Can you really measure investment risk? Risk is supposed to be a measure of the likelihood that an event less than expected will occur. For example, if you are flipping a coin and want the coin to land on heads, then the odds of that happening is 50%. The odds of flipping tails is also [...]
Why You Can’t Really Measure Investment Risk
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The Real Effects of Inflation on Your Investments
I don’t want you to be happy about losing money, and I know that sounds stupid…in fact, you are probably saying to yourself “why would anyone be happy about losing money?”
Well, it’s happened before. It’s happening today…and my guess is it will happen in the future. I’ll explain in a moment…
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Owning vs Renting: Which One Is Really Better?
It’s become a popular debate in financial planning: owning vs renting. One of the “undeniable” truths we are often told is that it is always better to own a home than to rent an apartment. I disagree with that so-called truth (and have been called all kinds of stupid for it, too). The logic behind [...]
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Retirement Plan Rules, Part 4: Employer Pension Plans
An employer pension is getting to be quite rare these days. Pensions are retirement plans that, traditionally, an employer would fund on behalf of the employee. These are quite easy to understand and many of the arbitrary rules are similar, if not the same, as the arbitrary rules for annuities. This is because pensions use [...]
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How To Increase Your Retirement Savings
This year, CNN Money reported that 43 percent of Americans have less than $10,000 saved for retirement. If Americans want to someday live off of their savings, then something must change (and fast). What accounts for such low savings rates? While there are many circumstances that could bring out such low savings rates (loss of [...]