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Is saving really that hard? Nope, not for the great majority of Americans.

R Quinn | Apr 28, 2026

"You really think people can’t save at $72,000 a year?"

- R Quinn

The Vision, the Babe , Einstein and the Q

mflack | Apr 25, 2026

"I remember one really bad April a few years ago, my Giants were batting below .200 as a team. When I wrote my weekly column for our fan site, I called them "The Fighting Mendozas.""

- DrLefty

For Richer, For Poorer: 37 Years of Compounding

Mark Crothers | Apr 28, 2026

"Happy anniversary to you Krazy Kidz! The only things I can say about my own wedding in 1983 and our finances are (a) it was a very cheap wedding and (b) we were too young and dumb to realize that we were actually too poor to get married. And yet here we still are! Blessings!"

- DrLefty

Note to HD Writers and Contributors

Elaine M. Clements | Apr 3, 2026

"Why have I stopped posting? There are two areas where my previous articles could be cited - Spotlight on a topic, and Spotlight on an author. Apparently topics and authors change throughout the day. After an unscientific search during March, I resolved to look at HD at least twice each day during the month of April - morning and evening. I have never seen any of my articles cited in either place. I have no idea how the topics and authors are selected, but if my previous articles are not worth re-publshing, why should I put time and effort into new articles. I am not criticizing the articles that are highlighted in these two areas. They are fine articles. I have concluded that my articles are simply not up to snuff. With Jonathan's help, I published about 20 articles, many fewer than some others. But I would have thought that in two months time at least one or two might have been worthy to include. As an aside - I would much prefer to see such one topic, and one author highlighted each day. I am not going to come back to HD six or eight times a day to see what has changed. I wish I could look at it just once a day, and not worry that I am missing something significant. Larry Sayler"

- Larry Sayler

Around the Obstacles

ArticleDan Smith | Apr 25, 2026

I WAS 48 years old when the judgement was final and the papers were signed. My former wife and I split our net worth 50/50. There were no arguments over household items like furniture; I didn’t care about that stuff. Pam gladly accepted my proposal that she keep the house, and all its equity, in exchange for me keeping an offsetting amount of the IRAs and my 401(k), a very good move for my future self. By giving up the house, I also escaped the mortgage, which was the only loan obligation I had. Had there been consumer debt (there was none), I would have eliminated that as quickly as possible, beginning with the highest interest loans. I was ordered to pay spousal support to age 65, or my retirement if I worked beyond 65. I would be lying if I told you that I liked paying alimony. Still, it wasn’t unfair considering our age at divorce, Pam’s depression, and the fact that she mostly stayed at home to raise our kids. Long before the divorce was ever final, I knew I’d have to make up for lost time if I ever wanted to retire in the manner to which I wanted to had become accustomed. The divorce wasn’t going to be the only obstacle I would have to overcome. Thirty years of delivering beverages resulted in osteoarthritis and plantar fasciitis; my days on the beer truck were rapidly coming to an end. I needed a plan. Where Was I? I had to understand exactly where I was, and what my options were.

My continued employment as a delivery driver would likely have left me on Social Security Disability (SSDI) by age 55.
I was very interested in personal finance, and knew many people in that field who would help me get my foot in the door.
I had acquired bookkeeping, payroll, and tax prep skills through my involvement with my local union, though I never pictured myself as the type to sit behind a desk, in a dimly lit office, crunching numbers beneath the glow of one of those green shade banker’s lamps.
As a last resort, I could fall back on my truck driving skills, using my commercial drivers license to get a job hauling ‘no-touch’ freight of some sort.
Last but not least, I needed a place to live. “Hello, mom and dad, I need my room back”. Sleeping on the twin mattress I gave up 25 years earlier, was not part of my plan.
I was determined not to let my occupation as a beer truck driver dictate my future job prospects.

Where did I want to be?

Where to live? Living with the folks was never meant to be a long term thing. After three months of that, I signed my first ever apartment lease as a lessee, as opposed to a lessor. That lasted two years, until a very large increase in the rent caused me to buy a duplex, and become a lessor again.
Where to work? I continued my work as a delivery driver for three more years. My position as the local union president, and my five paid weeks of vacation actually kept me off of the truck much of the time. That enabled me to tolerate the maladies that would eventually force me out of that job. Having absolutely no desire to spend the balance of my life languishing on SSDI and a minimal IRA balance, I set off on the path to becoming a financial services guy. That did not work out, and if you want more information on that, here’s a link.
To make ends meet, I turned to my last resort; driving a truck. Piloting an 18-wheeler was not how I envisioned my remaining working days. And although the freight was ‘no touch’, driving 600 miles every day in a Kenworth tractor is still pretty hard on your vertebrae. But sometimes you have to do what you have to do to survive and to keep your eye on your finish line. My heart goes out to full time drivers, that job is no walk in the park.
And what about love? My preference was to be in a relationship, but not any relationship. I wanted a good partner, I wanted to be a good partner as well. What qualities would I look for in a new partner? Independent, established, confident, and nice. Was I asking too much?

Making it All Work Finally, preparation collided with opportunity. In other words, I got lucky. Remember when I told you I didn’t picture myself as ever being a bean-counter? Two established financial services guys set me up with free office space and began funneling tax prep clients to me. What began with me preparing taxes for about three dozen of my union brothers, instantly turned into over 100 clients. There I was, a bean counter of sorts. I kept that truck driving job for several more years. And remember that duplex I bought after the rent spiked at my apartment? Well, there was this girl living next door. Enter Chrissy. We became best friends. She is no longer my neighbor. She is now my spouse. Of course, at the time we met, aside from being a nice guy, I wasn’t much of a catch. Man, she took a chance on me. As my client count went up, my days driving the big-rig went down. When the client count got to about 400, I retired forever from driving. No more trips to Chicago, Des Moines, Snow Shoe PA, or Jersey City. Chrissy and I began pounding 40% of our gross pay into savings. It would take until I was 70, but working together, we got to a place each of us only dreamed we would be. By living within our means, and keeping lifestyle creep to a minimum, we surpassed our goals. Chris retired at 64 and helped me during my final three years as a tax preparer. Lucky for me, Federal Wage and Hour never found out that I violated the minimum wage laws by never paying her in the first place. I sold the practice at age 70. I prepared 650 tax returns in my final year. It’s important to note that during our journey, we did not starve ourselves of food nor fun. We counted 27 trips during our first ten years together. Chris was great at finding great deals to various destinations in the Caribbean, and we turned several of her business trips into mini vacations as well. It’s important to prepare for the future, but have some fun along the way as well. I hope this piece inspires someone who is still on the road, dealing with similar obstacles, and wondering if there was a way around them. For 30 years, Dan Smith was a driver-salesman and local union representative, before building a successful income-tax practice in Toledo, Ohio. He retired in 2022. Dan has two beautiful daughters, two loving sons-in-law and seven grandchildren. He and Chris, the love of his life, have been together for two great decades and counting. Check out Dan's earlier articles.

The IRA Decision That Affects Your Kids

David Lancaster | Apr 17, 2026

"I had thought when the kid inherit an ira they can take distributions over 10yrs we are both taking rmds now. age 76,75 am I wrong"

- Kenneth Tobin

Investing Fundamentals: A Simple Guide for Beginners

William Housley | Apr 24, 2026

"I have read about this idea in the past and thought what a great. However at 67, being grandchildless, and considering the age both my parents passed, if we were so blessed in the future I will not live to see them as teenagers."

- David Lancaster

Happy 50th!

Rick Connor | Apr 27, 2026

"Another great post Rick. Keep ‘em coming!"

- David Lancaster

The great COLA debate-maybe not the expected solution.

R Quinn | Apr 26, 2026

"Do you really think it is all that complicated to transition from working and spending to retired and spending? If a person had an income of $80,000 and a lifestyle accordingly, there are two basic questions. Do I want the same lifestyle and what, if any, major declines in spending will occur immediately upon retirement. Perhaps a mortgage, saving a significant percentage that goes away. You have a good estimate of income needed to start. You can always get a SS estimate and now you have a rough idea of the income you must be able to generate. I agree the investing and generating a retirement income stream is more difficult, but there is plenty of help out there. Being clueless is not justification in my book, neither is avoiding the effort not to be clueless. I go back to my days in employee benefits when we made information readily available to help employees make health benefit and retirement decisions, including face to face seminars. The biggest challenge was always just to get people to pay attention - when it was for their own benefit. I get a laugh at social media videos where seniors rant about struggling and how SS betrayed them as it isn’t enough. They claim loudly “I did everything right for forty years, I paid my SS taxes and now I can’t pay my bills” The thing is, they did not do everything right. There is one principle that even Buffet pushes. You save and invest first and your lifestyle, your budget, spending always come after. And you increase your saving rate with each increase in income or financial windfall. That works for all but the lowest income levels."

- R Quinn

A Life You Build

Jeff Peck | Apr 19, 2026

"This is an absolutely wonderful summary of how to live life fully. Appreciate what you have. Keep building. Show up and make good choices. Bravo."

- cynthiahoffman

How much to provide a college student monthly?

Chris | Apr 25, 2026

"This situation, as described, with darn near everything already covered, sounds like my kid. We gave enough for about meal out every week and gas money (but we tracked vehicle usage so we'd know if it was driven excessively). Spend less, accumulate more, that was the rule. If the car stayed parked, more money for food, etc. Maybe he doesn't even need the car? Maybe he'll use it to make money (but he oughta be studying!)."

- longtalltexan007

Live a little

greg_j_tomamichel | Apr 25, 2026

"The funny thing is: we had to smuggle it back out, neither one of us wanted any. My grandson and daughter scoffed the evidence yesterday.😂"

- Mark Crothers

Driving Prices

ArticleAdam M. Grossman | Apr 25, 2026

IN 2020, ELECTRIC car maker Lucid Motors brought in revenue of $4 million. Five years later, sales had risen impressively, to more than $1 billion. In 2025 alone, sales grew 68%. That sounds like a success story, and through that lens, it is. And yet, over that same period, the company’s stock dropped more than 89%. What happened? A better question is: What didn’t happen? Despite growing sales, the company has struggled to turn a profit. On sales of $1.3 billion last year, Lucid posted a loss of $3.8 billion. It’s experienced production problems and management turnover. It’s seen its competitors cut prices. As a result, it’s been forced to issue new shares, thus diluting the value of existing investors’ holdings, just to keep the lights on. In fairness to Lucid, the road to success is rarely a straight line. Arizona State University professor Hendrik Bessembinder studies the performance of public companies, and the results are sobering. In new research, he found that, over the past 100 years, the median return among stocks trading on U.S. exchanges was negative 6.9%. Only a minority of stocks, in other words, made any money at all. Why are these results so dismal? Four factors stand out. The first is emotion—specifically, investors’ emotions. After Lucid went public in late-2020, its stock began rising quickly, and in the early months of 2021, the shares gained nearly 500%. What was driving those gains? Since the company was just starting production, very little can be attributed to the company’s financial results. Instead, it was simply investor excitement around the electric vehicle market and the optimistic view that Lucid would become the next Tesla. But no sooner did the stock rise that it fell again. And in the years since, it’s been an overwhelmingly downward slide for investors. In the last interview he gave before he died in 1976, Benjamin Graham compared the stock market to a seesaw. “The present optimism is going to be overdone and the next pessimism will be overdone.” And that causes stocks to go to extremes. Fifty years later, Graham’s observation seems no less accurate. Indeed, investment manager Cliff Asness has argued that, because of the internet, the impact of emotions on the market is even worse today. Due to what he calls “the less-efficient market hypothesis,” inaccurate information can spread much more quickly today than it did in the past. You may recall the phenomenon in which a group of day traders, led by a YouTube personality who called himself Roaring Kitty, was able to drive up the stock of a nearly-bankrupt company for no rational reason. That couldn’t have happened in the years before social media. Another factor that can drive stock prices is government action, and this also explains part of Lucid’s slide. When the government ended tax credits on electric vehicles last year, that made electric cars much more expensive for consumers. And contrary to intuition, this year’s higher gas prices haven’t done much to entice buyers back to EVs. On the other hand, government action can sometimes be positive. In 2017, for example, Congress voted to cut the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%, significantly boosting public company profits. Perhaps the most obvious factor that can drive stock prices is competition. This can take a few different forms. Coke and Pepsi, for example, have been battling for more than 100 years, but their relative positions don’t change very much. At this point, neither company is going to go out of business as a result of the other. In his book The Innovator’s Dilemma, the late Clayton Christensen described a much more disruptive form of competition—the sort that upends industries entirely, such as when 19-year-old Bill Gates outsmarted IBM. At the time, IBM was the most dominant company in the computer industry, but over time its position faded. It underestimated how important personal computers would become and didn’t take the market seriously. Years later, it ended up selling off its PC business entirely, and today makes very little hardware. The same sort of thing happened to BlackBerry, to Kodak and to Polaroid, among others. Like IBM, all of these companies had enormous resources. But, according to Christensen, it was their success that became their greatest weakness, because it caused them to underestimate threats and to downplay the likelihood that anything fundamental might ever change. Ken Olson, the founder of Digital Equipment Corporation, a leader in minicomputers in the 1960s and 1970s, famously asserted, “There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home.” The tricky aspect of the innovator’s dilemma, though, is that it isn’t universal. Consider the early years of the auto industry. Before automobiles gained popularity in the early 1900s, it’s estimated that there were 4,000 companies in the horse-and-carriage business. The right move for any of these companies would have been to try to transition into automobile manufacturing. Carriage makers, especially, had relevant skills and were best positioned to make this leap. But they adopted a collective mindset that the automobile wasn’t going to succeed, dismissing cars as “devil wagons.” But one of these carriage makers, Studebaker, did correctly assess where things were going and successfully transitioned to making automobiles. The rest failed, faded away or switched into other businesses. Companies, in other words, can be very good at one thing but lose their footing in the face of change. That’s a key factor behind Bessembinder’s findings. A final factor that can cause companies to stumble: random events. Consider, for example, what occurred in Thailand in 2011. Heavy rainfall resulted in flooding that caused large industrial areas to become submerged. This included the factories of hard drive manufacturers Western Digital and Seagate, causing their stocks to drop 35% and 45%, respectively. Both recovered, but this is an example of how even good companies can run into bad luck. Years of research has shown how difficult it is to predict stock prices. Bessembinder’s new work, however, makes an additional important point, which is that, for all of the reasons discussed here, and likely others, stocks face many more roads to potential demise than to success. Thus, to succeed at stock-picking doesn’t just require research and hard work. It requires an almost prophetic ability to identify the tiny handful of stocks that will turn into homeruns. But since the odds are so steeply against success, that’s a key reason I see it as so important to stick with the simpler and less risky alternative of index funds. Adam M. Grossman is the founder of Mayport, a fixed-fee wealth management firm. Sign up for Adam's Daily Ideas email, follow him on X @AdamMGrossman and check out his earlier articles.

Is saving really that hard? Nope, not for the great majority of Americans.

R Quinn | Apr 28, 2026

"You really think people can’t save at $72,000 a year?"

- R Quinn

The Vision, the Babe , Einstein and the Q

mflack | Apr 25, 2026

"I remember one really bad April a few years ago, my Giants were batting below .200 as a team. When I wrote my weekly column for our fan site, I called them "The Fighting Mendozas.""

- DrLefty

For Richer, For Poorer: 37 Years of Compounding

Mark Crothers | Apr 28, 2026

- DrLefty

Note to HD Writers and Contributors

Elaine M. Clements | Apr 3, 2026

- Larry Sayler

Around the Obstacles

ArticleDan Smith | Apr 25, 2026

My continued employment as a delivery driver would likely have left me on Social Security Disability (SSDI) by age 55.
I was very interested in personal finance, and knew many people in that field who would help me get my foot in the door.
I had acquired bookkeeping, payroll, and tax prep skills through my involvement with my local union, though I never pictured myself as the type to sit behind a desk, in a dimly lit office, crunching numbers beneath the glow of one of those green shade banker’s lamps.
As a last resort, I could fall back on my truck driving skills, using my commercial drivers license to get a job hauling ‘no-touch’ freight of some sort.
Last but not least, I needed a place to live. “Hello, mom and dad, I need my room back”. Sleeping on the twin mattress I gave up 25 years earlier, was not part of my plan.
I was determined not to let my occupation as a beer truck driver dictate my future job prospects.

Where did I want to be?

Where to live? Living with the folks was never meant to be a long term thing. After three months of that, I signed my first ever apartment lease as a lessee, as opposed to a lessor. That lasted two years, until a very large increase in the rent caused me to buy a duplex, and become a lessor again.
Where to work? I continued my work as a delivery driver for three more years. My position as the local union president, and my five paid weeks of vacation actually kept me off of the truck much of the time. That enabled me to tolerate the maladies that would eventually force me out of that job. Having absolutely no desire to spend the balance of my life languishing on SSDI and a minimal IRA balance, I set off on the path to becoming a financial services guy. That did not work out, and if you want more information on that, here’s a link.
To make ends meet, I turned to my last resort; driving a truck. Piloting an 18-wheeler was not how I envisioned my remaining working days. And although the freight was ‘no touch’, driving 600 miles every day in a Kenworth tractor is still pretty hard on your vertebrae. But sometimes you have to do what you have to do to survive and to keep your eye on your finish line. My heart goes out to full time drivers, that job is no walk in the park.
And what about love? My preference was to be in a relationship, but not any relationship. I wanted a good partner, I wanted to be a good partner as well. What qualities would I look for in a new partner? Independent, established, confident, and nice. Was I asking too much?

The IRA Decision That Affects Your Kids

David Lancaster | Apr 17, 2026

"I had thought when the kid inherit an ira they can take distributions over 10yrs we are both taking rmds now. age 76,75 am I wrong"

- Kenneth Tobin

Investing Fundamentals: A Simple Guide for Beginners

William Housley | Apr 24, 2026

- David Lancaster

Happy 50th!

Rick Connor | Apr 27, 2026

"Another great post Rick. Keep ‘em coming!"

- David Lancaster

The great COLA debate-maybe not the expected solution.

R Quinn | Apr 26, 2026

- R Quinn

Driving Prices

ArticleAdam M. Grossman | Apr 25, 2026

Manifesto

Apr 26, 2026

NO. 26: WE SHOULD strive to spend our days as we wish—by using our dollars to escape today’s chores that we dislike, while also saving for the ultimate prize: full financial freedom.

Truths

Apr 28, 2026

NO. 104: SHIFTS IN investor sentiment—as reflected in the stock market’s rising and falling price-earnings ratio—become less important as our time horizon lengthens. Instead, for investors who hold diversified stock portfolios for decades, what matters is the stock market's starting dividend yield and subsequent growth in earnings per share.

think

Apr 27, 2026

HUMAN CAPITAL. If we’re early in our career, our most valuable asset is usually our human capital—our ability to pull in a paycheck. That paycheck allows us to service debt, provides the savings needed for retirement and frees us up to invest in stocks. But as retirement approaches, we should aim to pay off all debt and shift maybe half our portfolio into bonds.

humans

Apr 26, 2026

NO. 32: WE REVISE our memories to make ourselves look better. Suppose we believe we’re smart at managing money, but then we panic during a market decline. The result can be the uneasy feeling known as “cognitive dissonance.” To escape our discomfort, we might revise our memory—and decide we stood our ground and perhaps even bought more.

Money Guide

Manifesto

Apr 26, 2026

NO. 26: WE SHOULD strive to spend our days as we wish—by using our dollars to escape today’s chores that we dislike, while also saving for the ultimate prize: full financial freedom.

Spotlight: Taxes

Effective vs. Marginal? Nah…..

Dan Smith | Jul 6, 2025

Perhaps what we should be debating is which is the most important line on the tax return. I can tell you that most would say line 34, “this is the amount you overpaid, or line 37, “this is the amount you owe. I contend line 24 matters most, “this is your total tax”. Rarely, and I mean well under 1% of the time, did a client ask me how much tax they paid. As a matter of fact,

ID.me

William Perry | Jul 16, 2025

I still help prepare tax returns for pay. As such I am required, among other things, to annually renew my preparer pin number.
I recently received the following from the IRS in a email –
We have updated the Tax Professional PTIN System sign-in process for tax return preparers who have a Social Security number (SSN). You will now sign in using ID.me, a technology provider that conducts identity verification and credential management for access to IRS online services.

Roth conversion opportunities extended

John Yeigh | Jul 9, 2025

The new U.S. tax legislation extends today’s relatively low tax-rates that were implemented in 2017. While this tax legislation includes some new nuances that may impact retirees, the main tax-rate impact for Roth conversions has been extended for 2026 and beyond. Here are four reminders of the benefits and challenges with Roth conversions. “Roth on.”
Who should Roth:
https://humbledollar.com/2020/05/to-roth-or-not/
How Roth conversions can impact Medicare premiums:
https://humbledollar.com/2023/04/that-28000000-tax/
Rothing can lower future taxes especially when considering the widow’s tax after the first spouse passes and estate tax impacts:
https://humbledollar.com/2023/01/securing-lower-taxes/
Rothing may not gain ground on future RMD tax obligations due to growth in tax deferred accounts:
https://www.theretirementmanifesto.com/my-biggest-surprise-in-retirement/

Tax Strategies for W-2 Employees

Bogdan Sheremeta | Jan 24, 2026

I get a lot of questions from W-2 employees asking, “How can I save money on taxes?”
Many people know that business owners have a lot of flexibility to lower their tax bill, but what about W-2 workers? I’ll skip some of the more “obvious” strategies, like:

401(k)
Backdoor Roth
HSA/FSA

Here are some other ones you might want to think about:

Commuter benefits
Some companies offer pre-tax commuter benefits that can be used for transportation expenses such as transit passes or parking.

Tax Efficiency

Bogdan Sheremeta | Apr 4, 2026

TAX EFFICIENT FUND placement is an often underrated topic. The goal of the tax efficient fund placement is to minimize taxes within your investments, and select the right account for those investments.

But how much does that actually matter?

Vanguard’s research finds that a thoughtful asset location strategy can add significantly more value than an equal location strategy. The value added typically ranges from 5 to 30 basis points of after-tax return, depending on circumstances (e.g.,

Kitces – Analyzing Congressional Republicans’ Budget Proposal For The 2025 TCJA Extension

William Perry | May 1, 2025

On April 30, Kitces posted an comprehensive article regarding the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) describing in detail where the congress is currently at and what steps are necessary to extend and/or change the the TCJA before the current tax law sunsets at the end of 2025.
https://www.kitces.com/blog/tax-cuts-and-jobs-act-tcja-sunset-budget-resolution-reconciliation-salt-cap-qbi-deduction-congress-republication-house-senate-bill/
I agree with the conclusion of the article to currently “wait and see” before taking action until I have a concrete expectation of what the individual income tax rules will look like in 2026.

Cashing In

John Yeigh | Jul 29, 2019

STOCK MARKET INDEXES are at all-time highs, share prices are expensive relative to earnings and global economic growth is slowing. Is it time to consider rebalancing our portfolios and perhaps adopting a more defensive approach? If you believe in rebalancing—maintaining a relatively consistent allocation to stocks and bonds—then, at some point in this bull market, you must sell stocks. I am hugely hesitant to do so, for three reasons. First, I am fundamentally a buy-and-hold forever investor, unless I need cash, so I don’t typically rebalance. Second, I hate paying taxes on stock gains in my taxable account. Third, I have no great ideas for what fixed-income alternatives I might buy, given today’s low interest rates. After years of waffling as markets rose, I recently did something I’ve never done before: I sold a large chunk of index funds in my taxable account, despite not needing the money. Taxes drove my selection of what to sell—I sold holdings with the smallest percentage gains. As many pundits point out, we don’t truly have profits until we sell. I took some profits and accept that I’ll pay the taxman his due. As an alternative, I could have locked in the gains and postponed taxes by buying a protective put. But puts require a cash outlay, timing considerations and trading complexities that aren’t for me. I slightly offset these stock sales with stock purchases within my retirement accounts. Since I now have more cash in my taxable account, I can put off tapping my tax-deferred accounts for longer. The unplanned capital gains will also add to my adjusted gross income, likely leading me to reduce my planned year-end Roth conversions or my sales of my old employer’s stock. Do I have a good plan for what to do with the cash I just raised? Not…

Road to Nowhere

John Yeigh | Feb 13, 2022

I’M DEBATING whether my life is better described by Tom Cochrane’s Life Is a Highway or Eddie Rabbitt’s Driving My Life Away. In a recent article, I noted that our family has driven our cars about 1.9 million miles. Since I’m the family’s King of the Road, I’ve been along for at least two-thirds of that ride. I’m also, alas, the king of lost time. The average commuting speed in the Washington, D.C., area—where I live—has been estimated at 24 and 46 mph. Whatever the right number is, the roads here have been described as the nation’s most congested. Let’s split the difference and call it 35 mph. If I take my 1.25 million miles at 35 mph, I’ve been in a car for more than 35,000 hours. That works out to almost 1,500 days, or roughly four years. Four years out of a likely 65-year adult life translates to about 10% of my total waking hours. That’s scary. These estimates don’t count our six years living overseas or time spent in others’ cars. However you run the calculation, this much is clear: A lot of my life has been spent in a car seat. Despite this, I mostly didn’t mind my car time—as long as the car was moving. My long commute allowed us to live in a resort town, plus it gave my wife a shorter ride to work. I enjoyed audiobooks, practiced hundreds of work presentations to the windshield, pondered life’s daily challenges, worked by cell phone, listened to NPR and tuned into my favorite radio stations. My non-commuting car time—to get to family, friends or a vacation—were even less lamented. I’m not alone in my comfort with Washington commuting, despite the congestion. According to a 2019 study by the National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board, “Half of…

Off the Payroll

John Yeigh | Jan 30, 2019

WHEN OUR DAUGHTER landed a great job after her 2018 college graduation, we expected her to soon move off the family payroll. She immediately budgeted to take on all routine living expenses, including housing, food, car and utilities. We did volunteer to cover some smaller expenses, largely in situations where family plans are available, such as cellphones, Netflix, Amazon Prime and AAA. We also kept her on our employer-provided health insurance, which involved no added cost. Today, a third of millennials still live at home. I get it. Young adults may be seeking a job, continuing college studies, saving for a down payment or wedding, temporarily displaced, or simply lazy or fearful about entering the workforce. Even if they move out, many others receive parental financial help, similar to what we planned for our daughter. But in our case, parental help turned out to be far larger than we expected. My daughter’s first big challenge was finding a place to live. In her new city, tiny apartments rent for some $2,000 per month. These apartments were too small to store snow tires, camping gear, skis and other stuff that should now be hers to manage. I also struggled with throwing away $24,000 a year on rent. That’s when I suggested she look into buying. This was a seismic shift from the original plan. Suddenly, our daughter had to step up and earn an instant PhD in real estate. She quickly learned that buyers get what they pay for—and that location, location, location is everything. Two important criteria were neighborhood safety and resale potential. After all, she might get a job transfer—a frequent occurrence early in a career. After considering many cheaper dumps, our daughter landed on a three-bedroom townhouse with a basement. It struck all of us as a solid value.…

Bracketology

John Yeigh | Mar 19, 2019

THE NCAA BASKETBALL season concludes every year with the March Madness playoffs. Many Americans engage in bracketology—trying to figure out which teams will get knocked out in each round and which will advance. Warren Buffett even offers an annual bracket-picking challenge, where Berkshire employees can win $1 million a year for life. This year, however, Americans with substantial retirement accounts might also want to try another form of bracketology: studying the 2017 tax law—and asking whether it offers a unique opportunity to convert hefty amounts of traditional IRA money to a Roth IRA. For most middle-income Americans, the 2017 tax law lowered their marginal income tax rates by three or four percentage points. The rate cuts are great, though there are some offsetting lost tax benefits, such as the new limit on state and local tax deductions and the loss of personal exemptions. How does all this affect Roth conversions? There are two important considerations. First, suppose you’ve accumulated a sizeable sum in all your 401(k)s, IRAs and similar tax-deferred accounts, including those of your spouse. Once each of you turn age 70½, you’ll be required to draw down those accounts and pay income taxes on the distributions. For instance, if you have a combined $1.5 million in retirement accounts at age 75, the required minimum distribution (RMD) would be $65,502. Add that distribution to any pension, Social Security and other income, and your total income could rise above $100,000 and move you into higher tax brackets. That brings us to the second consideration: 2017’s tax cuts are scheduled to end in 2025—and they could disappear after 2020’s election. That means there’s a brief but potentially unique opportunity to take advantage of today’s unprecedented low marginal tax rates. In 2017, under the old law, a couple filing jointly paid tax…

Penniless at Last

John Yeigh | Jul 19, 2022

IN AN EARLIER ARTICLE, I noted that my savings journey began in 1960 with a couple of jars of pennies that I started collecting at age five. I was following family ancestor Ben Franklin’s maxim that “a penny saved is a penny earned.” One of my uncles also had an interest in coin collecting. He and I began to actively search through countless penny rolls to find pennies with dates that we didn’t have. We bought Whitman coin albums and organized our pennies by date from the earliest Lincoln head pennies from 1909 up through the 1960s. We expanded our collection to include sets of Buffalo and Jefferson nickels, Mercury and Roosevelt dimes, and Washington silver quarters, plus any older coin we happened upon. Occasionally, we found Indian head pennies, Liberty nickels, Barber dimes or Walking Liberty quarters still in circulation. These dimes and quarters contained 90% silver through 1964, so they had a recognized commodity value. Our coin-collecting hobby lasted for eight years. During those eight years, we amassed five nearly complete Lincoln penny sets, missing only the rare 1909 penny minted in San Francisco with the initials V.B.D. for its engraver. One of these pennies in fine condition can cost more than $1,000. We had jars of old duplicate pennies as well. We assembled a couple of complete sets of Jefferson nickels and Roosevelt dimes. Our most valuable collection was the three nearly complete sets of Mercury dimes, lacking only a rare 1916 10-cent piece minted in Denver. We accumulated plenty of duplicate year silver coins as well. My uncle passed away in 1968 due to complications from polio, and my interests shifted. That’s when my coin collection went into hibernation, stored in various basements untouched for 50 years. [xyz-ihs snippet="Mobile-Subscribe"] I have no interest in pursuing this hobby…

Roth conversion opportunities extended

John Yeigh | Jul 9, 2025

The new U.S. tax legislation extends today's relatively low tax-rates that were implemented in 2017. While this tax legislation includes some new nuances that may impact retirees, the main tax-rate impact for Roth conversions has been extended for 2026 and beyond. Here are four reminders of the benefits and challenges with Roth conversions. "Roth on." Who should Roth: https://humbledollar.com/2020/05/to-roth-or-not/ How Roth conversions can impact Medicare premiums: https://humbledollar.com/2023/04/that-28000000-tax/ Rothing can lower future taxes especially when considering the widow's tax after the first spouse passes and estate tax impacts: https://humbledollar.com/2023/01/securing-lower-taxes/ Rothing may not gain ground on future RMD tax obligations due to growth in tax deferred accounts: https://www.theretirementmanifesto.com/my-biggest-surprise-in-retirement/

Is saving really that hard? Nope, not for the great majority of Americans.

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