Author’s note: This column was released in syndication on May 25, 2022. If you wanted to justify any investment moves your mind is contemplating right now, you had no problem finding confirmations and explanations for almost everything at last week’s Morningstar Investment Conference. Among the messages that might have sent your head spinning at the …
Author’s note: This column was released in syndication on May 18, 2022. I had an uncle whose lifetime financial goal was to amass $1 million to leave to his children. A farmer, he was frugal by nature; in his 70s, he finally reached his goal. Rather than celebrating his wealth, be turned into …
Author’s note: This column was released in syndication on May 11, 2022. There are a lot of financial concerns right now, but two items that I think were lost amid recent headlines stand out to me. In a world where the financial danger signs seem to be everywhere, it’s easy to overlook the warnings that …
Author’s note: This column was released in syndication on May 4. 2022 One of life’s truisms is that some things are better left unsaid. In the investing world, however, some things are just never said at all. Not because silence is “the right thing to do,” but more because no matter how much someone might …
This column was released in syndication on April 27. 2022. As I was parking last week, I noticed a dime and a penny on the ground near some teenagers. I asked the kids if they had dropped it and a girl explained as she climbed into the car that the change wasn’t hers. …
This column was released in syndication on April 20. 2022. My mother told me when I was a child that the way people face a challenge says a great deal about them. Every consumer is being challenged by inflation right now, and the way they respond, indeed, is speaking volumes. There’s no …
This column was released in syndication on April 13. 2022. Here’s some controversial financial advice for current times: Hold more cash. That is not the same as “go to cash,” which would be a call to exit the market. Far from it. And it’s not advice most people are comfortable giving …
This column was released in syndication on April 6. 2022. Jack in Seattle wants to teach his teenage son JJ important lessons about money, but the boy “doesn’t want to talk with me about money, he only wants to talk about cryptocurrency.” That disconnect – not believing that Bitcoin and other crypto coins …
Last week, Florida became the latest state to mandate a financial literacy course as a requirement for graduation from a public high school. It’s part of a trend that has more than 50 personal-finance education bills under consideration in 26 states, according to Next Gen Personal Finance, a non-profit organization that tracks the legislation. There …
Inflation is never a feel-good story. Nothing feels good about items getting more expensive, no matter how inconsequential price hikes were for decades prior to 2022. Gas prices have long been the biggest factor determining whether consumers were confident and happy or nervous and displeased. Elections turn on inflation numbers. “It’s the economy, stupid,” was …
