Retirement

Updated, Aug. 29, 2024: This post has been adjusted to correct the number in the headline. By Lucy Lazarony, Next Avenue Many Americans in their 50s don’t have nearly enough savings set aside for retirement. How bad is the shortfall? According to Prudential’s 2024 Pulse of the American Retiree survey, with just a decade until

Here are the documents you need to collect before filing To make the process of filing for Social Security benefits easier, it’s important to know what documents you need when applying. Here’s a directive from the Social Security website: “You must present original documents or copies certified by the agency that issued them. We (Social

Seemingly everyone agrees there’s a retirement crisis – everyone, that is, except for retirees themselves. In an April Wall Street Journal article, I noted that 86% of seniors in a Federal Reserve survey described their financial situation as either “doing okay” or “living comfortably.” Just 3% said they were “finding it difficult to get by.”

“I don’t want to be a burden on my children when I’m old.” This statement is one I consistently hear expressed by older people from all walks of life. While it’s natural and noble to be worried about how you might disrupt your children’s lives as you age, “worrying” isn’t a strategy! Instead, use any

For years, I have said that Dr. Ruth (Ruth Westheimer) is my role model. Dr. Ruth, sex therapist, professor, and author, spent her life educating people about sexual health. I heard Dr. Ruth speak in the early 1980s and again in 2014. In fact, I went to see the documentary, Ask Dr. Ruth twice because

You’ve recently retired, and you go to the doctor, and get the news. “Jim, there’s now a safe surgical procedure for your terminal medical condition. All things considered, you now have a long life to live!” This sounds like great news, right? It might be an unwelcomed prognosis if you assumed that your medical condition

By Lucy Lazarony, Next Avenue Many Americans in their 50s don’t have nearly enough savings set aside for retirement. How bad is the shortfall? According to Prudential’s 2024 Pulse of the American Retiree survey, with just a decade until the traditional retirement age, 55-year-old Americans have less than $50,000 in median retirement savings. Prudential says

By Richard Eisenberg, Next Avenue Here’s the long-term care problem for many middle-income people: They want to buy a long-term care policy to defray the staggering care costs they could incur in the future but lack the cash for its premiums. There may be a solution, thanks to the SECURE 2.0 law of 2022. Roughly

By Chris Farrell, Next Avenue Next Avenue readers know that the U.S. workforce is aging. The ranks of workers 65 years and older has nearly quadrupled to more than 11 million since the mid-1980s, according to a report by the Pew Research Center. The trend toward an older workforce will continue, largely thanks to the

Many estate owners are concerned about what will happen to the wealth in the next generation and the effects the inheritance will have on their heirs, making how to leave wealth to the next generation one of the most difficult estate planning decisions. Wealth is accumulated and preserved for the next generation at least partly

In just two months, the Social Security Administration will announce the Social Security cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for 2025. Below, we’ll answer some basic questions about the Social Security COLA and what it means for you. What Is The Social Security COLA? Social Security’s COLA increases the benefits paid to retirees and beneficiaries each year to

Technology is rapidly transforming the landscape of life in retirement and older age. A myriad of devices—big and small—are becoming part of our everyday lives as we age. The technology is coming. The less clear question about life in older age is how will we acquire and pay for these technologies. A New High-Tech Retirement

By Kelly K. James, Next Avenue During an interdepartmental Zoom meeting, a vice president asked for feedback about a video he’d produced, on a tight timeframe, to promote our company. On the video, one employee made a comment that made our company look bad. I thought she may have misspoken (and later learned she had)

By Elana Rabinowitz, Next Avenue “We call it pretirement,” a woman said while gushing about her new life in the affluent resort town of Saratoga Springs, New York. The smile on her face was impossible to hide. “Pretirement?” I asked, as if she made a verbal typo. She explained that it’s a phrase she and

Many American retirees are making significant mistakes with their traditional IRAs by planning to leave the accounts to their children or other heirs. Inheriting a traditional IRA never was a great deal and is significantly less appealing to heirs now. An IRA owner can take actions to increase the value of inheriting the assets. Most

Exceptionally long life is a subject of much study, as we see more people in the world living to age 100 and beyond. According to the Boston University centenarian study, out of a US population of approximately 336,997,624, in 2021, there were 89,739 centenarians (age 100+) or a prevalence of 0.027%.en. What’s their secret? Is

Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris is working hard to win the support of older voters, but what would she do to address their many concerns if she is elected president? In a campaign that has not yet shown many of its policy cards, Harris has offered only the roughest sketch of a governing agenda. But

Many of the ads for missing money are real, but you don’t have to pay anyone to find or claim the money for you or loved ones. When a check or other payment is returned to a business, the payer usually turns the money over to the state of the payee’s last address. The money

It is not a rare thing that as wealthy aging parents decline, some relatives seem to come out of the woodwork. They may not have spoken to Mom or Dad in years. But suddenly, they are so interested. They’ve learned one way or another that the parent is “losing it” and they see an opportunity.

Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin The IRS has issued interim guidance for a new opportunity for taxpayers created under SECURE 2.0 that allows employers to make matching contributions to retirement plans based on employees’ student loan payments. The match amount is calculated as if the employee contributed their loan amount to