Retirement sure has changed, hasn’t it? A century ago, it meant slowing down a bit as you got old and frail, but still working until you dropped. In the 1950s and 60s, it meant collecting a gold watch and living off a company-sponsored pension along with health benefits and Social Security. But, supporting retired workers is expensive, and companies grew to resent those obligations. So, in 1980, a Philadelphia benefits consultant named Ted Benna realized that Section 401(k) of the Revenue Act of 1978 could let his employees “defer” part of their paycheck into a deferred compensation plan. Just two years later, 7.5 million American workers were using the new plan to save. Today, there are over 710,000 plans covering more than 70 million Americans, holding over $7 trillion in assets.
Archives for May 2024
Game On!
Everyone knows Uncle Sam is spending money faster than he takes it in. Just how fast? As of March 1, according to CNBC, we’re adding a trillion dollars to the national debt every 100 days. Naturally, that eye-popping number has the IRS scrambling for every nickel they can find. So they’ve launched all sorts of campaigns to squeeze more money out of particularly promising prospects. Some are dreadfully technical and dull, like the “FIRPTA reporting for NRAs” campaign. (For the record, that involves withholding a 15% tax on gains when non-resident aliens sell U.S. real estate.) Others target a small number of high-dollar opportunities, like the “expatriation of individuals” campaign chasing after taxpayers who renounce their U.S. citizenship, or the “business aircraft campaign” that targets personal use of corporate jets.
Two Kinds of Green
Marijuana is still illegal at the federal level. That creates all sorts of problems for state-licensed cannabis businesses. For example, most of them can’t use commercial banks, which are wary of violating federal money-laundering laws. But much of that may be about to change.
A Good Walk Spoiled
Hank Aaron once said, “It took me seventeen years to get 3,000 hits in baseball. It took me one afternoon on the golf course.” Remarkably, millions of Americans still manage to love it. They’ll pick out their loudest pants or skirts, head for the course, fire up their carts, and whack a little white ball across a couple hundred acres of manicured lawn for hours at a time. Remarkably, some of them will consider the whole thing fun. The rest will suffer 18 holes in silent frustration until they hit that one gloriously perfect shot that fools them into thinking maybe, someday, they’ll conquer the game.