The Pareto principle (known as the 80/20 rule) states that for many outcomes, roughly 80% of consequences come from 20% of causes. How many times have you heard the 80/20 rule in conjunction with business, health, wealth, etc.? The implication associated with this is that 20% of your efforts produce 80% of the results. Interestingly,…
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For many Americans, putting money back into a retirement account such as a 401(k) or traditional IRA has been their primary choice to save for retirement. After all, most company plans offer some sort of matching incentive based on what you contribute and your contributions are deducted from your taxable income. In fact, you may…
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Medi-Share, which is a Christian healthcare sharing program used as an alternative to traditional health insurance, puts out a frequent newsletter with a short devotion or two. This week’s letter came at a perfect time. In case you’ve been hibernating, there is more than a bit of chaos in the world, in our nation, our…
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Can you hear it? It’s those two, ominous notes from the movie Jaws to let you know we are drawing nearer and nearer to the almost inevitable…the sunset of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) of 2017. This could mean that higher income taxes and estate taxes are headed your way. It’s important to…
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Everything is so expensive! Can I still retire? For most of the last 30 years, we Americans have lived in a bubble where no one really understood first-hand what inflation was. There were a couple years from 1991-2020 that the cost of living increased by over 4%, but for most of these years the cost…
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What is the best vehicle to save for college/education? In order to answer that question, there is another question that needs to be answered first: What will “college or education” look like for your child or grandchild? For a few people this answer is easy – my grandson wants to be a college professor… my…
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“Investing is complicated” – but it isn’t. It’s complicated because there is a lot to learn when it comes to investing. It’s complicated because it is an ever-changing field. It’s complicated because the “how to” needs to be coupled with the “why,” and there really isn’t an answer on Google for that. It isn’t complicated…
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Inflation has been a beast on the ole’ pocketbook. In the 4th quarter of 2023, household debt reached 17.5 trillion dollars with credit card debt – an increase of 50 billion dollars within that same quarter. This translates to Americans spending more with less capability to pay their debt. All while most of these same…
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Everyone has a slightly different definition when it comes to success. Recently we attended a forum that is made up of some of the most “successful” people in our industry. Interestingly enough, this was the focus the forum which lasted almost two hours. One of the definitions I heard, “Success is reducing the “have to’s”…
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In my opinion, there’s nothing like a good James Bond movie—likewise the titles. Ironically, we live in a day and age that the title of this article rings true—too true. There is no time to die. After all, there seems to be no time to do the things we want/need to do, much less not…
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