How Much Do You think You Need to Retire/What Age Will You/Spouse Retire: General Retirement Issues (Part 2)

You are lucky they’ll talk. Some won’t. My Dad won’t, nor my Mom. Honestly, I thin the ones who can talk about what they want are the same people who have already organized and made wills and trusts so things will go smoothly for their kids.

4 Likes

It affected the ethnicities who are the most overweight. I expect that Asians were less affected than whites because of that. That’s a warning to everyone to keep their weight under control.

https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/adult.html says that “Non-Hispanic Black adults (49.6%) had the highest age-adjusted prevalence of obesity, followed by Hispanic adults (44.8%), non-Hispanic White adults (42.2%) and non-Hispanic Asian adults (17.4%).” So not a huge difference, except for non-Hispanic Asian adults versus the others. But also note that the differences by weight/BMI alone may exaggerate obesity level differences, since Asian adults tend to have higher body fat percentages for a given BMI, while Black adults tend to have lower body fat percentages for a given BMI.

But looking more directly at death rates, the resulting estimator at http://www.predictcovidrisk.com/ indicates that, for the Medicare-age population, Asian people have a significantly higher risk of death than White people. Whatever the reasons, they are probably more than just obesity.

Wrong thread (?)

Anyone thinking about investing their retirement funds in “Nifties”? :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes: (NFTs) Not me! Still have a small box of kiddo’s beanie babies somewhere in the basement storage.

@BunsenBurner, funny, the morning radio show I Iisten to has been discussing this trend for a few weeks; the 50-60 year old hosts are struggling to wrap their heads around the concept, the thirtysomething producer keeps explaining it and has bought some. Tulips, anyone?

5 Likes

The beanie baby generation and the Pokémon generation now aged into investing… :slight_smile: While they are chasing puff tokens and dog coins, Mr. and I are thinking about getting a chunk of land!

4 Likes

Ugh I have beanie babies! As for pokemon, my youngest has a trading card business and he cleans up selling pokemon cards and other cards. He is also at 18 a very active investor but knows better than to buy into Gamestop, etc. although he and I each bought a few dollars worth of bitcoin from our “fun” money Robinhood accounts. Otherwise my kids stick to Fidelity for the most part, but the ability to buy and sell with no commissions and partial shares has really opened up the market to anyone who wants to invest, however, there has to be a lot of teaching that goes with it.

2 Likes

@srparent15 and remind them that if they are trading stocks, they may also lose the free online tax return options as those trades sometimes require an upgrades, an upgrade that may cost more than the stocks they own :wink:

1 Like

Haha, possibly. I actually use a tax website for doing my kids returns called FreeTaxUsa. It’s free for federal returns and I can compare against programs like TurboTax and the amounts owed or refunded are usually the same, you just don’t have to pay to then file it. For the state return I then just go directly to the state once I have the federal return filed and do them directly there. I’ve been doing that for a few years now. The one thing kids don’t realize and I had to explain to mine over the past few years, especially this last one, is that you need to pay taxes on this stuff so consider that when you sell something when you sell it for a gain. Nothing is for free, lol.

2 Likes

Is this the time to admit I still have a big Rubbermaid container of Beanie Babies in my basement and the recycling station near our home was probably the recipient of hundreds (thousands? - my mom spoiled her grandsons) of dollars of Pokémon cards, so of which may be worth quite a bit these days?

3 Likes

We FINALLY did backdoor Roth’s for the first time. I so wish I would have started several years ago, when I first heard of them. One of my retirement “problems” is I have too much in my tax-deferred account. I will likely need to do some Roth conversion, but my current tax rate is so high (state and local combined over 8%) I’m really not wanting to go that route.

3 Likes

We are in the same position. I’m eager to get money into tax free as I think tax rates are going to go crazy over the next decade. It’s going to be painful getting the money into Roths.

1 Like

doing Roth conversions is another good reason to delay SS as long as you can.

Yeah, we’ll likely wait til 70. We’ll retire in our 50’s so will have to work out the long term details. I’m most concerned about taxes snd medical.

2 Likes

We’ve started doing some Roth conversion, with guidance from our FA. For decades we had preferred to keep all 401K balance and contributions as traditional, mainly for simplicity (not having to track which money was and was not pre-taxed). It seemed a pay-now or pay-later thing. But now it’s time.

Bad stats:

This is my problem as well. I have converted almost all of my SEP money over the past few years but still have a little left. Next up is my 401k which is substantial and I put all of my income from my business in there annually so I don’t think I’m going to be converting that anytime soon. I may just have to bite the bullet on that one and use it as my main income source when I can take distributions when I’m 59-1/2 or start rolling them to the Roth at that time as if they’re income to some degree. At the same time, I just realize no time is ever really a good time and it’s just frustrating.

@ Happytimes2001 I am finding out what the ‘penalty’ is on early take out from SS (before full retirement age). We make way more than 8% on our investments, so will not go past full retirement age with drawing SS, and drawing SS will establish those payments. If a decision down the road to cut SS benefits, it may not affect those already drawing. PLUS one can pass along their investments to others; if you die before drawing SS or drawing much, it is lost. We have some cash to defer SS some - H already retired, so I took some money out of retirement funds to be ‘liquid’ for us. But we are not spending it down.

Originally SS was not to be taxable income, and it wasn’t from 1935 until it did (47 years later; during those years it was tax free income). Most people will pay tax on only half of the SS earnings.

Is has been ‘suggested’ that SS will reduce benefits by 25% when it has totally depleted the Trust Fund (in the year 2035 possibly).

while you may make 8% on your investments, that return is not guaranteed and risk-free, which SS is. A proper financial analysis would compare SS against any TIPS or equivalent instruments in your portfolio. Using an apples-to-apples mortality-adjusted discount rate, waiting to claim SS is a no-brainer for many. And yes, that means spending down your current assets. The other thing most folks don’t consider is the Spousal benefit. Looking at joint life expectancy tables, there is an 20% chance of one spouse making it to 90+.

That said, yes, if the SS law is not changed, everyone will receive a haircut in ~2035. There are no exceptions in the law for those currently receiving benefits. (Of course, Congress can change the law at any time.)

2 Likes