Every year at or near the beginning of November, certain Intel employees are provided the opportunity to participate in the company’s deferred compensation plan, called SERPLUS. It should be noted that, technically speaking, a deferred compensation plan can refer to any program through which employees can elect to have a portion of their income paid […]
Sailing to Hawaii
Imagine that you’ve decided to sail to Hawaii from the West Coast. It’s something you have been thinking about for many years. You can imagine watching the coastline disappear behind you as you begin your trip, the starry nights out at sea, the encounters with whales and other sea life, the occasional sighting of another […]
American Retirees Finally Get a (Small) Raise
The US Social Security Administration recently announced that beneficiaries – including retirees, disabled workers and their eligible dependents and surviving family members – will receive a 2.8% increase in their benefits in 2019. This will be the largest annual inflation adjustment since 2012. The cost of living adjustment (or COLA) for 2018 was 2.0%, and […]
Why This Year’s Medicare Open Enrollment Period May Be Extra Important
If you’re younger than 65, you probably don’t understand all the commotion. Why are there all these advertisements for Medicare Advantage and prescription drug plans all over the TV, radio and print media? Medicare is the federal government program that provides health care coverage (health insurance) if you are 65 or older, under 65 and […]
Buckets for the Storm
Ten years ago (September 15, 2008), Lehman Brothers, a prominent Wall Street investment bank filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The financial system had been deteriorating for months and the federal government had already stepped in on several occasions to provide support. But the government decided to allow to Lehman to fail. That decision helped to […]
Financial Planning – Springwater’s Role
For most of our clients, Springwater has developed a comprehensive financial plan. The plans address the core areas of financial planning: budgeting and cash flow management, risk management (i.e. insurance), tax planning, estate planning, retirement planning and investment management. Other important planning areas that may be addressed include education planning, debt management, Social Security planning, […]
How will the new tax laws impact divorce settlements?
The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act passed in December 2017 included new alimony tax rules that apply to divorce or separation agreements executed after Dec. 31, 2018. The changes can dramatically affect each spouse’s finances, and so are expected to increase the contentiousness of the divorce process. Beginning on January 1, 2019, the ex-spouse that […]
Social Security, Medicare and Inflation
Social Security benefits include automatic cost of living adjustments (“COLAs”), which are intended to ensure that payments keep pace with inflation. However, years of low inflation and rising Medicare premiums have meant that, for many seniors, the adequacy of Social Security for retirement income has declined. Over the past eight years, COLAs for Social Security […]
Do we really need to think about long-term care insurance?
The title of this blog probably induced an immediate reaction. If you’re like most of our clients, it was probably not positive. If you own long-term care insurance, you’re probably frustrated that the carrier has come back to you (perhaps more than once) and asked you to agree to higher premiums for the same coverage, […]
Projecting Your Health Care Costs in Retirement
A recent survey of retirees by the Employee Benefit Research Institute and Greenwald & Associates found that half of them had not attempted to calculate their health care expenses in retirement before they retired, and more than 40% said their health care costs are higher than they originally had expected. Years ago, when we built […]