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Are you underestimating how much retirement income you will need?
How much will you need to save for retirement? If you are one of more than 8 in 10 Americans, you have no idea how much retirement savings you will need when you leave the workforce, according to a recent…
LifePath Spending Tool
BlackRock, Inc., the world’s largest asset manager, revealed a new retirement income planning solution that relies on internal modelling and two participant inputs, age and current savings, to help individuals sustain the consumption pattern once they retire. By using the…
Is your Social Security taxed?
Is your Social Security taxed? The answer to that question is not that simple: Social Security benefits are taxed for some people but not others. According to Gil Charney, director at The Tax Institute at H&R Block, “Social Security taxation…
Planning to retire overseas and live on Social Security? Here’s where your check will go furthest
Social Security in the United States was never intended to provide more than 40% of your income needs. But if you’re considering retiring somewhere outside of the U.S. with Social Security as your main source of income, then you’ll want to…
Who really needs your Social Security number?
Although it’s true that many healthcare providers as well as numerous other service providers ask for your Social Security Number (SSN), the reality is that most of them don’t really need it. And with today’s focus on the need to…
Privacy, and your Social Security Number
In the news again, with great fanfare over eliminating it from your Medicare card, the Social Security Number remains an embarrassingly vulnerable element in the quest for individual privacy. Originally intended to be used only for identifying you for Social Security’s…
New Medicare Cards, New Security…and New Scams
Roll-out of the new Medicare Identification Cards–the ones without Social Security Numbers–begins in April and will continue throughout the coming year. As you are most likely aware, the format changes were mandated by the passing of the Medicare Access and…
Understanding the “Social Security Administration Representative Payee Program”
A representative payee is someone who is chosen by the Social Security Administration (SSA) to help individuals budget and spend the Social Security money. So, if you are receiving monthly Social Security benefits called SSI or SSDI, and the SSA…
Filing for Benefits: The Basic Question
As multimedia journalist Tracy Byrnes point out at the beginning of her post on www.thestreet.com, the first and most basic question you should consider asking yourself is, “Do you really need the check?” Asking this question will help you think through the pros…
Boomers Confident About Retirement Lifestyle, but is it Wishful Thinking?
Citing an NHP Foundation quote pointing to a “disconnect between Baby Boomers’ current financial status and where they perceive themselves in retirement,” a post by PlanAdvisor’s Lee Barney takes a look at a potential disconnect between where those age 50 and older…