The file and suspend strategy to increase Social Security benefits is officially over. A couple of other benefit increasing strategies are still available. File and suspend was an extremely popular strategy for people to increase their Social Security benefits, but as of April 29, 2016 it is no longer an option. That has left people [...]
Not everyone is capable of competently handling a large inheritance. Some people will spend assets unwisely and others will lose them to creditors. There is a simple way to protect your heirs from these self-inflicted harms. Everyone knows someone who is terrible at handling money. These are the people who can be counted on to [...]
A new California law that will make it the largest state so far to allow physician assisted suicide is about to go into effect. On June 9, 2016, California will become the fourth state to allow doctors to assist terminally ill patients to commit suicide. Beginning on that date, residents of California can request a [...]
After a musician passes away you can never be certain what will happen to his or her legacy. Some musicians continue to be very successful commercially. Their estates continue to grow. Other musicians fade into obscurity. It is tempting to think that what happens to a musician's legacy after he or she passes away is [...]
Prince is not the only entertainer who did not make an estate plan. Snoop Dogg does not have one either and he has no plans to get one. You might think the recent death of Prince and the news about how not having an estate plan will make his estate difficult to administer would cause [...]
The estate tax is 100 years old. The landmark birthday has caused many people to reflect on whether the estate tax should be repealed. Discussing whether to repeal the estate tax is always a political discussion. Liberals and conservatives rarely agree with each other about it. However, as the estate tax is now 100 years [...]
Japan's increasing aging population is creating many problems for the island nation. A bizarre one is corpse hotels in residential neighborhoods. Japan has a real estate shortage. There are not enough available plots of land on the islands to build everything that the country needs. You might expect that a real estate shortage would lead [...]
Before creating an estate plan that leaves your children unequal shares of your estate, it is a good idea to consider how to go about it to lessen the likelihood that your decision will be challenged. There are sometimes good reasons to leave one of your children a larger portion of your estate than another [...]
You can make your pets a part of your estate plan. More and more Americans are choosing to do so. Pet trusts and other ways to take care of pets after an owner passes away are one of the latest trends in estate planning. Estate planning with pets in mind has grown as Americans increasingly [...]
Everyone acknowledges that if nothing is done about Social Security, then the trust fund will run out of reserves in a few years. However, not everyone knows why that is the case. There is good news and bad news about the Social Security retirement trust fund. The bad news is that if nothing is done, [...]