Social Security Statement in the Mail The Social Security Administration announced that they will resume mailing paper statements to workers!  If you are age 60 and older, you’ll get one every year.  If you are younger you’ll get one every 5 years, if you don’t have an account. You can get a statement anytime by creating …Read More

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Exciting Economics? Most of us think economics is a boring subject which economists themselves label, “the dismal science.”  But a 700-page book by the French economist Thomas Piketty has taken the world by storm.  The book is called Capital in the 21st Century.  What’s all the fuss? Most of the attention-grabbing topics of economics after …Read More

Is Wall Street Rigged? The CBS news program 60 Minutes on March 30 and a March 31 article in the NYTimes discuss a new book about the US stock exchanges.  The opening statement in the 60-Minutes piece is, “Wall Street is rigged.” Is it? If the question is, “Is someone preventing the individual investor from making …Read More

Fundamentals:  Tax Rates This article is part of a continuing series on fundamentals of financial planning. Taxes are complicated.  But understanding and taking action on just a few tax concepts can make a big difference.  One of them is marginal tax rates, also called tax brackets. We’re looking at the federal income tax only. John …Read More