RetirementRevised

Social Security is our only universal retirement and disability income program, and the work of the Social Security Administration touches all our lives at one point or another. That’s why I worry so much about the the deterioration of customer service provided to the public in recent years by the Social Security Administration.

I’ve been writing about this a great deal over the past year, starting with an expose for the Sunday New York Times last November. That piece looked at how repeated cuts to the agency’s administrative budget over the past decade by Congress has forced the closing of field offices, staff cuts, and long delays on Social Security’s toll-free line -and an unconscionable backlog of people waiting for appeal hearings on disability insurance claims. Here’s one especially onerous statistic: in 2016, nearly 10,000 Americans died while waiting for a disability appeal to be heard and decided. I also recently covered a related story - the cutback of mailings of crucial annual Social Security benefit statements. That also is a budget-related decision, and a really dumb one.

Congress cut Social Security’s budget nearly 11% between 2010 and 2019, after adjusting for inflation. During the same time, the number of beneficiaries grew by more than 16 percent. The Social Security beneficiary rolls are growing quickly as the nation ages. This year, the agency will pay more than a trillion dollars in benefits to 69 million Americans. The agency forecasts that the beneficiary rolls will increase 43% over the next two decades.

All of this was in the news again this week with the decision of three former commissioners of the Social Security Administration to speak up by writing a letter to leaders in Congress, urging changes in the process used to set Social Security’s administrative budget. The letter was sent to 19 key lawmakers, including the leadership of both parties and the chairs and ranking members of all the key congressional committees controlling budget, appropriations and finance.

This was a remarkable, unprecedented step - partly because of its bipartisan nature. The letter was signed by two commissioners appointed in the past by Democratic presidents, and one by a Republican. You can read that story here, and the letter can be downloaded here, along with a list of the key Congressional leaders who received it.

One thing that should outrage all of us is that we pay for these services with our payroll tax contributions. The Social Security administrative budget is funded through the same payroll taxes that fund benefits. Currently, workers and employers split a tax of 12.4%.

The problem here really is not that there is an anti-Social Security caucus in Congress that wants to chop its administrative budget. If anything, Social Security offices are the kind of thing lawmakers want to protect - losing a field office is a little like losing a military base in your district.

The main issue is that the agency’s administrative budget is counted as part of the federal budget due to a somewhat disputed interpretation of federal law by the Office of Management and Budget. That means the Social Security administrative budget must compete with other non-defense discretionary spending needs. And since budget caps were enacted in 2011, that has forced these administrative budget cuts.

Joining me on the podcast this week to talk about all this is one of the foremost experts in the nation on the finances of Social Security. Kathleen Romig is a senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities in Washington, DC, where she works on Social Security, Supplemental Security Income, and other budget issues. Earlier in her career, she worked at the Social Security Administration, for the Social Security Advisory Board, and the Congressional Research Service.

Listen to the podcast by clicking on the player icon at the top of this page.

Subscribe during the Spring sale!

This podcast is part of the newsletter I distribute to subscribers to the RetirementRevised newsletter. It’s a listener-supported endeavor, and I hope you’ll consider subscribing. Along with the podcast, you’ll get access to the series of retirement guides that I’m publishing right now - brief, downloadable resources to help you understand challenges like optimizing Social Security benefits, transitioning to Medicare from other types of insurance and how to hire a financial adviser. Each guide is paired with a podcast interview with a top expert in the field.

Right now, you can take advantage of the Spring sale - half off your first year. Check it out using the “subscribe now” link at the bottom of this page, or visit the website for more details.

If you’re listening on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher, please leave a review and comment to let me know what you think. You’ll be helping me get more visibility for the show.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit retirementrevised.substack.com

This edition of the podcast examines a question that has fascinated me for years -- why do so many of us think that Social Security only matters to older people?

Yes, retirement benefits are the biggest component of Social Security. But the program also is tremendously important for disabled people of all ages, and surviving children and spouses of deceased beneficiaries. And maybe more to the point - the future of Social Security will matter very much to today’s young people. They will need Social Security every bit as much as today’s retirees and near-retirees . . . and probably more so in many cases if current economic and retirement benefit trends persist.

Yet many young people have heard the endless refrain that they should not count on Social Security to be there for them in the future. That is not surprising, considering the negative, often false propaganda uttered by politicians hostile to Social Security and the financial services industry, and misleading media coverage.

My guest on the podcast this week argues that worry about Social Security’s viability could become self-fulfilling if it erodes political support. That would be especially damaging for young people when they retire, argues Peter Arno, an economist at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and a scholar of both Social Security and health policy.

Arno points to four trends that suggest millennials will need to rely to a much greater extent on Social Security than current retirees and those approaching retirement now. They will be far less likely to receive retirement income from defined benefit pensions, and they have lower rates of home ownership than earlier generations. And, wage stagnation and crippling levels of student debt make it impossible for many to save for retirement.

Arno argues that there is a historic opportunity to unite boomers and millennials in support of strengthening Social Security. In a provocative article that he co-authored recently in the American Prospect, he takes on the root causes of the cynicism so many young people have today about Social Security and argues that Social Security should be a centerpiece policy issue for anyone interested in civil rights and social justice. Arno’s co-author on the article is Ann Beaudry, a progressive author and policy strategist who has worked with the National Committee to Preserve Social Security & Medicare, and other foundations.

“Social Security is the most successful anti-poverty policy in the history of the United States,” Arno says. “And this is not true just for seniors, but across the entire life cycle and the entire population. It reduces more poverty for children than any other policy, more poverty for working adults and more poverty for seniors. So it, it's an inter-generational antipoverty policy.”

The program’s impact is especially profound for people of color and women, he adds, noting that wage disparities create economic disadvantage that persists in retirement.

I also feature Arno’s comments in my column for Reuters this week. There, I get into some of the most recent Gallup poll data on Americans’ level of worry about Social Security - and what the program’s finances actually show these days.

This week’s podcast is part of a the subscription RetirementRevised.com newsletter. Right now, the newsletter is publishing a series of downloadable guides on the key challenges of retirement - each edition pairs a guide with a podcast interview with a top expert. So far, we’ve had guides on the transition to Medicare and how to hire a financial adviser. Next up is the guide to maximizing Social Security benefits, featuring a podcast interview with Mary Beth Franklin - another journalist who has been covering Social Security for years, and probably is the only person I can think of who geeks out over Social Security as much or more than I do!

Subscribe during the current Spring sale to receive 50 percent off your first year. Check it out using the little green button below, or click here to learn more about the newsletter. You also can subscribe to periodic free editions of the podcast on Apple podcasts or Stitcher.

Next up: Your guide to smart Social Security strategies

The next edition of the subscription newsletter includes the latest in my series of retirement guides, and I’m really excited about this one.

The guide looks at strategies for maximizing Social Security benefits - and the podcast features an interview with a journalist who geeks out over Social Security just as much as I do - Mary Beth Franklin. Mary Beth is a columnist for Investment News and a long-time financial reporter and author based in Washington, D.C. Mary Beth possesses a near-encyclopedic knowledge of Social Security, and we sat down recently to discuss just about every aspect of Social Security strategy. You won’t want to miss this one!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit retirementrevised.substack.com

How to hire a financial advisor

My new series of retirement guides for newsletter subscribers continues this week with a look at how to hire a financial advisor. This is a topic I’m passionate about, because hiring a financial advisor can improve your retirement - if you hire the right kind. And that means hiring a fiduciary.

The word “fiduciary” may sound like technical legalese, but it describes a critical distinction. Simply put, only advisors who are fiduciaries are required to put your best interest first, not their own. In this guide, you’ll learn about the differences in advisor obligations to you, varying compensation models and how to hire.

The idea behind these guides is to create a series of just-in-time education modules on the key challenges people face in planning for retirement. Each of these brief guides will explain how to cope with a retirement challenge, and will offer useful tips and resources. Each guide also will be paired with a podcast conversation with a top expert on the topic at hand.

The subscriber-only series launched last week focusing on one of the most important - and most complex - retirement challenges: the transition to Medicare from other types of insurance.

Podcast interview: Sheryl Garrett

This week’s guide is paired with a podcast interview with Sheryl Garrett, a Certified Financial Planner and a leading figure in the movement to educate Americans about the importance of trustworthy fiduciary advice. Please enjoy the excerpt from our interview by clicking on the player icon at the top of this page.

Spring subscription sale!

To receive the guides on hiring a planner and transitioning to Medicare, take advantage of the Spring subscription offer I’m running right now. Subscribe now to receive 50 percent off your first year. Click here to subscribe, or use the little green button.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit retirementrevised.substack.com

This week, I’m excited to let you know about the launch of a new series of retirement guides that I am creating exclusively for subscribers to this newsletter. The idea is just-in-time education on the key challenges people confront in planning for retirement. Each of these brief guides will explain how to cope with a retirement challenge, and will offer useful tips and resources. And they will be paired with a podcast conversation with a top expert on the topic at hand.

The series launches this week focusing on one of the most important - and most complex - retirement challenges: the transition to Medicare from other types of insurance.

This transition is fraught with pitfalls that can be costly. Signing up for Medicare at the right time is critical, along with understanding when the program’s coverage is primary. Getting this wrong can lead to costly lifetime late enrollment penalties on Part B premiums, and lengthy gaps in your insurance coverage.

My guest on the podcast is Joe Baker, who just retired as president of the Medicare Rights Center. Joe is one of the most knowledgeable people in the United States on Medicare. His organization is a non-profit that advocates for improvements in Medicare, and provides consumer advice and assistance.

Please enjoy an excerpt from my conversation with Joe in this week’s podcast - click the player above.

Spring subscription sale!

To receive the Medicare Transitions guide, take advantage of the Spring subscription offer I’m running right now. Subscribe now to receive 50 percent off your first year. Click here to subscribe, or use the little green button.

Next week: How anyone can afford a financial adviser

Next week’s guide and podcast: how to hire a financial planner. This one features a discussion with Sheryl Garrett, a visionary who has done more than most to promote the idea of unbiased, conflict-free fiduciary financial planning. Sheryl is a CFP and founder of the Garrett Planning Network. She has pioneered the notion of inexpensive hourly advice that does not cost a fortune, and her work recently was recognized with theInvestment News ICON award for 2019. Sheryl is the author of numerous books, including Personal Finance Workbook For Dummies.

Subscribers also will receive my brief guide to this important topic, and a free chapter download from Sheryl’s book.

Hear the podcast on Apple and Stitcher

The RetirementRevised podcast is now available on Apple and Android devices. Click here to subscribe on your iPhone, or here to subscribe on Stitcher (for Android devices).

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit retirementrevised.substack.com

Economists call it the “old-age dependency ratio” - a rough measure of the balance between people who work and retirees.

The ratio compares the number of people over age 65 - classified as “old” - with those aged 15 to 64 - and it is not headed in a healthy direction: by 2040, there will be 2.7 working-age Americans for each retiree, down from 4.8 in 2010.

That number from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta points toward a shortfall of workers available to support an aging population, and it is cited often to justify doom-and-gloom warnings about economic growth, federal spending and the health of our social insurance programs.

But don’t tell that to Chris Farrell. The senior economics contributor to "Marketplace," American Public Media’s nationally syndicated public radio business and economic program, is bullish on aging. Farrell is the author of a new book, Purpose and a Paycheck: Finding Meaning, Money, and Happiness in the Second Half of Life, that seeks to upend a range of myths about old age and dependency, replacing them with a new vision of contribution to society and purpose-driven living.

In this week’s podcast, I talk with Chris about some of the key ideas in his book:

* Why the "dependency ratio" is nonsense;

* Who is working longer - and why;

* Which industries and companies are accommodating older workers;

* The influence of women on the composition of an older workforce;

* Government polices that could make it easier for people to work longer.

Subscribe!

This podcast is excerpted from a series delivered each week to subscribers of the RetirementRevised newsletter. The newsletter delivers a concise summary of the week’s news on the retirement and aging beat, along with my most recent articles for Reuters, WealthManagement.com, Morningstar.com and The New York Times. Each edition includes a premium, full-length podcast featuring top experts on retirement planning and investing, Social Security and Medicare and the challenges of working longer.

Recent episodes have featured:

* Nancy Altman, a leader in the progressive movement to strengthen and expand Social Security - and a scholar on Social Security’s history who has written several important books on the program;

* Jill Schlesinger, the personal finance guru at CBS News and author of The Dumb Things Smart People Do with Their Money;

* Mitch Tuchman, a pioneer in robo-advisory services and founder of Rebalance;

* Elizabeth White, author of 55, Underemployed, and Faking Normal, a remarkable personal narrative about the traumatic experience of job loss at midlife.

* Richard Johnson, director of the program on retirement policy at The Urban Institute, for a discussion of the pros and cons of a higher Social Security retirement age.

* Dan Prescher, co-author of The International Living Guide to Retiring Overseas on a Budget: How to Live Well on $25,000 a Year.

I hope you’ll agree that the newsletter and podcast are a great way to stay on top of trends in retirement and aging.

Click here to view a sample edition of the newsletter, featuring my podcast interview with Jill Schlesinger. Or, just click the little green button below. You know what to do.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit retirementrevised.substack.com

What is the state of the job market for older workers? How can we better manage our careers as an asset that is part of a retirement plan? What are the prospects for people thinking of launching second careers as entrepreneurs.

This week on the RetirementRevised.com podcast, we get the view on these questions from two of the nation’s top experts on 50+ careers - Kerry Hannon and John Tarnoff. Both are speakers and best-selling authors, with books to their credit advising older workers on how to navigate the job market. But they look at the 50+ job market through somewhat different lenses.

Kerry is a journalist by background; her most recent book is Great Jobs for Everyone 50+, and she has a new book coming on this spring focused on older entrepreneurs, called Never Too Old to Get Rich: The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Starting a Business Mid-Life.

John has worked as an executive and producer in the entertainment industry, and as a technology entrepreneur. His own career hit a wall at age 50, which led him to his current work as a career coach helping people navigate job transitions. In 2017 he published a best-selling book, Boomer Reinvention: How to Create Your Dream Career Over 50. In 2017, he was named by PBS/Next Avenue as one of its Influencers In Aging.

Subscribe!

This podcast is excerpted from a series delivered each week to subscribers of the RetirementRevised newsletter. The newsletter delivers a concise summary of the week’s news on the retirement and aging beat, along with my most recent articles for Reuters, WealthManagement.com, Morningstar.com and The New York Times. Each edition includes a premium podcast featuring top experts on retirement planning and investing, Social Security and Medicare and the challenges of working longer. Recent episodes have featured:

* Nancy Altman, a leader in the progressive movement to strengthen and expand Social Security - and a scholar on Social Security’s history who has written several important books on the program;

* Jill Schlesinger, the personal finance guru at CBS News and author of The Dumb Things Smart People Do with Their Money;

* Mitch Tuchman, a pioneer in robo-advisory services and founder of Rebalance;

* Elizabeth White, author of 55, Underemployed, and Faking Normal, a remarkable personal narrative about the traumatic experience of job loss at midlife.

* Richard Johnson, director of the program on retirement policy at The Urban Institute, for a discussion of the pros and cons of a higher Social Security retirement age.

* Dan Prescher, co-author of The International Living Guide to Retiring Overseas on a Budget: How to Live Well on $25,000 a Year.

I hope you’ll agree that the newsletter and podcast are a great way to stay on top of trends in retirement and aging.

Click here to view a sample edition of the newsletter, featuring my podcast interview with Jill Schlesinger. Or, just click the little green button below. You know what to do.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit retirementrevised.substack.com

My guest on the podcast this week is Mitch Tuchman, a pioneer in what we now call the roboadvisor business – that is, investment advisory services that rely on software and algorithms to manage client portfolios. Mitch saw the need for a new low-cost approach to portfolio management back in 2008 when he started MarketRiders, one of the very first robos. But the model quickly evolved beyond just software to a blend of technology and human advice in the successor company he started, called Rebalance.

Mitch has an interesting personal story – Rebalance is a second career that was born out of a deeply personal mission stemming from challenges that his own family faced. We talked about that, and a range of other current topics in the retirement investing world, including what he thinks people approaching retirement really need today in terms of planning services. We also reflected on the legacy of Jack Bogle, the founder of Vanguard who passed away recently.

My guest on the podcast this week is Mitch Tuchman, a pioneer in what we now call the roboadvisor business - that is, investment advisory services that rely on software and algorithms to manage client portfolios. Mitch saw the need for a new low-cost approach to portfolio management back in 2008 when he started MarketRiders, one of the very first robos. But the model quickly evolved beyond just software to a blend of technology and human advice in the successor company he started, called Rebalance

Mitch has an interesting personal story - Rebalance is a second career that was born out of a deeply personal mission stemming from challenges that his own family faced. We talked about that, and a range of other current topics in the retirement investing world, including what he thinks people approaching retirement really need today in terms of planning services. We also reflected on the legacy of Jack Bogle, the founder of Vanguard who passed away recently.

This is listener-supported media - so subscribe already!

The in-depth version of this interview is available to subscribers to the RetirementRevised newsletter. I’m making this shortened version of the podcast available for free.

But even this free version contains none of the annoying advertising you face - or jump past - in most of your favorite podcasts. My pledge to you: I will never talk to you in my most sincere voice about the most comfortable mattress I’ve ever slept on, or the best meal delivery service on the planet. Even more important - no pitches for investment products, insurance or anything else. The RetirementRevised podcast is ad free now, ad free forever!

You’ll also receive the newsletter each week, chock full of my rantings on the key news of the week - stuff my editors would never let me print, but hey this a newsletter, just between you and me. This week, I look at the regulation formerly known as fiduciary - the SEC “Regulation Best Interest.” Find more info on the newsletter here, along with a link to a recent sample edition.

If you haven’t thought about subscribing to the newsletter, do it now - this is listener-supported media. It’s the future, so please get on board! Just use the green subscribe button below.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit retirementrevised.substack.com

My guest this week on the podcast is Richard Johnson. Rich directs the program on retirement policy at The Urban Institute in Washington, D.C. He is an economist by training, and a great deal of his research is focused on the labor market for older workers, and their employment and retirement decisions.

Recently Rich published an intriguing paper with a question in the title -- “Is it time to Raise the Social Security Retirement Age?” This is an idea that crops up often as a partial fix for the long-term financial challenges facing Social Security. It usually is justified by pointing to gains in longevity - if we’re all living longer, we should wait longer for Social Security benefits - right?

This isn’t the only idea out there for fixing Social Security’s financial problems, of course. The other way is to raise more money through higher payroll tax rates or other taxes. And the Democratic Party increasingly is looking to expansion as part of the fix.

Johnson’s paper does a great job of analyzing the retirement age question, looking at the pro and con arguments in great detail. Give it a listen.

This is listener-supported media - so subscribe already!

The in-depth version of this interview is available to subscribers to the RetirementRevised newsletter. I’m making this shortened version of the podcast available for free.

But even this free version contains none of the annoying advertising you face - or jump past - in most of your favorite podcasts. My pledge to you: I will never talk to you in my most sincere voice about the most comfortable mattress I’ve ever slept on, or the best meal delivery service on the planet. Even more important - no pitches for investment products, insurance or anything else. The RetirementRevised podcast is ad free now, ad free forever!

If you haven’t thought about subscribing to the newsletter, do it now - this is listener-supported media. It’s the future, so please get on board!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit retirementrevised.substack.com