Articles >> Retirement Planning

Inflation is traditionally defined as a concurrent increase in the prices of all or most goods. This is unlike ordinary circumstances, in which price increases for some goods are offset by decreases in others. A sustained inflation must be the result of an increase in the supply of money ...

The stage when retirement planning shifts into high gear is perhaps the most crucial time in the individual’s financial life cycle. It begins between the ages of 45 and 55, roughly a decade before the planned retirement date. The individual is entering his or her peak earning period; ...

Annuities and IRAs are both retirement-oriented investment entities. Both offer favorable tax treatment to owners. Both subject owners to penalties for premature withdrawals.

Despite these similarities, the two are fundamentally different things. Outlining these differences helps to ...

The reason why modern economies are so much more productive than ancient and medieval ones is because specialization is more highly developed. We don’t grow our own food, make our own clothes, build our own houses, or attend to our own medical needs. Most of us don’t even change the ...

When people save for retirement, what action contributes the most to their success? Casual observation suggests that most people consider the selection of investments and the amount saved to be paramount. This is wrong. To see why, consider the ...

In former times, an article on retirement investment would have been short and simple: “Shift everything to cash and conservative, fixed-income securities.”  Advances in medicine, nutrition and fitness have lengthened life expectancy and changed the perspective of investing. Today, a ...

Today the word "annuity" refers to an investment contract between an insurance company and one or more individuals. Originally, however, the word denoted the stream of lifelong payments from insurance company to annuity holder that represented ...

Retirement planning covers the time leading up to retirement, the conclusion of work and the years spent in retirement. Annuities can play an important role at each stage of the process. An analogy illustrates the role played by investments ...

Retirement annuities are generally those obtained through a pension plan provided by an employer to provide monthly payments for life or a non-qualified annuity product bought by an investor from an insurance company with after-tax dollars in exchange for monthly payments over a specified ...

Fixed annuities provide guaranteed retirement income and are typically favored by individuals who either have already left the work force or who are nearing retirement. The guaranteed retirement income results from the fact that fixed annuities  give their owners - who are called ...

As people approach their retirement, the need to maintain a reasonable level of income during their retirement turns into a real concern. It occurs that one needs a reasonable and steady stream of income if they are to maintain the standard of life they had been accustomed to during their ...

Equity annuities offer a good avenue for managing retirement risk because they provide the potential for a good return without the potential losses of principal associated with traditional investments. Equity annuities invest most of their premiums into a fixed annuity, with the rest placed ...

Buying an annuity is linked with a person’s age. When the investor is young the expectations are more. Since the investor is employed or running own business, the risk factors take a secondary position. However, when a person is about to retire, the earnings become as vital as the ...