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Slick TV ads often make financial planning and wealth management sound simple, but it’s usually not. Managing wealth requires knowing a lot about highly technical topics, like taxes, government regulations, and finance as well as history, psychology and how to communicate with loved ones about sensitive issues. This article highlights some of the knowledge needed to manage wealth and why it’s often so daunting without the help of an independent personal financial advisor who is familiar with your situation.
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Understanding The Federal Reserve Mandate To End Inflation
The Federal Reserve System, the nation’s central bank, has a dual mandate to pursue maximum employment and maintain price stability. These two priorities are currently treated equally, but that was not always the case. In fact, the Fed’s bias toward maximizing employment was a critical driver of the stagflation that plagued the U.S. in the late 1960s and 1970s. Recognizing the need to balance price stability and maximum employment, in 1977, Congress revised the Federal Reserve Act.
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Fed Governor Kugler Details Inflation And Economic Outlook
The 12-month inflation rate, as measured by the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) index, was 2.6% in December, down from its peak of 7.1% in June 2022, and the six-month rate for PCE inflation was even lower, at 2%, which is the target rate set by the Federal Reserve.
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Why Rates May Not Be Cut Until June
The cost of a loan to buy a home, car, college education, and achieve the American Dream is staying the same for now. As expected, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said the central bank did not lower loan rates following the Fed’s Wednesday, Jan. 31, 2024, policy meeting.
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Practical Suggestions For Achieving Your 2024 Resolutions
New Year’s resolutions usually fail because they‘re often too hard to achieve. After six months, only 10% of people who make resolutions achieve them or remain committed to them, , according to a study by Dr. Mark Griffiths, a Chartered Psychologist and Distinguished Professor of Behavioral Addiction at the Nottingham Trent University. What can you do to make financial, medical, or other personal resolutions more likely to be achieved?
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A Sign Of Progress In Solving U.S. Economic Problems
The Federal Reserve appears to be pulling off a feat most experts did not believe it could: ending its aggressive inflation-fighting campaign of 11 interest rate hikes without tipping the U.S. economy into a recession.
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Fed Keeps Rates Unchanged; Expects Easing In 2024
To promote transparency and free markets, the Federal Reserve System began publishing the opinions of the 19 U.S. central bankers that decide interest rate policy.
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Have You Logged Into Your Social Security Account?
Have you logged in to your Social Security account? Creating an online account at SSA.gov is an important first step in understanding your retirement income situation. However, only about 60 million of the 160 million individuals in the U.S. labor force who have Social Security accounts have created a way to access the Social Security Administration’s website.
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The Great Fake Out Of 2023 Is Poised To Extend Into 2024
All year long, the economy and stock prices have fooled experts and consumers, outperforming expectations month after month.
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Test Your Financial Planning IQ
The five questions below are a challenge meant to allow you to assess your knowledge of investing, tax and financial planning. If you have been following our news stream, this quiz draws on familiar ground. The answers are below.
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Planning Briefs
Two Observations That May Make Higher Taxes Easier To Bear
Published Wednesday, April 14, 2021 at: 4:41 PM EDT
For the first time since the administration of President Ronald Reagan, federal government tax policy is changing significantly. Tax cuts were in vogue for nearly four decades, but President Joseph Biden is planning on implementing higher federal taxes on corporations as well as high-income and high net-worth individuals in 2021.
As Congress debates the Biden administration proposal for a massive increase in federal infrastructure spending, which would require an increase in taxes and government borrowing, here are two key observations made yesterday at a professional education class, taught by independent economist, Fritz Meyer, which was attended by 190 independent tax, financial planning and investment advisors.
This chart shows how the United States Government spent its revenue over the half-century ended with the 2019 fiscal year. It’s from the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office. Priorities shifted. Health care spending and Social Security are receiving a greater share of revenue, while defense spending has been judged a lower priority since the fall of the Soviet Union.
In the decade ahead, spending on Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal health programs, along with Social Security and the interest payments on the national debt, are expected to continue to steadily increase as a percentage of the total economy.
Observation: The nondefense spending category, outlays for maintaining the nation’s infrastructure – roads, mass transit, communication, buildings, and basic functions of American society, has been allocated a shrinking share of gross domestic product as the population grew. Federal highway, mass transit, and communication systems make America the envy of most of the world but it has taken a backseat to other priorities.
Including all forms of taxes -- federal, state and local; income, sales, value-added, estate, and property taxes -- the U.S. has one of the lowest total tax burdens among the 37 developed nations that are members of the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Countries, such as China, Brazil, India and Russia, are not OECD members and excluded here.
Observation: The comparatively low tax burden of the U.S. allows some flexibility in solving the country’s long-term spending problems.
Nobody wants to pay more taxes, but these two observations might make the series of tax hikes expected to be enacted in the weeks ahead easier to bear.
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