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CONSIDER EVERYTHING

ICW Journal

Perspectives help cultivate ways of thinking about and understanding things and sightlines help develop clarity about what lies ahead.

These helpful primers, books and blogs can help you think about situations and problems in more wise and reasonable ways. They can help you develop longer-term perspectives and sightlines to withstand the shifting winds of short-term thinking. They can help you bypass  camouflaging distractions and help you stay focused on the key issues that matter most to the long-term success of your plan.

IT’S JUST PART OF WHAT WE DO.

Fiduciary Wealth Management
Scottsdale | Phoenix

Wealth management
designed to maximize your life.

Focus on what’s important.

We help you develop and maintain perspectives and sightlines to your plan.

CONSIDER EVERYTHING

ICW Journal | Perspective and Sightlines

Perspectives help cultivate ways of thinking about and understanding things and sightlines help develop clarity about what lies ahead.

These helpful primers, books and blogs can help you think about situations and problems in more wise and reasonable ways. They can help you develop longer-term perspectives and sightlines to withstand the shifting winds of short-term thinking. They can help you bypass  camouflaging distractions and help you stay focused on the key issues that matter most to the long-term success of your plan.

It's just part of what we do.

We help you develop and maintain perspectives and sightlines to your plan.

ICW Papers | Perspective and Sightlines

You May Not Believe It Until You Read It, But It’s True. The shocking truth about index investing is that reality can …

With the days of company pensions faded into memory, it’s up to most of us to build and manage our own pension …

The year was 1983: The U.S. invaded Grenada. A gallon of gas cost 96 cents. Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” video premiered. That year …

The the key takeaway from the first chapter of Morgan Housel’s remarkable book, The Psychology of Money – “Every decision people make …

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The Multi-Million Dollar Retirement Planning Question

With the days of company pensions faded into memory, it’s up to most of us to build and manage our own pension plans ‒ and manage the multi-million dollar retirement planning question ourselves. How much do we need? And what are the possibilities that we suffer shortfall risk – the possibility that our savings will expire before we do. A savings shortfall can be triggered by major losses in our retirement investments, which is why it’s important to mitigate what we call wipeout risk. Undersaving May Be A Bigger Factor in the Multi-Million Dollar Retirement Planning Question But a bigger factor behind shortfall risk ‒ and more widespread ‒ is undersaving. Too many earners are failing to work through the multi-million dollar retirement planning question and, equally importantly, work on saving enough for retirement. They are paying for their short-term wants first, and their long-term future needs last, after most of their income is gone. Of course, prioritizing short-term wants over long-term needs results in savings contributions that are too low to fund a lifestyle that resembles our working years. Paradoxically, the problem can be more acute among high-income earners, because higher incomes permit larger lifestyles. Of course, that has

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In 2022, Social Security Disability Recipients Will See the Biggest Increase in Four Decades

The year was 1983: The U.S. invaded Grenada. A gallon of gas cost 96 cents. Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” video premiered. That year was also the last time that recipients of Social Security disability benefits saw a cost-of-living increase steeper than the one just announced for 2022. This year, benefits will rise 5.9 percent, the sharpest upsurge since 1983’s 7.4 percent jump. Cost-of-living increases are tied to the consumer price index, and rising inflation rates and gas prices caused by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic mean Social Security disability and retirement benefit recipients will get a large boost in 2022. The 5.9 percent increase dwarfs last year’s 1.3 percent rise, and over the past decade hikes have averaged just 1.65 percent. For recipients of Supplemental Security Income (SSI), Social Security’s primary disability benefits program for low-income people, monthly benefits will go from $794 to $841 for individuals, or from $1,191 to $1,261 for couples. For recipients of Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), Social Security’s primary disability benefits program for people with longer work histories, average monthly benefits will go from $1,282 to $1,358. Part of the increase will be eaten up by higher Medicare Part B premiums, however. The standard monthly premium

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The Psychology of Money

The the key takeaway from the first chapter of Morgan Housel’s remarkable book, The Psychology of Money – “Every decision people make with money is justified by taking the information they have at the moment and plugging it into their unique mental model of how the world works.” This book is one of the best behavioral books we’ve read about investing and personal finance, because it approaches the topic from a refreshingly human perspective. Many authors approach the topics of investing and money like hard sciences: If A = B and B = C, then A = C. Morgan Housel reminds us that as humans, and not computers, we make financial decisions based more on our personal experiences than on objective financial truths. He argues persuasively that working with an understanding of our money psychology, rather than denying or ignoring it, is constructive to our financial success. We believe “The Psychology of Money” is such a well-written exposition of the money behaviors we all grapple with, and the resulting lessons we learn about wealth, greed and happiness, that we give a copy to every client and ask them to read it at the beginning of our relationship together. Developing shared

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