I always encourage everyone who has yet to claim social security benefits to check their SSA statement at least annually to make sure earnings have been properly credited. Now, there's another very important reason to check this information. Crooks are filing bogus claims for benefits.
One comment I’ve received over the years when working with a new client is, “I want to spend all of my money before I die.” Or said another way by the character Saul Bloom in the movie Ocean’s Twelve, “I want the last check I write to bounce.” This idea sounds very simple and elegant, but the reality is more like the unpredictable, all-over-the-place capers of the Ocean’s gang.
Last week, the Social Security Administration released another audit report explaining how some widows have been underpaid benefits. This is in addition to the errors disclosed last year affecting widows that we wrote about in Social Security Short-Changes 100,000+ Widows. The latest report concerns widows that are dually entitled to a retirement benefit and a survivor benefit.
One day, your kids or grandkids will inherit what you leave behind. Or, you may be the one set to inherit from the older generation. In either case, understanding the different tax ramifications between various asset/account types will go a long way toward avoiding mistakes at the time of inheritance and hopefully set the stage for
Not exactly an easy task… summarizing the largest tax change in 30 years. Instead of an exhaustive list of changes, here are the items we feel are most applicable to our clients, in order of relevance. Where possible, we offer planning considerations.
Just like I hate predicting future investment returns, I also hate talking about proposed tax legislation. The struggle comes from talking about things that may never come to pass, or may change by the time you read this. However, there are a couple of things in the current proposals that call for attention before the end of 2017.