DURING THE PANDEMIC, I’ve taken to reading the obituaries. I especially enjoy the stories about people who lived a long time. What I’ve found is that many of them volunteered in some fashion or continued to work until late in life. Most didn’t do it because of the money. They did it because it gave them a sense of purpose.
I’ve come to believe that doing work that we love and have a passion for—that’s meaningful to us—serves as our own personal “fountain of youth.”
Ask yourself: Why do rich people,

MY WIFE AND I CONTINUE to modify our retirement plan in response to changes in our lives. Most of the changes have to do with the timing of both our retirements. But there’s also the puzzling question of which investment accounts we should draw on for income. More on that later.
First, a bit of background: I started receiving my pension at the end of 2017, after I stopped working fulltime. We expected to start drawing on our retirement savings in 2018.

FOR THE RECORD, I’m a card-carrying member of the FIRE—financial independence/retire early—movement. Except I don’t believe in the RE part.
All the folks I know who advocate FIRE, and who have achieved financial independence, are still working in some capacity. Many of them have websites, put out podcasts or write books on how to retire early—which is funny because they’re still working and making money.
For some reason, they feel the need to deny that they’re still working.

LAST WEEK’S NEWS that Social Security recipients will receive a 5.9% cost-of-living adjustment for 2022 might seem like a nonevent. After all, those larger monthly checks will be fully devoured by today’s higher prices.
Or maybe not.
September’s report for the Consumer Price Index (CPI) showed that inflation for medical care services—a big cost for retirees—was quite tame over the past 12 months, rising less than 1%. Seniors also spend significantly less on transportation,

ONE OF THE TOUGHEST financial challenges most people face—second only to accumulating enough for retirement—is deciding how to convert those funds into retirement income. Especially when the goal is to never run out of money.

I pride myself on being informed. This morning, I received my comeuppance. I was reviewing my 401(k) account, which is administered by Fidelity Investments. I had taken my required minimum distribution for 2021, but was exploring other ways I could withdraw money.

IT’S EMBARRASSING to admit in a public forum that I failed at retirement. But I’m doing so—because I think people can learn from me, and thereby avoid making the same mistakes.
I spent my entire 38-year career in the banking industry. Naturally, I learned a lot about money and investing. I helped thousands of clients save for their own retirement. On top of that, my wife is an investment advisor.
But despite all that knowledge and expertise—and having enough money to retire comfortably—I still managed to find my way into retirement hell.

SIX YEARS AGO, when my grandmother was age 94, our family felt it was best for her to move from her home to a residential senior facility. She didn’t want to leave the house where she’d been living for more than 50 years. But with no close relatives nearby, we thought the time had arrived.
I’m not sure such a move would be necessary today.
Amazon just announced that its Alexa Together service will begin enrolling subscribers later this year.

I BEGAN WRITING THIS article after reading a Facebook group’s page filled with derogatory comments about seniors and technology. The comments related to seniors’ inability to use a smartphone. Talk about stereotyping. The fact is, some of us seniors are addicted to technology—at least the nontechnical part.

For example, I recently went shopping and forgot something vital. No, I had my face mask. What I was missing was my smartphone. Smart is an appropriate word because,

I’M A FAN OF SUSPENSE novels. But the latest mystery keeping me awake at night isn’t a work of fiction.
On Monday, Oct. 4, Vanguard Group announced it was cancelling a long-promised benefit, a health insurance subsidy for its retirees, which includes me. The very next day, the investment management company abruptly reversed course. The benefit was extended through 2022. Vanguard said it would “take a step back and recalibrate” its decision.
What prompted the reversal?

I’M SUFFERING FROM shoulder and foot pain. My doctor said I’ve done too many pushups and run too many miles. He scolded me, saying, “You’re 70 years old. You’re not 30 anymore.”
When I wake up in the morning, the pain radiating from my shoulder and foot makes me feel much older. My dentist also reminds me I’m not getting any younger. When examining my teeth, he noticed severe erosion along my gumline. He said,

VANGUARD GROUP is renowned for its rock-bottom investment costs, including announcing last week that it was lowering expenses on its target-date retirement funds. As a former Vanguard employee, I just learned how the company is, in part, paying for such cuts. Yesterday, Vanguard emailed retired “crew members” like me to say it was shutting down its retiree medical account program.
When my old newspaper company’s pension plan collapsed last year—it was underfunded by $1 billion—my payments were picked up by the federal Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp.

WHEN I WAS IN HIGH school, I had a summer job at a machine shop. My job was to deburr large cutting tools known as end mills. I would take a penny and run it over the cutting edge of the tool to smooth it out. Once I finished my job, the tools were sent to another facility for the next operation.
There was a young man in his 20s named Max whose job was to load these heavy boxes of tools onto a truck and transport them to the other facility,

INFLATION IS BAD news for bond investors, but it’s really terrible for annuitants and those receiving company pensions. Bond investors can at least reinvest maturing bonds in newer bonds paying higher yields. But most income annuities and pensions pay a fixed monthly benefit for life. In fact, you can no longer even buy inflation-adjusted single-premium immediate annuities. Meanwhile, just 7% of all private-sector pensioners received automatic cost-of-living increases, according to a 2000 survey by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

AS A HAPPILY RETIRED 69-year-old, I still remember a conversation I had with an acquaintance two decades ago. The gentleman had had many years in the military, followed by time as a city police officer. He had recently retired—forever—from his third career in federal law enforcement. That meant he was sitting pretty with three different pensions. To top it all off, he was probably in his mid-50s.
Even though my own retirement was still many years away,

I’VE HAD SOME dreadful jobs in my life. I spent one summer putting metal plates under a huge press for eight hours a day. Once the plates were in the right position, I’d push some buttons that would cause the press to crash down and shape the metal into something useful.
The goal was to work fast because that meant more pay. Some of the workers disabled the safety features so they could produce more widgets and earn extra money.