The financial planning profession has a big problem: less than 3.5 percent of all the 80,000 Certified Financial Planners (CFP) in the U.S. are black or Latino — just 2,700. The CFP Board Center for Financial Planning released a survey four months ago … Continue reading
(The following article originally appeared on the PBS NewsHour site.) The nation’s 67.6 million Social Security beneficiaries will receive a 2.8 percent cost next year, the Social Security Administration announced recently. That translates to a monthly… Continue reading
Life transitions demand that we change more than our roles or outer activities. They demand that we change from the inside out. With retirement, this shift happens when the obvious roles and responsibilities fall away, the structure of our days dissolv… Continue reading
Back in 2013, I blogged on Next Avenue about the excellent PBS FRONTLINE documentary, The Retirement Gamble, where correspondent Martin Smith reported on America’s troubling retirement savings crisis. He’s now back with a riveting sequel airing Tuesday… Continue reading
The idyllic retirement: free time to enjoy doing things you like and spending time with friends and family. The reality of retirement for some people, according to Michelle Pannor Silver, author of the new book, Retirement and Its Discontents: unfulfil… Continue reading
Most retirement planning articles talk about 401(k)s, because these retirement plans are aimed at people who work for companies. But public employees who work for government agencies and state colleges or universities have special retirement-planning r… Continue reading
Even in these deeply polarized times, you won’t get much pushback saying that America’s retirement system is flawed. Perhaps there are lessons we can learn from policy experiments and reforms in other countries? The answer is “Yes,” especially by looki… Continue reading
Though it’s true that money doesn’t buy happiness, a lack of it can certainly buy unhappiness. Let’s examine what money is from a different perspective and consider that our definition of financial wealth is flawed. I’ll offer a new way to measure it a… Continue reading
(The following article is adapted from The Retirement Dreammaker: Master the Art of Retirement Abundance by Matthew Jackson.) I’ve interviewed more than 1,000 retirees over the years and have observed retirees defaulting to a retirement lifestyle lacki… Continue reading
After reviewing a new survey of widows from Merrill Lynch and Age Wave, I’m worried about the wives of America, or more specifically the wives who, sadly, will likely one day experience the financial shocks of widowhood. Women are more than three times… Continue reading