed for years by NY state, as far as I know until he died in 2012. When he asked them they claimed it was his unused sick time and vacation time. For 22 years? he did the math and called them several times but they never agreed with his calculations and kept paying."
- Concerned
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 »

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

"I agree a good estate attorney who comes highly recommended is worth it. But I’d also recommend educating yourself especially around the tax implications. The first time I used an attorney recommended to me by my cpa the attorney didn’t set up a revocable living trust. I now have an excellent estate attorney who setup my estate and educated me and it is totally a different experience. My estate is so much better protected. The cost was totally worth it."
- Lucretia Ryan
Read more »

My Father: The Peace He Never Found

Andrew Clements  |  May 20, 2026

"Thank you for such an honest and thoughtful comment. I think many people quietly wrestle with the same fears you described, especially after decades where work, responsibility, and providing for family become such a large part of our identity. One thing writing this article taught me is that retirement itself is not the destination we sometimes imagine it to be. Financial security matters greatly, but purpose, connection, structure, and relationships matter just as much. The fact that you are already reflecting so deeply on these things tells me you are approaching retirement with a great deal of self-awareness. I suspect that awareness will ultimately serve you well. Thank you again for sharing your thoughts."
- Andrew Clements
Read more »

Percentage that “age in place”

Keith Pleas  |  May 24, 2026

Be the first to comment.
Read more »

Final Arrangements: A Learning Curve

DrLefty  |  Aug 18, 2024

"Thanks for this reminder. It’s not an easy thing to do but it must be done!"
- Nick Politakis
Read more »

Final Countdown

ArticleMichael Perry  |  Sep 15, 2021

AS I TYPE THIS, I’m less than a week from walking out the door of my workplace for the last time, bringing my second career to a close. I’m looking forward to the rest of my life. We’ve been anticipating this day and we’re more than ready. My wife is already retired. My work for a large corporation is fine, but I’m not passionate about it. While there are some positive aspects to where we currently live, the best part is the airport. We predicted some time ago that, if my job still had us here when we got to this point, we’d be calling it quits and taking our life’s possessions elsewhere. We’ve thought a lot about how we’ll support ourselves financially—what combination of pension benefit, retirement accounts, taxable accounts and Social Security benefits will carry us through the rest of our lives. Maybe that’s a topic for a future article. Short version: We’re comfortable with our situation and we have no hesitation about our decision to retire. We’ve also thought a lot about where and how to live, which is also a subject for another day. Short version again: We haven’t decided. We aren’t in as much of a hurry to move as we expected to be. One reason: We didn’t anticipate some of our close relatives would be living in Spain. There’s no telling how long they’ll be there, so—before we do anything else—we’ll spend some time with them. And who knows? In the next few years, we may make a surprise addition to our future hometown shortlist. A lot of folks find it bittersweet to leave behind fulltime work. I get it. Leaving my first career in the military was like that. But this time, I’m happy to say it’s all sweet.
Read more »

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

Jeff Peck  |  May 18, 2026

"This seems like a great idea for those of us that find ourselves in a position in which our retirement income is higher than anticipated (poor planning?). Having better, cheaper access to that money could make those seniors lives easier. David Bach has a good idea but I do not think there is likely to be support where it matters, in Congress, as it is a tax cut."
- T Roberts
Read more »

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

R Quinn  |  May 21, 2026

"So I am contributing money I've already been taxed on...then being taxed on it again when I take it out? No tax-free treatment on contributions? I dunno...double taxation seems a bit unfair. Simple or not."
- Mike May
Read more »

Country Club Venture Capital 

Mark Crothers  |  May 17, 2026

"My girls were singers, not dancers. In high school, my older daughter got into the madrigal choir, which required a renaissance costume. I paid $1500 for a local seamstress to make it for her. This was back in 2004! I was quite relieved when her younger sister chose the jazz choir instead. That outfit only cost $200."
- DrLefty
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 »

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Manifesto

May 24, 2026

NO. 49: WE SHOULD ensure our family will be okay financially, even if we aren’t around. That means making sure there’s enough money—and making sure our affairs are well organized.

Truths

May 24, 2026

NO. 60: SHORT-TERM results matter to long-term investors. Even if you’re investing for the long haul and have a strong stomach for short-term price swings, this volatility can have a huge impact on your long-run returns. Want to retire rich? Pray for lousy markets as you regularly save money during your working years—and buoyant markets as you approach retirement.

humans

May 23, 2026

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.

act

May 23, 2026

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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Manifesto

May 24, 2026

NO. 49: WE SHOULD ensure our family will be okay financially, even if we aren’t around. That means making sure there’s enough money—and making sure our affairs are well organized.

Spotlight: Saving

2026 Financial Plan

Adam M. Grossman   |  Jan 3, 2026

LOOKING TO UPDATE your financial plan for 2026? Below are ten strategies you might consider:
Gaining control
January is a good time to audit your investments. I’d start with this very basic step: If you have accounts at multiple brokerage firms, see if you can consolidate them. This won’t necessarily lead to better investment results, but if you have fewer accounts, it’ll be easier to monitor and to manage them. This might not seem like an important exercise,

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The Write Stuff

Jeffrey K. Actor   |  Sep 21, 2023

I’VE BEEN SAVING almost my entire adult life. Early on, three books put me on the path to financial success, helping me to reevaluate how I was living.
The first was The Automatic Millionaire by David Bach. This introduced me to the concept that small, automated savings could lead to big results, thanks to compounding over long periods. Albert Einstein reportedly said, “Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it,

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Where to Keep Cash

Bogdan Sheremeta   |  Dec 6, 2025

MY WIFE AND I have around $50,000 of emergency funds (~8 months of expenses). Considering that the job market is shaky, we feel comfortable holding this much cash.
Of course, it’s important to make the most out of your savings, so I want to share some options available to earn ~4% yield on your money.
Keep in mind that you should only use the following options for emergency savings and specific saving goals (e.g.

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LLC Tax Benefits

Bogdan Sheremeta   |  Oct 11, 2025

I WAS RANDOMLY scrolling on social media and saw this post:

“Can you just open an LLC and write things off?”
That’s a real question someone asked, and I’ve seen this question asked many times.
There are a lot of misconceptions around LLCs, their purpose, and how LLC changes your tax structure. With TikTok, there are “tax experts” sharing terrible advice, so let me clarify how it could be useful.
 
First, what is an LLC?

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Offsetting the Pain

Matt Trogdon   |  Feb 21, 2023

IT’S ONE THING TO talk to folks about the power of saving regularly. It’s much more profound to see it in action. I was reminded just how powerful saving can be during two recent meetings with financial-planning clients. In both cases, we looked back at 2022 and calculated how much the clients had saved.
In the first case, the clients had saved diligently throughout the year. They increased their 401(k) and 403(b) contributions, they opened and funded 529 plans,

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No Time Left for Calculating My Net Worth

Dan Smith   |  Jun 14, 2025

Oh my, I’m beginning to think that some of the articles I find on the internet aren’t really news at all. Below is one I clicked on today. It reminds me of those free dinners that Mike Flack recently posted about. I also think it ties in well with Dave Lancaster’s post about calculating net worth. 
The article didn’t define how it calculated net worth. I assume it includes checking and savings, IRAs and similar accounts,

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Spotlight: McGlynn

Late Fee

James McGlynn   |  Nov 11, 2019

I’M JUST A FEW YEARS from age 65—and being eligible for Medicare. One of my concerns: making a mistake that could trigger penalties. If you file for Social Security before age 65, you’ll be automatically enrolled in Medicare Part A and B. What if you’re still working at 65? Ask your human resources department for advice. Your coverage at work will dictate whether you should file for Medicare. If you aren’t covered by an employer’s health insurance plan and you aren’t yet collecting Social Security benefits, the best time to file for Medicare is three months before you turn age 65. That’ll allow time for the paperwork to be processed—and coverage should begin on the first day of the month you celebrate your 65th birthday. If you wait until age 65 to file, you might not have coverage for another month or so. What if you wait too long? There’s a penalty period that begins three months after you reach age 65. If it’s been more than three months since the month you turned 65 and you haven’t signed up for Medicare Part B, your monthly Part B premium will increase 10% for each full 12-month period that you could have been enrolled in Medicare Part B, but weren’t. You’ll pay this penalty for the rest of your life. There’s a similar penalty for Medicare’s Part D prescription drug coverage, but that penalty is calculated at 1% per month. It’s also permanent. These penalties are an inducement not to wait until you’re sick to get coverage and start paying Medicare premiums. The other penalty is potentially triggered if you’re stashing money in a health savings account (HSA) before you’re on Medicare Part A. HSAs, which offer unsurpassed tax advantages, are often funded by those with high-deductible health plans. But you aren’t…
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Still Stretching

James McGlynn   |  Jan 25, 2022

THE SECURE ACT, which took effect Jan. 1, 2020, made inheriting an IRA even more complicated. Before 2020, beneficiaries typically had the option of taking distributions from an inherited IRA over their lifetime, potentially squeezing many more years of tax-favored growth from these accounts. The SECURE Act drew a new line, eliminating some beneficiaries’ ability to make use of the so-called stretch IRA. Beneficiaries now are divided into two groups. Some have to empty an inherited IRA within 10 years of the original owner’s death. Others are permitted to stretch out their withdrawals for longer, often over their estimated lifetimes. I want to focus on this second group—called eligible designated beneficiaries—who can still defer taxable distributions for longer than 10 years. It includes more people than you might think. Under the SECURE Act, eligible designated beneficiaries include: Surviving spouses Disabled individuals Chronically ill individuals Minor children of the IRA owner Individuals who are less than 10 years younger than the IRA owner. Surviving spouses continue to have the most flexibility because they’re allowed either to roll over an inherited IRA into their own IRA account, and potentially delay all withdrawals until age 72, or to leave the money in the inherited IRA. The key advantage: Spouses have the flexibility to either stretch withdrawals over their own life expectancy or over the deceased account holder’s “life expectancy,” as calculated by the IRS, which could be beneficial if that happens to be longer. Disabled and chronically ill individuals can also stretch withdrawals over either their life expectancy or the remaining life expectancy of the deceased. Unlike a spouse, however, they aren’t allowed to roll over the IRA into their own account. Instead, they must use an inherited IRA account to shelter assets until they’re withdrawn. Minor children of the IRA owner—but not…
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The Taxman Cometh

James McGlynn   |  Oct 23, 2020

LATE LAST YEAR, Congress voted to kill off the so-called stretch IRA, which had allowed those who inherited retirement accounts to draw them down slowly over their lifetime. Many folks were surprised by the stretch IRA’s demise, but they shouldn’t have been. When a tax break or some other government provision benefits only a few folks, Congress often changes the law. Think back to 2015. That year, Congress eliminated the ability to “file and suspend” Social Security—another strategy that tended to be exploited only by a privileged few. I suspect we’ll see similar Congressional action in the years ahead. This election season, there’s been talk of reversing the tax rate reductions in 2017’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA), especially for those who’ve benefited the most from those cuts. In any case, after year-end 2025, many of the TCJA changes sunset. The upshot: If Congress doesn’t act in the next five years, taxes will automatically increase. But it isn’t just the TCJA that’s in the political crosshairs. Here are five other key areas where we might see changes to the tax code: There’s discussion of eliminating the preferential long-term capital gains and qualified dividend tax rates for those with incomes above $1 million. Warren Buffett has often complained that he pays a lower tax rate than his secretary. This change would ease his conscience by boosting the capital gains and dividend tax rate from 20% to potentially 39.6%, but only for those with seven-figure incomes. The TCJA reduced corporate tax rates from 35% to 21%. There are proposals to increase that rate to 28% and to ensure all corporations pay a 15% minimum tax. I predict that, at some point between now and 2034, there’ll be changes to the payroll tax that funds Social Security or, alternatively, that other federal…
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Danger: Cliff Ahead

James McGlynn   |  Jan 29, 2020

MEET IRMAA. YOU WON'T like her. IRMAA is short for income-related monthly adjustment amount. It’s a premium surcharge levied on those covered by Medicare Part B and Part D—and who have income above certain thresholds. In 2020, the standard premium for Part B, which covers outpatient care, is $144.60 a month. That’s what you pay if you file taxes as a single individual and your modified adjusted gross income is $87,000 or less, or if you’re married filing jointly with annual income of $174,000 and below. What if your income, including tax-free municipal bond interest, exceeds these levels? You may be subject to the IRMAA surcharge. The Part B premium is set so that it pays for 25% of Medicare’s actual cost. The remaining 75% is effectively subsidized by the federal government’s general revenue. The IRMAA surcharge is designed to remove this subsidy for those able to pay—those whose income is above the $87,000 and $174,000 thresholds. The IRMAA surcharge only affects 5% of Medicare recipients, but—depending on what happens with the inflation adjustments to the IRMAA income brackets—this 5% could increase over time. In 2020, there are five different IRMAA income tiers. The Part B surcharge starts at $57.80 per month, equal to $693.60 annually, and gets as high up as $347 per month, or $4,164 annually. Keep in mind that the IRMAA surcharge is per person, so couples pay double these amounts. If your income bumps you into the next income tier, you trigger the new tier’s full surcharge. For instance, income that moves you into the second tier—which starts at $109,000, versus $87,000 for the first tier—will trigger the second tier’s higher rate, even if you exceed the threshold by just $1. This so-called cliff penalty means that $1 of extra income triggers an additional IRMAA surcharge…
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John Oliver does a complete show skewering Medicare Advantage

James McGlynn CFA RICP®   |  Oct 31, 2025

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Ejoi9yfLVCc?si=e_gSARLaTFOHhSZh" title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe> Educational and funny  
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Your 10-Year Reward

James McGlynn   |  Jul 7, 2020

IF YOU’RE MARRIED, filing for Social Security can be confusing. But there’s one group who has it even worse—those who are divorced. In recent weeks, I’ve had a number of conversations with women who had no idea that they were even eligible for spousal benefits based on their ex-husband’s earnings record. (I also recently watched the television show Dirty John: The Betty Broderick Story, which gave completely erroneous advice on benefits for ex-spouses.) My hope: Someone reading this may learn that he or she is eligible for spousal or survivor benefits from an ex-spouse. A divorced spouse is eligible for Social Security spousal benefits if he or she was married for 10 years or more. Period. Being married for only nine-and-a-half years doesn’t cut it. Every divorce lawyer in the country should be aware that it’s worth delaying a divorce, so the marriage officially lasts at least 10 years. There are other mistakes and misconceptions among those who are divorced. The ex-spouse isn’t informed that you’re filing. The ex-spouse can’t prevent you from filing. As long as you’ve been divorced for more than two years, you’re aged 62 or older and your ex-spouse is at least age 62, you would be eligible for Social Security spousal benefits, as long as the marriage lasted 10-plus years. There are also misconceptions about when to file for spousal benefits. Unlike filing for Social Security benefits based on your own earnings record, where it often pays to delay to age 70, there’s no advantage to delaying spousal benefits beyond your full retirement age, which is age 66 or 67, depending on the year you were born. If you’re planning to receive only spousal benefits, because the benefit based on your own earnings record is modest, you shouldn’t wait to age 70, but rather file…
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