Financial Symmetry News & Views

Archive for June, 2009

Distributions from your retirement accounts are not required by the IRS for 2009 but does that mean that they aren’t necessary? For those who have other sources of cash flow, this waiver does present opportunities for tax planning purposes.

If you haven’t noticed, budgeting is hip these days. This is thanks to the economic uncertainty caused by the stock market’s second worst bear market in the last 100 years. People’s fear of losing their jobs and significant losses in their investment accounts has shifted the importance of financial planning and knowing how to budget back into the spotlight. But there are still people resistant to both of these ideas.

Naturally parents want to provide the best for their children. For many parents today this means paying for them to earn a college degree. This is an admirable goal, and one that their children will greatly appreciate when they graduate free from student loan debt. But what does saving for the ever-rising cost of college tuition mean for their other lifestyle goals?

Hyman Minsky was an economist who developed a theory about financial markets that seems to nearly perfectly describe the path of this crisis.