WHEN I WAS A NEWSPAPER reporter in Florida in the early 1980s, we were preoccupied with the chance that a hurricane would spin out of the Gulf of Mexico and slam into Florida’s West coast. It would be the biggest story of our lives if a big one struck the low-lying coastal city of St. Petersburg. It never came our way, fortunately for everyone.
The most serious storm I covered back then was called the “no-name storm” because it didn’t muster hurricane-strength winds.

IT WAS 1982 OR thereabouts. After attempting to be a landlord for several years, I decided it wasn’t for me. I sold the house and the four-family apartment building I’d been managing.
The final task in closing out this adventure would come at tax time. Keeping the books was the one aspect of being a landlord that I didn’t mind. I understood how accumulated appreciation would be recaptured and how capital gains tax would affect that year’s taxes.

Connie and I had four children between July 1970 and September 1975. That was a fun decade especially given I was going to school three nights a week until 1978 when after nine years I received a degree.
Those fun times were only surpassed by the ten years when we had one, two or three children in college at once. Our oldest went to Carnegie Mellon on a required five-year program and the others all went to Franklin and Marshall –

WHEN I WAS GROWING up, I’d receive Series E savings bonds as birthday gifts from my parents. It was the start of many to come. My parents had great respect for savings bonds and, as I got older, I came to hold them in high regard as well.
Savings bonds never offered the highest interest rate. At a defense plant where I worked, a guy in the accounting department questioned my bond buying. He noted that savings bonds paid less interest than the certificates of deposit then available.

For us Medicare types, it’s that Part D time of year again. In mid-September I received an email from our Part D insurer, Aetna Silverscript, saying I could see the Annual Notice of Change online. I did so and got a shock. My wife’s and my monthly premiums were going from $9.80 each to $44.80 each beginning in January 2025.
I did a little reading online, and contacted our broker, and learned that due to some recent legislation Part D plans were in for some big changes in 2025.

I’ve made the trip from Pennsylvania to California six times. The first time I went, I didn’t have to pay for my plane tickets. Each of the next five times, the entire trip was completely free.
I was asked to be the best man in a college friend’s wedding a couple of years after we graduated. He lived near Los Angeles. I planned my trip out there with another college friend, Robert. Like me, he was an engineer and single.

IS IT WORTH OWNING international stocks? There’s far from universal agreement. The traditional argument for investing outside the U.S. is straightforward: diversification—since domestic and international stocks don’t move in lockstep, and sometimes diverge significantly.
At the same time, however, international stocks have lagged behind their U.S. counterparts for so many years that it’s been trying the patience of even the most tenacious investors. Domestic stocks have outpaced international stocks in eight of the past 10 years.

FOUR MONTHS AGO, I was told I might have just a year to live. It’s been a whirlwind ever since.
I’ve been inundated with messages from acquaintances and readers, gone to countless medical appointments, my diagnosis has received a surprising amount of media attention, I’ve been hustling to organize my financial affairs, and Elaine and I have taken two trips.
Where do things stand today? Here’s what’s been going on.
Medical update. After three radiation treatments to zap the 10 cancerous lesions on my brain and an intense opening round of infusion sessions,

Here are some proposals I’ve seen for fixing Social Security.
Remove the income cap on the payroll tax. Currently at $168.600, this would have people and their employer, as well as self-employed folks pay the tax on all of their income. It would not include any commensurate increase in their benefits. While I’ve never had the problem of earning over the income cap, it doesn’t seem entirely fare to me to put all of the load these people.

Connie and I just had our annual financial meeting- how best to give money away. 
Every since I discovered QCDs – you know what that is, right, I enjoy avoiding taxes on a RMD. 
As long as I have to take the money out of my IRA, I like putting it to good use – tax-free if possible.
Where does it go? A chunk goes to church and several religious organizations- Connie’s call. 
We give to a food pantry on Cape Cod and one local.

When I moved from London to New York City in 1986, I didn’t have a job lined up. But after a panicked search, I landed a position at Forbes magazine—as a so-called reporter, the title given to lowly fact-checkers. Almost two years later, I escaped that drudgery when I was promoted to staff writer and assigned the mutual-funds beat.
At the time, the fund world was a cesspool of dubious practices and misinformation, which was bad for investors but good for curious journalists.

There appear to be many wealthy folks trying to live longer. Billionaires, including Jeff Bezos, are making large investments in the research of the aging process. I read about one tech entrepreneur who spends $2 million a year in an attempt to turn back the clock.
Equinox, an upscale gym, offers a $40,000 a year membership that helps you live “100 healthy years.” It includes biomarkers and fitness tests to measure your health. Then they use the data to create your own personalized health and fitness plan that includes coaches and trainers.

I never meant that a consumer buying cases of water at the grocery was wasting money, my point was that at so many venues, water costs well over a hundred bucks a gallon. Why is my tap water only worth .003 cents per gallon, at the store maybe a buck a gallon, and at a concert 120.00 per gallon?
Which price is “correct”? Even at a store, if water is more than a nickel a gallon,

Following is the text of a post that has appeared over and over on social media. 
“ The Retirement Scam
The average lifespan is 76 years.
Middle age isn’t 50 – it’s 38.
They’ve tricked us into working until we’re 67.
By the time we retire, we only have 9 years left in this world.
Why do we only get to enjoy life when we’re old,

WHEN I WAS A YOUNG adult, my parents sat me down and explained that I might at some point inherit money from my grandfather’s trust, which had also helped put me through college. My grandfather passed away in 1984, and his wife—my father’s stepmother—became the trust’s beneficiary.
My father was an only child. The trust stipulated that, if his stepmother died before him, he would receive two-thirds of the trust, while my two siblings and I would share the other third.