The Retirement Beat

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• Obama Retirement Fix: No Day at the Beach

  By Carla Fried | Nov 20, 2009 | 0 comments

  The Obama Administration's recent tweak to policy makes it easier to bank unused vacation days in your retirement account. As much as Americans need to save more for retirement, using the vacation days could be a smarter retirement planning strategy

• Lip Service Popular Retirement Planning Strategy

  By Carla Fried | Nov 18, 2009 | 0 comments

  It's clear we know we need to save more to ensure a secure retirement. But for all the lip service given to the new realities of retirement planning, we're still coming up short--way short--on putting our money where our mouths are.

• Indicator to Watch: 401(k) Match

  By Carla Fried | Nov 16, 2009 | 0 comments

  The good news: More firms that slashed or suspended their 401(k) matching contribution now say they plan on reinstating the benefit in 2010. The not so good news: some employer matches will be less generous than before.

• Investor Manifesto: Is Nausea the Key to Success?

  By Carla Fried | Nov 13, 2009 | 2 comments

  Top investing mind William J. Bernstein has written an easy-to-read retirement road map for individual investors. The Investor's Manifesto flips the focus from "getting rich" to making sure you don't die poor.

• The New Retirement Risk: Decisionmaking Skills Peak at 53

  By Carla Fried | Nov 11, 2009 | 2 comments

  Financial decision-making skills peak at age 53. Yet retirees need to still be making smart choices into their 70s and beyond. Welcome to yet another retirement risk.

• Retirees Plan on Going Broke

  By Carla Fried | Nov 9, 2009 | 0 comments

  Americans expect to spend down their retirement savings at a 10 percent annual rate says Wells Fargo's annual Retirement Fitness Survey. And that's a sure-fire recipe for financial disaster.

• Gen Xers Face Retirement Trouble

  By Carla Fried | Nov 4, 2009 | 10 comments

  Baby Boomers get all the attention when it comes to the retirement-savings crunch, but Gen Xers are actually in worse shape. Fifty-six percent of Gen X households will lack the savings and assets to retire well.

• Game On: How Long Will You Live?

  By Carla Fried | Nov 2, 2009 | 1 comment

  After playing around with some online longevity calculators, I face this conundrum: If I don’t build up my retirement stash to support me until I'm 95, my next best option might be to take up recreational drugs and increase my alcohol intake.

• No Promotion? Blame It on the 401(k)

  By Carla Fried | Oct 27, 2009 | 0 comments

  Yep, yet another reason to pile even more scorn on the the flawed 401(k): A just-released GAO study that takes a look at the 401(k) auto-enrollment trend presents an interesting motivation for why employers are warming up to auto-enrollment: “A representative of a large plan consulting firm noted that sponsors may do this [auto enrollment] with [...]

• Do Seniors Really Need Obama’s Costly COLA Substitute?

  By Carla Fried | Oct 23, 2009 | 2 comments

  The political cost of no Social Security cost-of-living-adjustment (COLA) in 2010 seems to be about $250 per retiree. That’s the value of a special Social Security payout President Obama proposed last week, timed to offset the news that for the first time since the Social Security COLA was introduced in 1975, there will be no [...]

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