Joe Kiefer

Comments

• Morningstar gives an overview of continuing care retirement communities in this article published Tuesday, Aug. 5, 2025. I leave the task of assessing the accuracy and usefulness of the article to those of you who have experience with or at least more knowledge of CCRCs. Is a Continuing Care Retirement Community Right for You? | Morningstar

  Post: CCRC – continuing care retirement community

  Link to comment from August 6, 2025

• On a perhaps-related note, Morningstar's Christine Benz has another column out this week as part of her years-long examination of long-term care issues: The Hidden Crisis in Long-Term Care | Morningstar

  Post: Bankruptcies in continuing care

  Link to comment from July 11, 2025

• Here is a gift-article link (hoping it works for everyone; sometimes they do not.): https://wapo.st/463eDeC

  Post: Some people are never satisfied

  Link to comment from July 10, 2025

• Morningstar's Christine Benz wrote yesterday of speaking at a small overseas CampFI "camp meeting" in April: https://www.morningstar.com/personal-finance/my-baptism-by-fire-lessons-financial-independence

  Post: Going too far with FIRE: The downside of being in the financial advice business – RDQ

  Link to comment from May 30, 2025

• In addition to index funds generally incurring less in capital gains because of low turnover, Vanguard's special mutual fund structure, which now can be copied by other firms, allows avoiding most if not all capital-gains distributions. Vanguard's Total Stock Market Index Fund Admiral Shares (VTSAX) has not paid a capital gain (short-term or long-term) since 2000. In contrast, State Street Core Equity Fund, an active mutual fund that looks a lot like the S&P 500, has dumped huge capital gains on investors in recent years.

  Post: The great uninformed and misinformed population worries Quinn

  Link to comment from April 20, 2025

• This story was in the news Wednesday: Trump administration plans to end the IRS Direct File program for free tax filing, AP sources say https://apnews.com/article/irs-direct-file-tax-returns-free-trump-4bb0bca02fab9b3d06ae6f45ac67b7ab

  Post: Now taxes are filed, I have a question: How did you prepare your taxes? 

  Link to comment from April 17, 2025

• This column on Social Security from the Conversation was cited in a Wall Street Journal newsletter this morning: Social Security’s trust fund could run out of money sooner than expected due to changes in taxes and benefits

  Post: Ida M Fuller, Social Security, EVs, taxes and a 340 million person society-Quinn rambles on, but with a purpose

  Link to comment from April 16, 2025

• Given that Mike Piper is a big part of this discussion, I will note that he has disputed describing the 8%-per-year increase in Social Security benefits after Full Retirement Age as an 8% return. Here is a link to his 2020 post on the subject: https://articles.opensocialsecurity.com/8-return/ Key excerpts: "To know the actual return you would get from delaying Social Security, we’d have to know how long you will live (and how long your spouse will live, if you’re married). ... (W)e can calculate an expected return based on life expectancies. But that figure turns out to be nowhere near 8% in most cases. For an average unmarried male, the expected return from waiting to file for Social Security works out to about 1.8% above inflation. For an average unmarried female, it’s about 3% above inflation. For a married person, it depends on the difference in ages between the two spouses as well as the difference in primary insurance amounts. (In short, it’s usually significantly higher for the higher earner in the couple and lower for the lower earner in the couple.)"

  Post: Open Social Security – interesting finding on optimization and mortality tables

  Link to comment from January 15, 2025

• Garrison Keillor, in a "News From Lake Wobegon" monologue many years ago, cited his mother's cautionary phrase to him and his five siblings when guests were invited for dinner: "Family, Hold Back." My wife and I have half-seriously adopted that phrase at times.

  Post: Pass the mashed potatoes by Quinn

  Link to comment from December 30, 2024

• The column needs an update of this sentence (an update that Jonathan OK'd, by the way): "If you purchase coverage through your state or the federal government’s health-insurance exchange, you could receive a tax credit if your income, based on family size, is four times the federal poverty level or less." The past few years have seen legislative enhancements of Affordable Care Act eligibility and coverage. The premium tax credit's eligibility cutoff (aka, the "cliff") had been 400% of the federal poverty level for years; for a family of three in 2024, that would be $103,280. However, that cliff was temporarily eliminated in 2021 to expand eligibility to higher-income households. In my two-person household, if we have an adjusted gross income of $100,000 in 2025, I would get a tax credit of $328 a month. Without a tax credit, my 2024 high-deductible/HSA-eligible plan would have a full premium of just over $1,000 a month in 2025. As AGI rises, the 2025 tax credit for my household shows a glide path down until it zeroes out at an AGI above $146,000. (Your numbers are likely to vary.) The expansion of eligibility and the enhancements of subsidies are to expire at the end of 2025 -- if the new powers-to-be in D.C. don't change anything during the year.

  Post: A Taxing Retirement

  Link to comment from November 16, 2024