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Why This Episode Is a Must-Listen  The stock market feels more complex than ever—rising inflation, shifting interest rates, and non-stop headlines can rattle even the most seasoned investors. If you want to cut through the noise and build a long-term investing strategy that works, you'll want to hear directly from professionals who have navigated everything from market booms to bear cycles. This episode of Inspired Money brings together four leading investment minds to share real-world tactics, mindsets, and frameworks for surviving—and thriving—over the long haul. Meet the Expert Panelists David Stein is the founder of Money for the Rest of Us and a former institutional investment strategist who managed billions in assets as Chief Portfolio Strategist at FEG Investment Advisors. He now educates individuals through his top-ranked podcast, best-selling book, and investment tools platform Asset Camp, helping investors build resilient portfolios with confidence and clarity. https://moneyfortherestofus.com  https://assetcamp.com      Mariko Gordon, CFA, CFP® is the CEO of Uzume LLC, where she provides financial planning and consulting services to individuals and families. She previously founded and built Daruma Capital Management into a $2.5 billion firm with a distinctive, non-traditional approach to investing. With over 30 years of experience as a small-cap stock picker, she now helps clients navigate personal finance, entrepreneurship, and life transitions, drawing from her deep expertise in business, investing, and her multicultural heritage.  https://marikogordon.com https://www.uzumellc.com   Mike Taylor is the Lead Portfolio Manager of the Simplify Health Care ETF (PINK), the first 100% pro bono ETF with all net profits benefiting the Susan G. Komen Foundation. With over two decades of experience managing long/short healthcare equity portfolios at firms like Citadel, Millennium, and Diamondback Capital, Mike is widely recognized for running one of Wall Street's top-performing healthcare hedge funds.  https://www.simplify.us   Chris Wang, Managing Partner and Director of Research at Runnymede Capital Management, previously held roles as a research analyst and Assistant Portfolio Manager at TIAA-CREF. With over two decades of experience, Chris is known for Runnymede's unwavering integrity and distinguished track record in safeguarding clients' assets during turbulent financial times.  www.runnymede.com  Key Highlights: Building Resilient Portfolios David emphasizes the importance of asset allocation and diversification rather than focusing solely on picking individual stocks. By thinking like an endowment and blending global equities, bonds, and real assets, even individual investors can manage risk over time. He suggests, “As individuals, we can't just naively invest in the S&P 500 and hope things will go well… Our job is to understand the drivers and manage more like an institution.” Investing vs. Gambling Mariko draws a clear line between investing and speculation: investing has a positive expected return and is grounded in a long-term horizon and strong fundamentals, while gambling is driven by short-term bets and speculation. Her practical advice: “Do it for 10% of your portfolio and learn from your mistakes… Put most of your money elsewhere.” Adapting to Market Realities Mike shares that success in the market isn't about being right most of the time, but about surviving your mistakes and adapting. He reveals that the best hedge fund managers aren't right every day, but consistently compound small advantages: “The difference between a manager who's good versus great is literally 3% of days up more. And that, compounded, is your return.”  Staying Rational in Volatile Markets Chris highlights the importance of sticking to a disciplined, research-driven strategy—and knowing when to be aggressive or defensive based on business cycles. Emotional investing and impulsive changes hurt performance. “Sometimes you just have to step away from the screen… avoiding the headlines and reading [only] on Sundays can help you keep perspective,” he says. Call-to-Action So here's your assignment for the week: Take 15 minutes and review your current investments. Ask yourself: Am I clear on why I own each holding? If you can't answer that confidently, dig in. Is it a value play? A growth opportunity? A dividend payer? Or something you heard about on social media?  Clarity is the first step toward confidence — and confident investors stay the course.  Find the Inspired Money channel on YouTube or listen to Inspired Money in your favorite podcast player. Andy Wang, Host/Producer of Inspired Money

IntroductionLIVE from your ESG EV Dipstick, it's a Business Pants Friday Show here at January 17th Studios, featuring AnalystHole Matt Moscardi. On today's weekly wrap up: The CEO takeover has accelerated; bravery for sale at Costco; and men finally have power Our show today is being sponsored by Free Float Analytics, the only platform measuring board power, connections, and performance for FREE.Story of the Week (DR):DealBook: C.E.O.s hail the chief MMElon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg to attend Trump's inauguration: The three will be seated together on the inauguration platform with other prominent guests.About $200M so far (BIden about $60M)Amazon: $2 millionMeta: $1 millionMeta CEO Mark Zuckerberg: $1 million (personal donation)Robinhood: $2 millionBank of America: $1 millionGoldman Sachs: UndisclosedGoogle: $1 millionMicrosoft: $1 millionUber: $1 millionUber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi: $1 million (personal donation) Boeing: $1 millionFord/GM//Hyundai/Toyota: $1 millionRipple [Cryptocurrency]: $5 millionApple CEO Tim Cook: $1 million (personal donation)OpenAI CEO Sam Altman: $1 million (personal donation)etc.In Farewell Address, Biden Warns of an ‘Oligarchy' Taking Shape in AmericaPresident Joe Biden's farewell address Wednesday came with a series of warnings for the future of the country, among them that a rising “oligarchy taking shape” threatens American democracy: "Today, an oligarchy is taking shape in America of extreme wealth, power and influence that literally threatens our entire democracy, our basic rights and freedoms and a fair shot for everyone to get ahead."“... concerned about the potential rise of a tech-industrial complex," Biden said. "It could pose real dangers for our country as well.""Social media is giving up on fact-checking. The truth is smothered by lies told for power and for profit." he said, appearing to refer to Meta's ending its fact-checking program.without safeguards, AI could "spawn new threats to our rights, our way of life, to our privacy, how we work and how we protect our nation."​​161 years ago, a New Zealand sheep farmer predicted AI doomOn June 13, 1863, a letter titled "Darwin among the Machines" written by Samuel Butler (under the pseudonym Cellarius) published in The Press newspaper of Christchurch warned about the potential dangers of mechanical evolution and called for the destruction of machines, foreshadowing the development of what we now call artificial intelligence—and the backlash against it from people who fear it may threaten humanity with extinction. It presented what may be the first published argument for stopping technological progress to prevent machines from dominating humanity.The letter drew direct parallels between Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and the rapid development of machinery, suggesting that machines could evolve consciousness and eventually supplant humans as Earth's dominant species."We are ourselves creating our own successors." he wrote. "We are daily adding to the beauty and delicacy of their physical organisation; we are daily giving them greater power and supplying by all sorts of ingenious contrivances that self-regulating, self-acting power which will be to them what intellect has been to the human race. In the course of ages we shall find ourselves the inferior race."In the letter, he also portrayed humans becoming subservient to machines, but first serving as caretakers who would maintain and help reproduce mechanical life—a relationship Butler compared to that between humans and their domestic animals, before it later inverts and machines take over.Goldman Sachs CEO David Solomon says AI can write 95% of an IPO prospectusThe initial registration prospectus for an IPO, called S1, usually took a six-person team two weeks to complete. However, now 95 per cent of the work can be completed by AI in minutes, he said. Goldman Sachs chief David Solomon questions start-ups' need to listHe also asked private companies to take ‘great caution' before deciding to go public, adding that the depth of capital in private markets has made the need to go public redundant for many. Goodliest of the Week (MM/DR):DR: Costco is holding the line on DEI; Delta Doubles Down on DEI, ESG Policies; Apple backs diversity programs rejected by US firmsMM: European Union orders X to hand over algorithm documentsAssholiest of the Week (MM):Alpha masculine cosplayMiddle school beta nerds realizing they have “fuck you” money and now trying to act like big boys… which means dunking on women, gays, blacks, trans, and momWe need to be more manlyMommy made me do it, but now I'm a big boyElon paid for someone to spend 24 hours a day leveling up a video game character, then pretended it was him and he was good at itTrump Taps Mel Gibson, Sylvester Stallone and Jon Voight as Hollywood ‘Ambassadors'Bezos has a HUGE NEW ROCKET guysThe Nerd Alpha Cosplay is using MAGA Trump as a vehicle…Inauguration hypocrisy ($170m)Game: of the top donors to the Trump inauguration, which is the biggest hypocrite?I give you the name of 10 largest donors, you say whether they're a hypocrite who gave more to Dems or not because they gave more to GOP anywayAutocrat hypocrisy DRInstagram and YouTube Prepare to Benefit if TikTok is BannedZuckerberg, Brin, and Page Prepare to Benefit if China is BannedThere are 743 authoritarian (dual class, founder lead, fake democratic) US companies that trade out of about 2,200 - that's a whopping ⅓ of the US market that's fake democratic public companiesLet's apply the “China Threat Theory” to them:Economic consolidationTotalitarian companies are 34% of US market capMilitary spendingPalantir (0.3% of market cap) and 9 other totalitarian companies have weapons manufacturing (total 2% of US cap)Privacy and espionage16% - 16% - of US market cap is totalitarian companies involved in privacy violations or data breachesThe top 4 are obviously nerd alpha cosplayers - Brin/Page, Bezos, Zuck, MuskPropagandaTesla and Walmart are the two largest firms flagged for misleading customers through advertisingMusk straight up lies to customersTotal cap of 3.33%Human rightsAlphabet, Amazon, and Meta are flagged for human rights problems, both in and out of labor forcePalantir and Salesforce as well11% of US market capHere are the most Chinese Threat US Totalitarian companies:National Presto IndustriesPalantirBerkshire HathawayTeslaMetaAmazonAlphabet is tops!Yeah, but DEI!John Deere Sued by FTC Over Equipment-Repair PracticesSEC sues Elon Musk, says he cheated Twitter investors out of $150 millionToyota truck unit fined $1.6 billion for emissions violationsYeah, but it was a DEI firm, so we feel bad for the fanHeadliniest of the WeekDR: Mark Zuckerberg is reportedly blaming former Meta exec Sheryl Sandberg for a company inclusivity initiativeMark Zuckerberg praises benefits of 'masculine energy', calls corporate America 'culturally neutered'78% of Fortune 500 HR leaders say they have trouble getting the C-suite to believe in the long-term benefits of childcare MM: McDonald's Retires DEI Goal SettingMM: Carrier Global Corporation Appoints Amy Miles to its Board of DirectorsYou might not think this is funny if you don't know who Amy Miles or Carrier are… Carrier makes HVAC systemsCEO is David Gitlin, on Boeing boardAmy Miles is the CEO of Regal Entertainment (the movie theaters) and is on the board of GapShe joins ex Walmart, ex GSK, ex American Water Works, ex TIAA CREF execs on a board overseeing… air conditionersWho Won the Week?DR: Oligarchy TruthersMM: Co-co-co CEOs - Paramount Will Allow Its 3 Co-CEOs to Resign and Receive Severance If They Are DemotedPredictionsDR: The DEI decision train gets rolling as a bulk of S&P 500 takes a sideMM: After Vivek said we have to stop venerating jocks, and the middle school nerdboys with money have shown how unfit they are to run anything, Free Float adds a data point that shows the percentage Jock Influence on every board to get a sense of there being team players that might actually be adults in the room and it's the beginning of the end of the Nerd Fake Alpha era

“A rare thing.” That's what co-creator Steve Levitan called “the incredible alchemy of elements coming together” that was Modern Family.He and Christopher Lloyd, who he'd worked with on Frasier, wanted to create a show that felt real. A show with heart. And it took the right writers, characters, and actors to play them to make it happen. And it happened for 11 years, winning 22 Emmys.And in this episode, we're taking B2B marketing lessons from it with the help of our special guest, CMO at Altimetrik, Jeff Fleischman.Together, we talk about being passionate about your brand, showing persistence and grit, and the art of making “a rare thing.” About our guest, Jeff FleischmanJeffrey Fleischman is a seasoned senior executive with over 35 years of experience spanning the financial services, banking, insurance, and technology. As CMO of Altimetrik he manages the company's brand, marketing, lead generation, public relations, and communications functions. Jeff brings a wealth of expertise to the role. Previously, he served as Chief Marketing & Digital Officer at Penn Mutual, driving omni-channel campaigns and advancing digital initiatives. His leadership journey includes key roles at renowned companies such as Citi, American Express, TIAA-CREF, and Chase.Jeff's passion lies in creating innovative, customer-focused strategies and experiences that integrate data, technology, and design. His extensive expertise covers areas like omni-channel marketing, data analytics, product management, and business transformation. He holds a B.S. in finance from Syracuse University and an MBA in finance, investments, and banking from Hofstra University. He has or held board positions with Artemis, Zenmonics Inc., Hornor, Townsend & Kent, Telera, and IEP Youth Services.Jeff is an author, advisor, investor, and speaker. His book, "Advice To My Younger Self," reflects his commitment to empowering others to achieve their aspirations.Beyond his professional achievements, he expresses creativity through painting and crafting unique art pieces, breathing new life into old furniture, and has a passion for music.What B2B Companies Can Learn From Modern Family:Be passionate about your brand. Jeff says, “On the passionate and competitive side, Jay Pritchett's archenemy was Earl, his former partner of Closets, Closet, Closets. And they were at odds with each other, trying to outdo each other, trying to out-innovate each other. It's that competitiveness and that passion that you need as a marketer. That passion really does have to come through.”Show persistence and grit. A lot of marketing is about trial and error. You find out what works with your audience by keeping things fresh and building your momentum. So don't let the things that don't work slow you down; just keep going. Jeff says, “Both Jay and Phil shared that kind of grit to be the best of what they can be, to beat everyone else out, whether it be another realtor, whether it be Earl from Closets, Closets, Closets. And as marketers, it's a very noisy world out there. Everyone's pushing content out. Everyone's trying to be everything to all customers. So how do you stand out? Not everything's going to be a home run. Not every piece of content, every blog, every white paper is going to resonate. But you need to just stick to your focus on how you take your brand and elevate it. And you don't stop trying. And if it works, great. If not, move on to the next one.”Focus on the heart of your content. Work on the emotion you want your audience to feel when they experience your content. That's how you know your message will hit home and stick. And then you can start to chop it up for use across channels. Ian says, “So often in B2B marketing, we get so caught up in trying to create the asset and then chop it up and do all these things that you're trying to do all the motions of the thing rather than the actual sentiment that is in the clip.”Quotes*”You need to create opportunities for your community and your audience to talk about you to other people. They're not just sitting around all day thinking of your software. The number of people who are just thrilled with [your product] are not just going to sing it from the rooftops every second of every day. You need to cultivate those things and allow them to share it as much as you can.”*”For marketers, tie what you're doing back to the company strategy. And if you do that, you don't have to push people. They're going to be pushing you to do more, and want more from you. If you don't know numbers, you don't know how to measure, you don't know ROI, it's a serious blind spot. Bring back what you're doing to numbers, bring back to ROI, talk like a CFO.”*”Take a bite-sized approach. We never start off with a big bang. Our approach is tiny. Let's do a proof of concept. Let's get a quick win. We won't disrupt your customers. We won't disrupt your business. It's within your environment. And I can tell you, 99 percent of everything we started out with was a small project. And now we have extremely large engagements. They trust us, they know us, and those relationships grew over time.”*”You're basically in a newspaper business. You have to invest in content, it's 24/7, it never ends. If you think putting a PDF up on a website or, you know, putting new colors onto your website is the idea of content, you know, it's a big miss. So, content is an investment, it's an asset, and it's very dynamic. You have to put the right content at the right place at the right time on the right, you know, device or environment. And it just never stops. Technology's gotten better, data's gotten better, AI is now in the mix. So as you think about B2B marketing and where you really can make a difference, it's taking content that gets noticed. And, you know, the more you do that, the more you'll get noticed.”Time Stamps[0:55] Meet Jeff Fleischman, CMO of Altimetrik[5:41] Learn about Jeff's Role at Altimetrik[7:43] About the Creation and Success of Modern Family[10:59] Casting Challenges and Character Development[15:17] Marketing Takeaways from Modern Family[27:48] What Marketers Can Learn from Jay Pritchett's Competitive Spirit[29:12] Grit and Persistence in Marketing[33:48] How to Build a Strong Social Media Presence[34:49] The Role of Earned Media[46:14] AI in Marketing: A Game Changer[52:02] Jeff's Advice for First-Time CMOsLinksConnect with Jeff on LinkedInLearn more about AltimetrikAbout Remarkable!Remarkable! is created by the team at Caspian Studios, the premier B2B Podcast-as-a-Service company. Caspian creates both nonfiction and fiction series for B2B companies. If you want a fiction series check out our new offering - The Business Thriller - Hollywood style storytelling for B2B. Learn more at CaspianStudios.com. In today's episode, you heard from Ian Faison (CEO of Caspian Studios) and Meredith Gooderham (Senior Producer). Remarkable was produced this week by Meredith Gooderham, mixed by Scott Goodrich, and our theme song is “Solomon” by FALAK. Create something remarkable. Rise above the noise.

Gene and Alyssa answer buckets o' questions: She asks if her son should pay ahead on his mortgage.  Spoiler alert – it's not the answer you might expect! She asks if a financial advisor and a tax advisor are the same?  As you will expect – it depends! She is retiring from PSERS.  Should she take her contributions out or leave them in? They have investments in several types of accounts.  Where should they take their retirement income from first?  Lots more . . . Free Second Opinion Meetings Meet with a More than Money advisor to review your entire financial picture or simply project your retirement Meet with our Social Security partner to plan the best S/S strategy for you Meet with our estate planning attorney partner to review your estate plans – if you have any Meet with our insurance partner to review your life or long term care coverages Discover how to have your 401(k) professionally managed without leaving your company plan Schedule a free second opinion meeting with a More than Money advisor? Call today (610-746-7007) or email (Gene@AskMtM.com) to schedule your time with us.

In this episode of the Inspired Money Live Stream Podcast, we take a fascinating journey through history's most significant economic downturns. Joined by guest experts Caleb Silver, Chris Wang, and Gary Brode, we discuss the complexities of financial crises and crucial lessons learned from the past. Episode Highlights: Exploring Economic History and Its Lessons "Financial Lessons from History: Insights from Economic Crises" served as a profound exploration of how past financial disasters have shaped the current economic strategies and investor behaviors. Our distinguished guests shared their insights, offering listeners a comprehensive view of the cyclical nature of markets and the importance of preparedness.

In this episode of the Speaking Out of Place podcast, Professor David Palumbo-Liu talks with legendary climate activist Bill McKibben and scholar Caroline Levine. McKibben relates his long struggle to get companies to divest from fossil fuels and for the world in general to act immediately to seriously and substantially address this existential crisis. Levine tells of her efforts to get the giant pension fund, TIAA-CREF, to divest. She also talks about her new book, The Activist Humanist, and its relation to both her teaching and her activism.Bill McKibben is founder of Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for action on climate and justice. His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has appeared in 24 languages. He's gone on to write 20 books, and his work appears regularly in periodicals from the New Yorker to Rolling Stone. He serves as the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he has won the Gandhi Peace Prize as well as honorary degrees from 20 colleges and universities. He was awarded the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the alternative Nobel, in the Swedish Parliament. Foreign Policy named him to its inaugural list of the world's 100 most important global thinkers.McKibben helped found 350.org, the first global grassroots climate campaign, which has organized protests on every continent, including Antarctica, for climate action. He played a leading role in launching the opposition to big oil pipeline projects like Keystone XL, and the fossil fuel divestment campaign, which has become the biggest anti-corporate campaign in history, with endowments worth more than $40 trillion stepping back from oil, gas and coal. He stepped down as board chair of 350 in 2015, and left the board and stepped down from his volunteer role as senior adviser in 2020, accepting emeritus status. He lives in the mountains above Lake Champlain with his wife, the writer Sue Halpern, where he spends as much time as possible outdoors. In 2014, biologists credited his career by naming a new species of woodland gnat—Megophthalmidia mckibbeni–in his honor.Caroline Levine has spent her career asking how and why the humanities and the arts matter, especially in democratic societies. She argues for an understanding of forms and structures as essential both to understanding links between art and society and to the challenge of taking meaningful political action. She is the author of four books. The most recent, The Activist Humanist: Form and Method in the Climate Crisis (Princeton University Press 2023), grows out of the theoretical work of Forms: Whole, Rhythm, Hierarchy, Network (2015, winner of the James Russell Lowell Prize from the MLA, and named one of Flavorwire's “10 Must-Read Academic Books of 2015”). Levine has also published The Serious Pleasures of Suspense: Victorian Realism and Narrative Doubt (2003, winner of the Perkins Prize for the best book in narrative studies) and Provoking Democracy: Why We Need the Arts (2007)."Viewed one way, we live in a very hopeful moment. Thanks to in large part the work of university scientists and engineers, we now live on a planet where the cheapest way to produce power is to point a sheet of glass at the sun. That is to say, we could run our Earth on energy from heaven instead of hell, and we could do it fast. The fast is the hard part here. The only difference between all the examples of the long victories of social justice activism that we're in now is that this one is a time-limited problem. If we don't solve it fast, then no one's got a plan for how you refreeze the Arctic once you've melted it. And so we have to move very quickly. Our systems are not designed to move quickly. It's the easiest thing in the world to slow down and delay change, which is all that the fossil fuel industry at this point is trying to do, and that means that it's time for maximum effort from all of us. The story to tell is that the planet is outside its comfort zone, so we need to be outside ours."https://billmckibben.comhttps://350.orghttps://thirdact.orghttps://english.cornell.edu/caroline-levinehttps://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691250588/the-activist-humanisthttps://tiaa-divest.orgwww.palumbo-liu.com https://speakingoutofplace.comhttps://twitter.com/palumboliu?s=20

In this episode of the Speaking Out of Place podcast, Professor David Palumbo-Liu talks with legendary climate activist Bill McKibben and scholar Caroline Levine. McKibben relates his long struggle to get companies to divest from fossil fuels and for the world in general to act immediately to seriously and substantially address this existential crisis. Levine tells of her efforts to get the giant pension fund, TIAA-CREF, to divest. She also talks about her new book, The Activist Humanist, and its relation to both her teaching and her activism.Bill McKibben is founder of Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for action on climate and justice. His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has appeared in 24 languages. He's gone on to write 20 books, and his work appears regularly in periodicals from the New Yorker to Rolling Stone. He serves as the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he has won the Gandhi Peace Prize as well as honorary degrees from 20 colleges and universities. He was awarded the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the alternative Nobel, in the Swedish Parliament. Foreign Policy named him to its inaugural list of the world's 100 most important global thinkers.McKibben helped found 350.org, the first global grassroots climate campaign, which has organized protests on every continent, including Antarctica, for climate action. He played a leading role in launching the opposition to big oil pipeline projects like Keystone XL, and the fossil fuel divestment campaign, which has become the biggest anti-corporate campaign in history, with endowments worth more than $40 trillion stepping back from oil, gas and coal. He stepped down as board chair of 350 in 2015, and left the board and stepped down from his volunteer role as senior adviser in 2020, accepting emeritus status. He lives in the mountains above Lake Champlain with his wife, the writer Sue Halpern, where he spends as much time as possible outdoors. In 2014, biologists credited his career by naming a new species of woodland gnat—Megophthalmidia mckibbeni–in his honor.Caroline Levine has spent her career asking how and why the humanities and the arts matter, especially in democratic societies. She argues for an understanding of forms and structures as essential both to understanding links between art and society and to the challenge of taking meaningful political action. She is the author of four books. The most recent, The Activist Humanist: Form and Method in the Climate Crisis (Princeton University Press 2023), grows out of the theoretical work of Forms: Whole, Rhythm, Hierarchy, Network (2015, winner of the James Russell Lowell Prize from the MLA, and named one of Flavorwire's “10 Must-Read Academic Books of 2015”). Levine has also published The Serious Pleasures of Suspense: Victorian Realism and Narrative Doubt (2003, winner of the Perkins Prize for the best book in narrative studies) and Provoking Democracy: Why We Need the Arts (2007)."Viewed one way, we live in a very hopeful moment. Thanks to in large part the work of university scientists and engineers, we now live on a planet where the cheapest way to produce power is to point a sheet of glass at the sun. That is to say, we could run our Earth on energy from heaven instead of hell, and we could do it fast. The fast is the hard part here. The only difference between all the examples of the long victories of social justice activism that we're in now is that this one is a time-limited problem. If we don't solve it fast, then no one's got a plan for how you refreeze the Arctic once you've melted it. And so we have to move very quickly. Our systems are not designed to move quickly. It's the easiest thing in the world to slow down and delay change, which is all that the fossil fuel industry at this point is trying to do, and that means that it's time for maximum effort from all of us. The story to tell is that the planet is outside its comfort zone, so we need to be outside ours."https://billmckibben.comhttps://350.orghttps://thirdact.orghttps://english.cornell.edu/caroline-levinehttps://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691250588/the-activist-humanisthttps://tiaa-divest.orgwww.palumbo-liu.com https://speakingoutofplace.comhttps://twitter.com/palumboliu?s=20

In this episode of the Speaking Out of Place podcast, Professor David Palumbo-Liu talks with legendary climate activist Bill McKibben and scholar Caroline Levine. McKibben relates his long struggle to get companies to divest from fossil fuels and for the world in general to act immediately to seriously and substantially address this existential crisis. Levine tells of her efforts to get the giant pension fund, TIAA-CREF, to divest. She also talks about her new book, The Activist Humanist, and its relation to both her teaching and her activism.Bill McKibben is founder of Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for action on climate and justice. His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has appeared in 24 languages. He's gone on to write 20 books, and his work appears regularly in periodicals from the New Yorker to Rolling Stone. He serves as the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he has won the Gandhi Peace Prize as well as honorary degrees from 20 colleges and universities. He was awarded the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the alternative Nobel, in the Swedish Parliament. Foreign Policy named him to its inaugural list of the world's 100 most important global thinkers.McKibben helped found 350.org, the first global grassroots climate campaign, which has organized protests on every continent, including Antarctica, for climate action. He played a leading role in launching the opposition to big oil pipeline projects like Keystone XL, and the fossil fuel divestment campaign, which has become the biggest anti-corporate campaign in history, with endowments worth more than $40 trillion stepping back from oil, gas and coal. He stepped down as board chair of 350 in 2015, and left the board and stepped down from his volunteer role as senior adviser in 2020, accepting emeritus status. He lives in the mountains above Lake Champlain with his wife, the writer Sue Halpern, where he spends as much time as possible outdoors. In 2014, biologists credited his career by naming a new species of woodland gnat—Megophthalmidia mckibbeni–in his honor.Caroline Levine has spent her career asking how and why the humanities and the arts matter, especially in democratic societies. She argues for an understanding of forms and structures as essential both to understanding links between art and society and to the challenge of taking meaningful political action. She is the author of four books. The most recent, The Activist Humanist: Form and Method in the Climate Crisis (Princeton University Press 2023), grows out of the theoretical work of Forms: Whole, Rhythm, Hierarchy, Network (2015, winner of the James Russell Lowell Prize from the MLA, and named one of Flavorwire's “10 Must-Read Academic Books of 2015”). Levine has also published The Serious Pleasures of Suspense: Victorian Realism and Narrative Doubt (2003, winner of the Perkins Prize for the best book in narrative studies) and Provoking Democracy: Why We Need the Arts (2007)."Viewed one way, we live in a very hopeful moment. Thanks to in large part the work of university scientists and engineers, we now live on a planet where the cheapest way to produce power is to point a sheet of glass at the sun. That is to say, we could run our Earth on energy from heaven instead of hell, and we could do it fast. The fast is the hard part here. The only difference between all the examples of the long victories of social justice activism that we're in now is that this one is a time-limited problem. If we don't solve it fast, then no one's got a plan for how you refreeze the Arctic once you've melted it. And so we have to move very quickly. Our systems are not designed to move quickly. It's the easiest thing in the world to slow down and delay change, which is all that the fossil fuel industry at this point is trying to do, and that means that it's time for maximum effort from all of us. The story to tell is that the planet is outside its comfort zone, so we need to be outside ours."https://billmckibben.comhttps://350.orghttps://thirdact.orghttps://english.cornell.edu/caroline-levinehttps://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691250588/the-activist-humanisthttps://tiaa-divest.orgwww.palumbo-liu.com https://speakingoutofplace.comhttps://twitter.com/palumboliu?s=20

In this episode of the Speaking Out of Place podcast, Professor David Palumbo-Liu talks with legendary climate activist Bill McKibben and scholar Caroline Levine. McKibben relates his long struggle to get companies to divest from fossil fuels and for the world in general to act immediately to seriously and substantially address this existential crisis. Levine tells of her efforts to get the giant pension fund, TIAA-CREF, to divest. She also talks about her new book, The Activist Humanist, and its relation to both her teaching and her activism.Bill McKibben is founder of Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for action on climate and justice. His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has appeared in 24 languages. He's gone on to write 20 books, and his work appears regularly in periodicals from the New Yorker to Rolling Stone. He serves as the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he has won the Gandhi Peace Prize as well as honorary degrees from 20 colleges and universities. He was awarded the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the alternative Nobel, in the Swedish Parliament. Foreign Policy named him to its inaugural list of the world's 100 most important global thinkers.McKibben helped found 350.org, the first global grassroots climate campaign, which has organized protests on every continent, including Antarctica, for climate action. He played a leading role in launching the opposition to big oil pipeline projects like Keystone XL, and the fossil fuel divestment campaign, which has become the biggest anti-corporate campaign in history, with endowments worth more than $40 trillion stepping back from oil, gas and coal. He stepped down as board chair of 350 in 2015, and left the board and stepped down from his volunteer role as senior adviser in 2020, accepting emeritus status. He lives in the mountains above Lake Champlain with his wife, the writer Sue Halpern, where he spends as much time as possible outdoors. In 2014, biologists credited his career by naming a new species of woodland gnat—Megophthalmidia mckibbeni–in his honor.Caroline Levine has spent her career asking how and why the humanities and the arts matter, especially in democratic societies. She argues for an understanding of forms and structures as essential both to understanding links between art and society and to the challenge of taking meaningful political action. She is the author of four books. The most recent, The Activist Humanist: Form and Method in the Climate Crisis (Princeton University Press 2023), grows out of the theoretical work of Forms: Whole, Rhythm, Hierarchy, Network (2015, winner of the James Russell Lowell Prize from the MLA, and named one of Flavorwire's “10 Must-Read Academic Books of 2015”). Levine has also published The Serious Pleasures of Suspense: Victorian Realism and Narrative Doubt (2003, winner of the Perkins Prize for the best book in narrative studies) and Provoking Democracy: Why We Need the Arts (2007)."Viewed one way, we live in a very hopeful moment. Thanks to in large part the work of university scientists and engineers, we now live on a planet where the cheapest way to produce power is to point a sheet of glass at the sun. That is to say, we could run our Earth on energy from heaven instead of hell, and we could do it fast. The fast is the hard part here. The only difference between all the examples of the long victories of social justice activism that we're in now is that this one is a time-limited problem. If we don't solve it fast, then no one's got a plan for how you refreeze the Arctic once you've melted it. And so we have to move very quickly. Our systems are not designed to move quickly. It's the easiest thing in the world to slow down and delay change, which is all that the fossil fuel industry at this point is trying to do, and that means that it's time for maximum effort from all of us. The story to tell is that the planet is outside its comfort zone, so we need to be outside ours."https://billmckibben.comhttps://350.orghttps://thirdact.orghttps://english.cornell.edu/caroline-levinehttps://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691250588/the-activist-humanisthttps://tiaa-divest.orgwww.palumbo-liu.com https://speakingoutofplace.comhttps://twitter.com/palumboliu?s=20

In this episode of the Speaking Out of Place podcast, Professor David Palumbo-Liu talks with legendary climate activist Bill McKibben and scholar Caroline Levine. McKibben relates his long struggle to get companies to divest from fossil fuels and for the world in general to act immediately to seriously and substantially address this existential crisis. Levine tells of her efforts to get the giant pension fund, TIAA-CREF, to divest. She also talks about her new book, The Activist Humanist, and its relation to both her teaching and her activism.Bill McKibben is founder of Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for action on climate and justice. His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has appeared in 24 languages. He's gone on to write 20 books, and his work appears regularly in periodicals from the New Yorker to Rolling Stone. He serves as the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he has won the Gandhi Peace Prize as well as honorary degrees from 20 colleges and universities. He was awarded the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the alternative Nobel, in the Swedish Parliament. Foreign Policy named him to its inaugural list of the world's 100 most important global thinkers.McKibben helped found 350.org, the first global grassroots climate campaign, which has organized protests on every continent, including Antarctica, for climate action. He played a leading role in launching the opposition to big oil pipeline projects like Keystone XL, and the fossil fuel divestment campaign, which has become the biggest anti-corporate campaign in history, with endowments worth more than $40 trillion stepping back from oil, gas and coal. He stepped down as board chair of 350 in 2015, and left the board and stepped down from his volunteer role as senior adviser in 2020, accepting emeritus status. He lives in the mountains above Lake Champlain with his wife, the writer Sue Halpern, where he spends as much time as possible outdoors. In 2014, biologists credited his career by naming a new species of woodland gnat—Megophthalmidia mckibbeni–in his honor.Caroline Levine has spent her career asking how and why the humanities and the arts matter, especially in democratic societies. She argues for an understanding of forms and structures as essential both to understanding links between art and society and to the challenge of taking meaningful political action. She is the author of four books. The most recent, The Activist Humanist: Form and Method in the Climate Crisis (Princeton University Press 2023), grows out of the theoretical work of Forms: Whole, Rhythm, Hierarchy, Network (2015, winner of the James Russell Lowell Prize from the MLA, and named one of Flavorwire's “10 Must-Read Academic Books of 2015”). Levine has also published The Serious Pleasures of Suspense: Victorian Realism and Narrative Doubt (2003, winner of the Perkins Prize for the best book in narrative studies) and Provoking Democracy: Why We Need the Arts (2007)."Viewed one way, we live in a very hopeful moment. Thanks to in large part the work of university scientists and engineers, we now live on a planet where the cheapest way to produce power is to point a sheet of glass at the sun. That is to say, we could run our Earth on energy from heaven instead of hell, and we could do it fast. The fast is the hard part here. The only difference between all the examples of the long victories of social justice activism that we're in now is that this one is a time-limited problem. If we don't solve it fast, then no one's got a plan for how you refreeze the Arctic once you've melted it. And so we have to move very quickly. Our systems are not designed to move quickly. It's the easiest thing in the world to slow down and delay change, which is all that the fossil fuel industry at this point is trying to do, and that means that it's time for maximum effort from all of us. The story to tell is that the planet is outside its comfort zone, so we need to be outside ours."https://billmckibben.comhttps://350.orghttps://thirdact.orghttps://english.cornell.edu/caroline-levinehttps://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691250588/the-activist-humanisthttps://tiaa-divest.orgwww.palumbo-liu.com https://speakingoutofplace.comhttps://twitter.com/palumboliu?s=20

In this episode of the Speaking Out of Place podcast, Professor David Palumbo-Liu talks with legendary climate activist Bill McKibben and scholar Caroline Levine. McKibben relates his long struggle to get companies to divest from fossil fuels and for the world in general to act immediately to seriously and substantially address this existential crisis. Levine tells of her efforts to get the giant pension fund, TIAA-CREF, to divest. She also talks about her new book, The Activist Humanist, and its relation to both her teaching and her activism.Bill McKibben is founder of Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for action on climate and justice. His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has appeared in 24 languages. He's gone on to write 20 books, and his work appears regularly in periodicals from the New Yorker to Rolling Stone. He serves as the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he has won the Gandhi Peace Prize as well as honorary degrees from 20 colleges and universities. He was awarded the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the alternative Nobel, in the Swedish Parliament. Foreign Policy named him to its inaugural list of the world's 100 most important global thinkers.McKibben helped found 350.org, the first global grassroots climate campaign, which has organized protests on every continent, including Antarctica, for climate action. He played a leading role in launching the opposition to big oil pipeline projects like Keystone XL, and the fossil fuel divestment campaign, which has become the biggest anti-corporate campaign in history, with endowments worth more than $40 trillion stepping back from oil, gas and coal. He stepped down as board chair of 350 in 2015, and left the board and stepped down from his volunteer role as senior adviser in 2020, accepting emeritus status. He lives in the mountains above Lake Champlain with his wife, the writer Sue Halpern, where he spends as much time as possible outdoors. In 2014, biologists credited his career by naming a new species of woodland gnat—Megophthalmidia mckibbeni–in his honor.Caroline Levine has spent her career asking how and why the humanities and the arts matter, especially in democratic societies. She argues for an understanding of forms and structures as essential both to understanding links between art and society and to the challenge of taking meaningful political action. She is the author of four books. The most recent, The Activist Humanist: Form and Method in the Climate Crisis (Princeton University Press 2023), grows out of the theoretical work of Forms: Whole, Rhythm, Hierarchy, Network (2015, winner of the James Russell Lowell Prize from the MLA, and named one of Flavorwire's “10 Must-Read Academic Books of 2015”). Levine has also published The Serious Pleasures of Suspense: Victorian Realism and Narrative Doubt (2003, winner of the Perkins Prize for the best book in narrative studies) and Provoking Democracy: Why We Need the Arts (2007)."Viewed one way, we live in a very hopeful moment. Thanks to in large part the work of university scientists and engineers, we now live on a planet where the cheapest way to produce power is to point a sheet of glass at the sun. That is to say, we could run our Earth on energy from heaven instead of hell, and we could do it fast. The fast is the hard part here. The only difference between all the examples of the long victories of social justice activism that we're in now is that this one is a time-limited problem. If we don't solve it fast, then no one's got a plan for how you refreeze the Arctic once you've melted it. And so we have to move very quickly. Our systems are not designed to move quickly. It's the easiest thing in the world to slow down and delay change, which is all that the fossil fuel industry at this point is trying to do, and that means that it's time for maximum effort from all of us. The story to tell is that the planet is outside its comfort zone, so we need to be outside ours."https://billmckibben.comhttps://350.orghttps://thirdact.orghttps://english.cornell.edu/caroline-levinehttps://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691250588/the-activist-humanisthttps://tiaa-divest.orgwww.palumbo-liu.com https://speakingoutofplace.comhttps://twitter.com/palumboliu?s=20

In this episode of the Speaking Out of Place podcast, Professor David Palumbo-Liu talks with legendary climate activist Bill McKibben and scholar Caroline Levine. McKibben relates his long struggle to get companies to divest from fossil fuels and for the world in general to act immediately to seriously and substantially address this existential crisis. Levine tells of her efforts to get the giant pension fund, TIAA-CREF, to divest. She also talks about her new book, The Activist Humanist, and its relation to both her teaching and her activism.Bill McKibben is founder of Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for action on climate and justice. His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has appeared in 24 languages. He's gone on to write 20 books, and his work appears regularly in periodicals from the New Yorker to Rolling Stone. He serves as the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he has won the Gandhi Peace Prize as well as honorary degrees from 20 colleges and universities. He was awarded the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the alternative Nobel, in the Swedish Parliament. Foreign Policy named him to its inaugural list of the world's 100 most important global thinkers.McKibben helped found 350.org, the first global grassroots climate campaign, which has organized protests on every continent, including Antarctica, for climate action. He played a leading role in launching the opposition to big oil pipeline projects like Keystone XL, and the fossil fuel divestment campaign, which has become the biggest anti-corporate campaign in history, with endowments worth more than $40 trillion stepping back from oil, gas and coal. He stepped down as board chair of 350 in 2015, and left the board and stepped down from his volunteer role as senior adviser in 2020, accepting emeritus status. He lives in the mountains above Lake Champlain with his wife, the writer Sue Halpern, where he spends as much time as possible outdoors. In 2014, biologists credited his career by naming a new species of woodland gnat—Megophthalmidia mckibbeni–in his honor.Caroline Levine has spent her career asking how and why the humanities and the arts matter, especially in democratic societies. She argues for an understanding of forms and structures as essential both to understanding links between art and society and to the challenge of taking meaningful political action. She is the author of four books. The most recent, The Activist Humanist: Form and Method in the Climate Crisis (Princeton University Press 2023), grows out of the theoretical work of Forms: Whole, Rhythm, Hierarchy, Network (2015, winner of the James Russell Lowell Prize from the MLA, and named one of Flavorwire's “10 Must-Read Academic Books of 2015”). Levine has also published The Serious Pleasures of Suspense: Victorian Realism and Narrative Doubt (2003, winner of the Perkins Prize for the best book in narrative studies) and Provoking Democracy: Why We Need the Arts (2007)."Viewed one way, we live in a very hopeful moment. Thanks to in large part the work of university scientists and engineers, we now live on a planet where the cheapest way to produce power is to point a sheet of glass at the sun. That is to say, we could run our Earth on energy from heaven instead of hell, and we could do it fast. The fast is the hard part here. The only difference between all the examples of the long victories of social justice activism that we're in now is that this one is a time-limited problem. If we don't solve it fast, then no one's got a plan for how you refreeze the Arctic once you've melted it. And so we have to move very quickly. Our systems are not designed to move quickly. It's the easiest thing in the world to slow down and delay change, which is all that the fossil fuel industry at this point is trying to do, and that means that it's time for maximum effort from all of us. The story to tell is that the planet is outside its comfort zone, so we need to be outside ours."https://billmckibben.comhttps://350.orghttps://thirdact.orghttps://english.cornell.edu/caroline-levinehttps://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691250588/the-activist-humanisthttps://tiaa-divest.orgwww.palumbo-liu.com https://speakingoutofplace.comhttps://twitter.com/palumboliu?s=20

Today we speak with legendary climate activist Bill McKibben and scholar Caroline Levine. McKibben relates his long struggle to get companies to divest from fossil fuels and for the world in general to act immediately to seriously and substantially address this existential crisis. Levine tells of her efforts to get the giant pension fund, TIAA-CREF, to divest. She also talks about her new book, The Activist Humanist, and its relation to both her teaching and her activism.Caroline Levine has spent her career asking how and why the humanities and the arts matter, especially in democratic societies. She argues for an understanding of forms and structures as essential both to understanding links between art and society and to the challenge of taking meaningful political action. She is the author of four books. The most recent, The Activist Humanist: Form and Method in the Climate Crisis (Princeton University Press 2023), grows out of the theoretical work of Forms: Whole, Rhythm, Hierarchy, Network (2015, winner of the James Russell Lowell Prize from the MLA, and named one of Flavorwire's “10 Must-Read Academic Books of 2015”). Levine has also published The Serious Pleasures of Suspense: Victorian Realism and Narrative Doubt (2003, winner of the Perkins Prize for the best book in narrative studies) and Provoking Democracy: Why We Need the Arts (2007).Bill McKibben is founder of Third Act, which organizes people over the age of 60 for action on climate and justice. His 1989 book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has appeared in 24 languages. He's gone on to write 20 books, and his work appears regularly in periodicals from the New Yorker to Rolling Stone. He serves as the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he has won the Gandhi Peace Prize as well as honorary degrees from 20 colleges and universities. He was awarded the Right Livelihood Award, sometimes called the alternative Nobel, in the Swedish Parliament. Foreign Policy named him to its inaugural list of the world's 100 most important global thinkers.McKibben helped found 350.org, the first global grassroots climate campaign, which has organized protests on every continent, including Antarctica, for climate action. He played a leading role in launching the opposition to big oil pipeline projects like Keystone XL, and the fossil fuel divestment campaign, which has become the biggest anti-corporate campaign in history, with endowments worth more than $40 trillion stepping back from oil, gas and coal. He stepped down as board chair of 350 in 2015, and left the board and stepped down from his volunteer role as senior adviser in 2020, accepting emeritus status. He lives in the mountains above Lake Champlain with his wife, the writer Sue Halpern, where he spends as much time as possible outdoors. In 2014, biologists credited his career by naming a new species of woodland gnat—Megophthalmidia mckibbeni–in his honor.  

Patreon Revisitor Episode Time!  First time revisitor Seth Gill and repeat revisitor Jon Lamoreaux of The Hustle joins us to talk Bob Mould's first solo album “Workbook” from 1989.  Plenty of other discussion including The Smiths and Bandsplain, Counting Crows (get ready Jon for a long December), Tom Waits, Disney movies, Lucero, finding about Husker Du on a train to Alabama, 120 Minutes, TIAA CREF, peanut butter sandwiches, and some “I love that you love it” moments. Songs in the episode from Garrison's records include “Just A Little Rain” (used as the intro song) & “Almost There” & “More Than You Could Give” (from My Sister, My Brother).Check out Bob Mould at: https://bobmould.com/Check out The Hustle at: https://thehustle.podbean.com/Check out other episodes at RecordsRevisitedPodcast.com, Apple Podcasts, Castbox, iHeartMedia, Google Podcasts and Spotify. Additional content is found at: Facebook.com/recordsrevisitedpodcast or twitter @podcastrecords or IG at instagram.com/recordsrevisitedpodcast/ or join our Patreon at patreon.com/RecordsRevisitedPodcast

What should Martin do about his outrageously fee-heavy 403(b) plan? Should EF hedge his pre-tax non-qualified 415 excess plan? What should Max do with his old TIAA plan, and what are the pros and cons of a cash balance defined benefit plan for self-employed people like Brent Money? Plus, Mike needs Joe and Big Al's spitball on the highly compensated employee rule and excess 401(k) contributions, and the fellas explain how employee stock purchase plans are taxed for Big Cheese Bob the Tomato.  Timestamps: 00:55 - What to Do About My Outrageous Fee-Heavy 403(b)? (Martin, Miami, FL) 05:56 - Should I Hedge My Pre-Tax Non-Qualified 415 Excess Plan? (EF, Kansas) 14:25 - What to Do With My Old TIAA Retirement Plan? (Max, Seattle) 24:29 - Highly Compensated Employee Rule and Excess 401(k) Contributions (Mike, Castleton, NY) 29:16 - How Are Employee Stock Purchase Plans (ESPP) Taxed? (Big Cheese/Bob the Tomato) 32:26 - Cash Balance Plans Pros and Cons for Self-Employed (Brent Money, Bennington, NE) 40:52 - The Derails Access this week's free financial resources in the podcast show notes at https://bit.ly/ymyw-449  Investing Basics Guide - free download Financial Boot Camp: Investing Basics - new from YMYW TV Episode Transcript Ask Joe & Big Al On Air for your Retirement Spitball Analysis

This just in: college is freaking expensive! But pursuing any kind of education after high school – whether a bachelor's degree, associate's, or trade certification – can make a huge difference in your career. In this special episode of “Grown-Up Stuff: How to Adult,” sponsored by EdVest of Wisconsin and the Michigan Education Savings Program, Matt and Molly speak with college savings experts Robin Lott and Jackie James about the best ways to save and pay for higher education as a parent or student. (Spoiler alert: start saving now.) If you have children – or plan on it down the road – it's never too early or too late to start saving for college.  Learn about the best student loan options, how often you can reapply for financial aid, and the many benefits to opening a 529 college savings plan.  Sources Cited:  National Center for Education Statistics “A Look at College Tuition Growth Over 20 Years” - US News & World Report Federal Student Aid Data for the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) forms See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Gene and Alyssa answer tons of listener questions: She got a letter from TIAA-CREF that her information was hacked. What should she do? Should he name his daughter his power of attorney or is there a better way? She's been waiting for her inheritance for two years. Should she consult an attorney? They don't live close to the MtM World Headquarters. Can they still be clients? Lots more . . . Free Second Opinion Meetings Do you have questions about your financial situation? Are you on track to reach your financial goals – particularly your retirement goals? What should you be doing right now? Are you taking too much risk with your investments? Is your 401(k) or 403(b) being actively managed for you? Schedule a free second opinion meeting with a More than Money advisor? Call today (610-746-7007) or email (Gene@AskMtM.com) to schedule your time with us.

www.CPOplaybook.comEpisode TranscriptShelly Carlin discusses the organization's role in influencing public policy and regulatory processes related to human resources. She delves into the concept of executive compensation, its components, and how Chief People Officers (CHRO) contribute to aligning the interests of executives with those of shareholders.*Michele (Shelly) Carlin BioMichele (Shelly) Carlin is Executive Vice President of HR Policy Association and its Center On Executive Compensation and former CEO of the American Health Policy Institute. Shelly joined the Association in August 2014 from Motorola Solutions, where she was Senior Vice President, Human Resources and Communications.During her tenure at Motorola, Shelly led the HR function through a period of substantial change, from the spin-off of its consumer cell phone business to a major transformation of how HR services are delivered. She also implemented the CEO Leadership Forum, a business-driven learning program for the company's top 20 high potential executives.Prior to serving as the head of HR, Shelly was Corporate Vice President, Global Rewards. Before joining Motorola in 2008, she was VP of Compensation, Benefits and HR Technology for the Campbell Soup Company. Shelly's earlier positions included VP, HR Rewards and Operations for TIAA-CREF; VP of Compensation and Benefits for Sears, Roebuck and Co.; and SVP of executive compensation and corporate unit reporting for Bcom3 Group, Inc.Shelly earned an BA and MBA from the University of California, Los Angeles and was an Academic All-American in softball and a member of UCLA's 1982 National Championship team.*Be a guest on the showAll media inquiries: media@cpoplaybook.com

Dave and Nick have another MSU case study for you. This one is a very common scenario that comes up often - couples who are nearing retirement and seeking help from a financial advisor. They know they want to retire and they are looking for someone to help them put all the pieces together. They have been managing their money themselves, for the most part, with some support from the plan providers at Michigan State. But now that they're getting close to crunch time they are really starting to think about what it means to go from fully employed long-term careers at Michigan State to being retirees. Two Common Questions about Retiring from MSU The first two questions typically are: “Can we retire?” “What does that look like?” They are concerned that there is something they are missing or not thinking of and they want our help thinking through the options and managing it going forward. The people that come to us in this situation are commonly in the same age range with similar situations. Here are the avatars we created to discuss this case study. Bob is 62 and Barb is 61, they are married and they both have long careers as MS faculty. They've saved for retirement all through their careers. However, Bob is worried that with raising a family and moving across the country once, they are behind. He's ready to retire if they can afford it but Barb isn't so sure, regardless of their finances. Bob is old enough to draw social security and he feels he should be able to be done with work. They set up their MSU accounts years ago with TIAA CREF and then left them alone. We chose TIAA CREF for this example because it gives us a couple of wrinkles to talk about with their plan. Bob knows they have a lot of risk but it is paid off well over the years and he is confident that will continue into the future. Regardless of social security and investment accounts, Barb feels that they can't retire until their mortgage is paid off. They owe about $120,000 for the next five years at a rate of 3.5%. This was originally a fifteen-year mortgage and they refinanced when rates were very low. Listen as Nick and Dave add some common themes to this scenario and unpack it a little bit. Do you know anyone in a similar situation who works at MSU (or another university) who is getting ready to retire? A financial advisor may be a great investment at this stage of the game. Call us today! 517-321-4832  Shotwell Rutter Baer financial planners specialize in helping clients who are employed by MSU. We have extensive knowledge of the benefits packages offered by MSU and how to maximize their offerings. You can find more information on the MSU section of our website. About Shotwell Rutter Baer Shotwell Rutter Baer is proud to be an independent, fee-only registered investment advisory firm. This means that we are only compensated by our clients for our knowledge and guidance — not from commissions by selling financial products. Our only motivation is to help you achieve financial freedom and peace of mind. By structuring our business this way we believe that many of the conflicts of interest that plague the financial services industry are eliminated. We work for our clients, period. Click here to learn about the Strategic Reliable Blueprint, our financial plan process for your future. Call us at 517-321-4832 for financial and retirement investing advice.

Which investments should go in your traditional IRA vs your Roth IRA, and does that asset location depend on your age? Learn how to generate “tax alpha” to get better returns on your investments. Plus, Joe and Big Al spitball whether to roll a TIAA 403(b) to an IRA or take the annuity, and they spitball retirement and Roth conversion and Roth contribution strategies for an overseas officer with a military pension, and for Americans working abroad who qualify for the foreign earned income exclusion. Timestamps: 00:51 - Best Assets to Hold in Traditional IRA and Roth IRA? (Michael, Colorado - voice) 7:40 - Is Investment Asset Location Dependent on Age? (Glen)  11:35 - TIAA 403(b): Take the Annuity or Roll to an IRA? (Brad, Northeast TN) 19:34 - Military Pension Spitball: Overseas Officer with Fluctuating Income & Taxes (US Grant, Alexandria, VA... usually) 24:29 - Foreign Earned Income Exclusion & Roth 401(k) Rules (Jeff, Singapore via North Dakota) 31:32 - The Derails Access this week's free financial resources in the podcast show notes at https://bit.ly/ymyw-422: Why Asset Location Matters Guide Register for our free 2023 tax planning webinar, March 29, 12pm PT/3pm ET Schedule a free financial assessment Episode Transcript Ask Joe & Big Al On Air

I could not wait to talk again with JeVon McCormick. On our new season, I am joined by Ellis Fitch and Anthony Garone. We dive into JeVon's second book, Modern Leader, including a chat about the foreword written by the one and only David Goggins. JeVon talks about how that came about. We dive into a substantial moment in JeVon's life, and part of the motivation for his latest book. Making the decision to go by JeVon instead of J.T. (which you'll hear him referred to in our season 1 interview here), he talks about "the broken playbook" that we all play by, and how he made the decision to own his full name, and what he hopes to see by doing that. Allen talks about a story in the book about a drive JeVon took with his dad through an area of River Oaks, and how some of those moments motivated him to write this latest book as well. JeVon talks about who he specifically wanted to reach with this message. Allen mentions a phenomenon that JeVon brought up in the book about shaming people for asking questions. JeVon talks about the responsibility of people to teach rather than to take the position that it "isn't my responsibility to teach them".  Ellis and JeVon dive into DEI initiatives (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion), particularly within publicly traded companies, and JeVon talks about how some of the intentions are misguided. JeVon talks about some interesting examples about changing the playbook, and cites the example of the change of leadership and pattern of succession at TIAA-CREF, and how now Thasunda Brown Duckett is the current CEO. Anthony asks about what practical top-down solutions  companies can put in practice to affect real change to the broken playbook. Thanks for listening to this episode. Here are some links below from the show and more information about the hosts. JeVon's LinkedIn page JeVonMcCormick.com website Scribe Media website The hosts of the show: Allen Plunkett, owner of Phoenix Staff Ellis Fitch, Content Strategist and co-founder of Edify Content Anthony Garone, Ghostwriter and co-founder of Edify Content

Listen as Jen sits down with Franchise Consultant, Executive Coach and Author, Rich LeBrun. Rich breaks down how he helps others develop their full entrepreneurial potential. Get to know Rich LeBrun: Having had the opportunity to own and operate several businesses throughout his thirty-year career, Rich LeBrun is passionate about helping his clients reach their financial freedom and secure their future through business ownership. Whether you are an executive out of work, a woman re-entering the workforce, a veteran returning home from service or someone just not ready to retire, Rich wants to help those in life's transition navigate through the exciting journey of selecting their franchise opportunity. Choosing the right franchise to own can be one of the most crucial and rewarding decisions one will make in a lifetime. Rich is ready to successfully guide you through this process to find freedom and true passion in owning your own business. Prior to becoming a franchise consultant, Rich was a Vice President with the largest commercial real estate company in Chicago. His clients included TIAA-CREF, Henderson Global Investors, Blackrock, MIRVAC, and Sun Life Financial. Rich LeBrun is passionate about helping his clients reach their financial freedom and secure their future through business ownership. Rich is a Certified Franchise Broker (CFB) Certified Commercial Investment Manager (CCIM) Get in touch with Rich: EMAIL: rich@lebrunadvisorygroup.com WEBSITE Get it Done Entrepreneurs Podcast LN FB YouTube Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome back! In this episode Dr. Shenique Carmichael shares her story and tells us how Leah's Hopes and Dreams is making an impact in the homeless community here in Charlotte and around the world.  About Leah's Hopes and Dreams: Leah's Hopes and Dreams, a non-profit organization, provide our homeless communities with vital resources enabling them to not only survive, but to thrive. Our goal is to provide these under-served communities with the tools and services necessary to eradicate homelessness in our community. About Dr. Shenique Carmichael:  Shenique Carmichael, Founder and President of Leah's Hopes and Dream (LHD), is an accomplished business owner, leader, and business partner with over a decade of progressive experience leading and managing strategic business initiatives from inception through implementation. She recently published her first book – “Don't Quit. God is not done yet!” This book was written to encourage, motivate, and empower individuals to keep moving forward no matter what obstacles they face. ​ She is supported by her husband Mike of 19 years and has two children, Destini 20, and Isaiah 15. She is employed by TIAA-CREF and works with a team responsible for managing changes that drive and sustain company performance and compliance with industry and regulatory guidelines. She was born in Nassau Bahamas but was raised on one of the most beautiful Islands of the Bahamas – Exuma. She currently resides in Charlotte North Carolina where she works with other non-profit organizations helping to build the community by empowering homeless individuals, underprivileged families, and work to help reduce poverty which is a constant battle. ​ Shenique completed her undergraduate at St. Augustine's University in Raleigh where she focused on Business Administration and Marketing. She obtained her Master's Degree from Pfeiffer University in Banking and Finance, and received her Ph.D. in Leadership and Organizational Change from Walden University. ​ Leah's Hopes and Dreams stands on three principles – Faith, Loving Unconditionally, and Giving without Exception. It was created out of her love for GOD, families, and wanting to make a difference in our community. Growing up in the Bahamas, she understands the struggle of poverty, and the need to educate individuals on the importance of understanding their purpose. ​ Shenique ministers to women on a weekly basis, encourage them to follow their dreams; know who they are in Christ and stand firm on the word of GOD. She is also working with other organizations to educate and provide career training for individuals who need to get back into the workforce. Once a month, she and her team go out to feed the homeless and underprivileged families. During this time, they embrace that opportunity to share the gospel and pray with them. Her heart is set on educating, others, and taking advantage of every opportunity God provides to ensure that HE gets the glory in everything she does.

Achieving prominence in your field is tough for anyone; let alone a minority. Now imagine that world is Wall Street. Adam Schroeder and Naresh Vissa talk with Thomas W Jones about his rise through the system, handling tough situations at Citi during the Great Recession, and how he managed to start his own venture capital company. Thomas is the former Vice Chairman, President & COO at TIAA-CREF, the largest pension system in the country; Former Vice Chairman of Travelers, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and Freddie Mac; Former Chairman & CEO of Smith Barney Asset Management; Former CEO of Global Investment Management at Citigroup; Former Treasurer at John Hancock Insurance Company; Founder and senior partner of venture capital investment firm TWJ Capital; author of the new book From Willard Straight to Wall Street: A Memoir. Website: www.TWJCapital.com www.TomJones69.com www.Patreon.com/WorkFromHomeShow www.WorkFromHomeShow.com

GUEST OVERVIEW: Allen Waters is a Rhode Island native and 4th generation resident of Providence, Waters graduated from Classical High School and received a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of Rhode Island. He had a thirty-year career as an investment consultant with a number of firms, including Merrill Lynch, Charles Schwab, and TIAA-CREF. Always ready to give back to the community, Waters has served on the boards of a number of organizations from the Rhode Island Black Heritage Society to South Providence Tutorial to Providence Country Day School and has been invited to serve by the Scandinavian Communities in 2021.

If you've been looking at college price tags and wishing you'd started saving earlier, you might want to tune in to today's show. Guest Yvette Haring of TIAA-CREF will be talking about 520 college savings programs and whether or not it's too late to open one (hint—probably not!). In other segments, we're talking to working parents to find out how they make time to support their students (it's Working Parents Day!), and answering listeners' admissions and finance questions.

If you've been looking at college price tags and wishing you'd started saving earlier, you might want to tune in to today's show. Guest Yvette Haring of TIAA-CREF will be talking about 520 college savings programs and whether or not it's too late to open one (hint—probably not!). In other segments, we're talking to working parents to find out how they make time to support their students (it's Working Parents Day!), and answering listeners' admissions and finance questions.

If you've been looking at college price tags and wishing you'd started saving earlier, you might want to tune in to today's show. Guest Yvette Haring of TIAA-CREF will be talking about 520 college savings programs and whether or not it's too late to open one (hint—probably not!). In other segments, we're talking to working parents to find out how they make time to support their students (it's Working Parents Day!), and answering listeners' admissions and finance questions.

Chad Hartley is a midwestern guy through and through. He was born and raised in Illinois. As a junior he dabbled in triathlons but it was the bike that was his calling. Versatile is the word I would use with him. He raced the track, road, and crits. He turned pro after a 6th place at the national criterium champs. His first pro team was one that eventually turned into Jittery Joe's. Chad eventually got a ride with TIAA-CREF and went to Europe. His European career was interrupted by having Iliac Artery Endofibrosis. He called it a day on racing in Europe but came back to the states but found a home on teams like Kenda, Sharecare, Alto Velo to Octane. He's still racing, doing a bit of coaching and running the Wisconsin Bicycle Association. Enjoy!

What a treat we have for you today! On today's episode of The Weiss Investor, Kenny hangs out with Malcolm Ethridge, an EVP at CIC Wealth, financial advisor and host of the Tech Money Podcast based in the Washington, D.C., area. You've seen him on CNBC and Cheddar, and today Malcolm dives into how he got started using his knowledge of TIAA-CREF right out of college to help professors and academics plan their retirement. After spending time at Merrill Lynch and Wells Fargo, he came to prefer independent firms and makes his case for working with them, as well as the case for why podcasting is such an important part of the business. Finally, they close out by digging into NUAs and QSBS, Peter Thiel, Elon Musk's tweets, the latest with Jay Powell and the Fed, and preparing for turbulence. The advice they offer young people entering the industry is invaluable! Check us out at WeissRatings.com.

Listen to an interview with Maria Mendonça on U.S. teachers' pension fund TIAA investments in Brazil deforestation. From a report on GRAIN.org "Swedish, US and Canadian pension funds have acquired farmlands in Brazil by way of a Brazilian businessman accused of using violence and fraud to displace small farmers. These pension funds are also using complex company structures that have the effect of evading Brazilian laws restricting foreign investments in farmland. The pension funds have been investing in Brazil through a global farmland fund called TIAA-CREF Global Agriculture LLC (TCGA). The fund is managed by the US-based Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association - College Retirement Equities Fund (TIAA-CREF). Those investing in the fund include TIAA-CREF, the Second Swedish National Pension Fund (AP2) and the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDP) and the British Columbia Investment Management Corporation (bcIMC) of Canada." Music on this edition by @sessagrandeza Free City Radio is hosted and produced by Stefan @spirodon Christoff Thank you to Devlin Kuyek for helping to facilitate this interview and to Alternatives for support for this interview series looking at the ways that people globally involved in ecological and social justice movements are responding to the pandemic crisis and the ways that governments + corporations are using the crisis to push forward neo-colonial violent economic and social policies.

In this special episode, Huma Gupta and China Sajadian discuss abolition geographies and environmental movements with renowned geographer and activist Ruth Wilson Gilmore. She is the author of the award-winning Golden Gulag: Prisons, Surplus, Crisis, and Opposition in Globalizing California and several forthcoming books, including Change Everything, Abolition Geography: Essays Toward Liberation, and Stuart Hall: Selected Writings on Race and Difference, co-edited with Paul Gilroy. In this interview, Gilmore explains her research on carcerality through a global, comparative lens, from the long traditions of emancipation within Black Marxism, to popular struggles against TIAA-CREF land grabs in Brazil, to the contemporary challenges of giant monopsonies like Amazon. If abolition must be green, Gilmore insists, it must also be anti-capitalist and internationalist. Such an approach to abolition not only underscores how different parts of the world are, in Gilmore's words, partitioned and re-partitioned by capitalism -- but also the ways that dispossessed, criminalized, and vulnerable people across seemingly disparate contexts come to recognize their fundamental connections to each other.

Just as there are no two recipes that contain the exact same ingredients or measurements, there are no two success stories exactly the same. Recipe For Success features entrepreneurs, visionary leaders and innovators of all ages who will share their ingredients that make them successful – personally and professionally. Let's get cooking! During his 25-year career in the commercial real estate brokerage industry, Greg Martin has specialized in the leasing of office buildings in Broward and Palm Beach counties on behalf of institutional clients, public and private companies, and individual investors. Over the past four years, Greg and his team have represented over 3.5 million square feet of class A & B office product in the area. Before joining Avison Young, Greg served as Senior Vice-President with Flagler Real Estate Services for two years, and he spent a total of 16 years with Cushman & Wakefield and CBRE. With experience in building sales and tenant representation, Greg has a diverse background that includes marketing and promotions, enabling him to serve clients with a variety of requirements. Current and past clients include: TIAA-CREF, SunTrust Bank, Clarion Partners, TA Associates, Mainstreet Capital Partners, DRA Advisors, Banyan Street Capital, Raith Capital Partners, Vanderbilt Properties, Starwood, True North, LFC Development, PGIM, Stiles Corporation, and The Alter Group. During his career, Greg has earned several industry awards and recognition, including NAIOP Broker of the Year (2005 & 2013). In 2017, Greg served as the president of NAIOP's South Florida chapter and was honored with the National Chapter President of the Year award at their national meeting. Greg also served as chairman of the board for a local charity named Taylor's Closet, where he helped facilitate a recent move into a new facility. Most recently, Greg has been appointed to the City of Fort Lauderdale Parks & Recreation Advisory Board. Greg holds a Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration from Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, where he was also a four-year letterman on the varsity men's basketball team. For more information about Junior Achievement of South Florida, visit https://www.jasouthflorida.org. Follow us on social media: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jasouthflorida LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/junior-achievement-of-south-florida/ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jasouthflorida Twitter: https://twitter.com/JASouthFlorida

Ms. Miller is co-owner, President/Managing Partner, and Head of Portfolio Management of Hillcrest Finance LLC, a New York City based real estate credit platform. In this capacity, she has oversight of the day-to-day operations of the Firm, as well as portfolio management responsibilities for Hillcrest's investment vehicles. Ms. Miller has over 30 years of experience in the real estate industry. Prior to joining Hillcrest, Ms. Miller was Managing Director at Rockwood Capital where she was responsible for business development, product strategy, capital raising, and investor relations. Previously, Ms. Miller held positions with notable real estate investment management firms including Global Managing Director of Trammell Crow Company's Global Services Group, Managing Partner of Investment Strategy with Hart Advisers, Inc., Vice President of Portfolio Management at J.P. Morgan Investment Management, Inc., Vice President of Marketing and Client Services with O'Connor Capital Partners, and Vice President at TIAA-CREF. Ms. Miller received a Bachelor of Science degree in Architecture from the University of Virginia and a Master of Science degree in Real Estate Investment, Finance, and Development from New York University. She is a Counselor of Real Estate®, a member of the Urban Land Institute, the Pension Real Estate Association, and both of IREI Editorial Boards. In addition, Ms. Miller is a member of The University of Virginia's Foundation Board of Directors, The University of Virginia's Architecture School Foundation Board of Directors, and the Charter School Growth Fund's Structured Finance Committee.

About this episode:In this week’s episode, Hillary Allen interviews exercise physiologist Dr. Allen Lim. They discuss the inner workings of how you lose sodium during exercise, why dehydration is so different for every athlete, and how it affects their performance.Episode Highlights:Sodium loss is geneticSodium intake should drive thirstWhere is the water located in your body, and why it’s so important How to troubleshoot sodium loss problemsGuest Bio – Dr. Allen Lim:Dr. Allen Lim received his doctorate from the Applied Exercise Science Laboratory in the Department of Integrative Physiology at the University of Colorado. Allen worked on the Pro Cycling Tour as a sport scientist and coach for the Phonak, TIAA-CREF, Slipstream, Garmin, and Radio Shack professional cycling teams. More recently, Allen founded Skratch Labs, a boot-strapped sports nutrition company, that was ranked in 2014 as the 3rd fastest growing food and beverage company in the USA by Inc., 5000.Allen has co-written three cookbooks with Chef Biju Thomas – the Feed Zone Cookbook, the Feed Zone Portables, and the Feed Zone Table – all of which help to give people the basic skills and knowledge to prepare real food from scratch as part of a physically active lifestyle.Allen has served as a consultant for the Chinese Olympic Team at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, for the US Olympic Cycling Team at the 2012 and 2016 Olympic Games in London and Rio, and for organizations and individuals ranging from the Joe Gibbs Racing Team, Kansas City Royals, and President George W. Bush.A sought-after speaker, Allen has given two TEDx talks, guest lectures regularly at the University of Colorado at Boulder and has been a key note speaker for organizations like the American College of Sports Medicine, Training Peaks, Map My Fitness, Strava, The North Face, The Colorado Outdoor Industry Leadership Summit, Under Armour, and the Gold Lab Symposium.Read More About Dr. Allen Lim:https://www.skratchlabs.com/pages/about-ushttps://www.instagram.com/allenskratch/https://twitter.com/allenskratch

(1:35) - Start of interview(2:23) - Peggy's "origin story"(3:04) - Her experience at Notre Dame (BA and JD)(4:17) - Her progression from Wall St. law firm work to Mellon Bank, JP Morgan, Pfizer, Sara Lee and Prudential.(6:17) -  Dennis Weatherstone (former CEO of JP Morgan) as a catalyst of #corpgov at the bank in the mid-90s.(7:00) - Her move to Pfizer, drawn by Terry Gallagher and Bill Steer focus on #corpgov (pre SOX 2002)(7:50) - The focus on governance in late 1990s - Peter Clapman at TIAA CREF and other institutional investors.(9:31) - On that first meeting of Pfizer's board leaders with institutional investors in 2007 (Marty Lipton referred to it as "another example of corporate governance run amuck").(10:51) - On the role of a Chief Governance Officer.(12:31) - Her transition to serving on boards (previously with the MONY Ground, MONY Life Insurance Company and Occidental Petroleum Corporation. Currently with the Orion Group Holdings).(16:36) - On the history and focus of Prudential Financial. "It's a company with a purpose, 146 years old, with an incredible partnership and commitment to Newark, NJ."(19:18) - Her take on the purpose of the corporation and the new BRT statement (2019). "It's nothing new, it was the same at Pfizer, it's a balance."(23:45) - Her take on b-corps, benefit corporations and public benefit corporations. "We just don't have a robust law and precedent, yet"(25:05) - Managing the "tone from the top" at the board level. "The culture is ingrained at Prudential."(28:00) - Her take on ESG. "I think it's always been there." Now it's just gone mainstream. On the environmental side, people like Tim Smith (Boston Trust Walden) and institutions such as CERES have been active for decades on these topics.(29:23) - On board diversity. "It's really more important to have broader diversity than just gender." This has gone mainstream too.(33:13) - Her take on climate change and sustainability.(35:07) - Her take on board education. "It depends: you need a tool box. For some boards it could be writing a memo, for other boards it's inviting outside expertise, and for others it's one of their own who has a specific background." More boards are adding experts in sustainability.(39:52) - Her thoughts on blockchain technology in corporate governance.(40:44) - Her recommendation to directors on shareholder activism. "You have to be your own activists." Duty to ask for questions, alternatives and seek long term value. "You're not there for the pastries."(43:00) - Her favorite books:The Bible.To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee (1960).Winesberg, Ohio, by Sherwood Anderson (1919)(43:59) - Her mentors (starting out all family members, her father). Professionally:Dennis Weatherstone  (ex CEO JP Morgan)Bill Steer (ex CEO Pfizer), David Shedlarz (ex CFO Pfizer), Karen Katen  (ex Vice Chair Pfizer)Jane Pfeiffer (from her first board at MONY)(45:33) - Her favorite quote: "Speak the truth but leave quickly"(46:81) - Her "unusual habit": cleaning.(46:35) - The living person she most admires: she looks at people's character.Sarah Teslik (Partner, Joele Frank)Elise Walter (ex Chair of the SEC, and director of Occidental Petroleum Corporation)Peggy Foran is the Chief Governance Officer, SVP and Corporate Secretary of Prudential Financial. Peggy has been a corporate governance leader throughout her career at Sara Lee Corporation, Pfizer and JP Morgan. She also serves as a director of Orion Group Holdings, and previously served on the boards of Occidental Petroleum Corporation, The MONY Group, and MONY Life Insurance Company. She currently serves as an active member of many influential advisory boards including the Council of Institutional Investors, the American College of Governance Counsel, the American Bar Association, Catalyst, the Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance, NACD, the Center for Audit Quality (CAQ), the International Integrated Reporting Council, ICGN, and the Society for Corporate Governance.If you like this show, please consider subscribing, leaving a review or sharing this podcast on social media. __Follow Evan on:Twitter @evanepsteinSubstack https://evanepstein.substack.com/Music/Soundtrack (found via Free Music Archive): Seeing The Future by Dexter Britain is licensed under a Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License 

It goes without saying – nearly every sector globally has been affected by the Covid-19 pandemic. But for few sectors are those effects more evident than universities. From admissions to in-person classes to college sports, there’s hardly an element of the experience that hasn’t had to pivot quickly. So what about endowment investing? As universities face untold economic uncertainties and challenges, what impact has it had on the approach endowments take. Put differently, have the characteristics that make endowment investing different – from time horizons to information access and beyond – been helpful in navigating these new challenges? Daniel Feder is one to ask. Dan is a Managing Director with the University of Michigan Investment Office and leads the endowment’s investments in private equity and venture capital. Prior to joining Michigan, Dan was the Managing Director of Private Markets at the Washington University Investment Management Company. Previously, among other roles, Feder served asManaging Director of Private Markets for the Sequoia Capital Heritage Fund, Senior Investment Manager in the endowment services area at TIAA-CREF, and Managing Director at Princeton University Investment Company, the investment office for Princeton University’s endowment.

Teachers have been getting taken advantage of when it comes to their investment options. Thankfully, the internet and technology have made it easier to get the word out and help teachers wanting to do better. During his first year of teaching, Dan Otter was asked if he cared about his financial future. He politely listened to a hardball sales pitch about an investment scheme he didn't fully understand. Rather than blindly following other teachers at his school who had invested in it, Dan began to educate himself by learning about John Bogle, Vanguard, and low-cost investing. He learned the salesperson who had approached him was trying to sell him a high-cost annuity inside a 403b and that it was a terrible product. Unfortunately, most of his colleagues had signed up for these poor investment products despite having more than 100 options available to them, including Vanguard. Dan began to speak up and asked pointed questions when other teachers began to talk about their sales agent in the teacher's lounge. Though he had never done it before, he started looking at their statements and showing them how much the fees were. Appreciating Dan‘s insight and help, it was suggested that he put on workshops. After thinking about it, he bought the domain 403bWise, and with help from a friend, they built and launched the website in March 2000. The mission of the website was education and advocacy, where teachers and school employees could come and learn about the 403b in a non-sales environment and also advocate for low-cost options like Vanguard. Although this was 20 years ago, Dan says the problem with 403b persists today. Teachers usually find 403bWise after they have been sold one of these expensive products. Dan says that not all 403b's are created equal. After working in different environments where 403b's are available. They were largely terrible in the public school systems with many vendors. Private schools generally have just one vendor, as do universities, like Fidelity, TIAA-CREF, or Vanguard. 403b's fall outside of federal oversight, specifically Arista regulation, so the employer does not have the same kind of fiduciary duty. Just being on the list signifies tacit endorsement, however, the vendors are not vetted by the school districts. Just because you aren't paying money out of pocket, doesn't mean there are no fees. Vendors make the fees hard to find. Teachers all over the country can get fee information on the website, 403bcompare.com. Dan says to look for costs in two places; mortality and expense, and then look at the mutual funds that are part of the annuity. If you find out that you are in a bad product, you may also have to pay 7% of your balance just to get out of it. Using the hypothetical example of a relatively new teacher earning $50,000 per year who expects to retire after 30 years, the difference between investing in one of these terrible annuity products versus one found after learning more from 403bWise can be $200,000. Over 35 years, a teacher contributing $250 a month earning 6% will earn $185,391 when investing with one of the lunchroom sales agents, while the teacher investing the same $250 a month earning 6% interest with a low-cost company will have $343,000 at the end of 35 years. Dan was able to visit the Vanguard campus as a guest of their 403b unit and says they are very focused on this market and getting on vendor lists. A good fee for a 403b is 0.5, or 50 basis points, or less. Companies like Fidelity, Vanguard, and Aspire Financial Services are good. In California, CalSTERS, the state pension agency, created their own 403b after and is on most vendor lists. Do not confuse Fidelity with American Fidelity Assurance, which is a high-cost company. A 457 may be an even better plan than the 403b. Reputable 457 plan companies include TIAA-CREF, T. Rowe Price, and Vanguard. The National Tax Deferred Savings Association is a well-funded lobby with an interest in maintaining a high cost, multi-vendor 403b environment. Montgomery Country schools in Maryland is one of the few school districts to put their 403b plan out for bid. They reduced the number of vendors down to just one, Fidelity, and plan participation and contribution have increased. Dan would like to see every district do what Montgomery County did, but it needs to start with the teachers from the ground up. The 403Wise website has three main sections, education, advocacy, and community. Under the Quick Start Guide, the tool, Find a Good Vendor, on the home page allows teachers to search within their own school district. 403b compliance is often outsourced to third-party administrators who bring in vendors who yield them revenue. Even one of the big national unions, the NEA, has an endorsement deal with a financial company called Security Benefit, which offers a product called the NEA Value Builder with load fees of 5%. After being sued, they offer a fantastic and unadvertised product called NEA Direct Investment. Anyone who would like to try and make a difference in their school district should reach out to 403bWise because they are building a network of advocates. In addition to joining the Facebook group, reviewing the website, and learning about the 403b vendors available to you, check to see if a 457b plan is also available. A 457b works similarly to a 403b but has a few more amazing benefits. If you separate from service, you can access the money in a 457b tax and penalty-free. Also, when just three years before retirement age, you may double contributions. And finally, 457b's requires more fiduciary oversight. Resources Mentioned In Today's Conversation ChooseFI Episode 220 Fix My 403b with Nancy Bachety Fix My 403b 403bcompare.com If You Want To Support ChooseFI: Earn $1,000 in cashback with ChooseFI's 3-card credit card strategy.  Share FI by sending a friend ChooseFI: Your Blueprint to Financial Independence.

Dentists, like other professionals, should develop a solid financial plan to build wealth and prepare for retirement. Planning for financial independence while building their dental practice is an issue that concerns dentists at all stages of their career, whether they’re just starting out, growing to multiple locations, or preparing to sell their practice in preparation for retirement. Developing a financial plan with the guidance of a team of professional advisors helps them meet their unique current and future goals and will continue to evolve throughout the various life stages.  In this episode of The Art of Dental Finance and Management podcast, Art meets with Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP and Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS of Eide Bailly Financial Services about the financial planning process for dentists. Ryan and Zachary emphasize why financial plans are so important, major pitfalls to avoid (typically not having any financial plan), as well as what steps dentists can take to ensure success. They also discuss some of the essential elements of a solid financial plan: Budgeting Debt reduction Student loans Retirement savings Insurance coverage Children’s education Estate planning Reach out to Art if you have any questions regarding dental finance and management for your dental practice. More information about the Eide Bailly dental team can be found at www.eidebailly.com/dentist.   [CALL OUT BOX – We Can Help Button] Let us help you build a solid financial.   [cta: www.eidebailly.com/financialfuture]     The Transcript   Art Wiederman, CPA And hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Art of Dental Finance and Management with Art Wiederman, CPA. I am your host, Art Wiederman. It's a pleasure for me to be joining you today and sharing some information. I am a dental division director at the CPA firm of Eide Bailly. Our CPA firm represents about 800 dentists and today's topic is, goes to the core of what this podcast series is about. It's called The Art of Dental Finance and Management.   And today we're going to be talking about a financial plan. I've done podcasts on the 10 Biggest Financial Mistakes Dentists Make, and I've talked about retirement planning. But today I have two really great experts from our firm, Ryan Weigel and Zach Schnitzler. And Zach and Ryan are going to go ahead and talk about financial planning. They're part of our financial planning group.   We're going to talk about why do you need a financial plan? What is a financial plan and what are the biggest mistakes we see dentists making. Because they're working with dentists and other professionals all over the place and they have a really neat retirement planning module. And I'm going to talk about insurance. So we're going to get to that in a couple of minutes.   I do have some information for you that I want to share with you first about our partners. And then about something that happened yesterday that came out from Treasury. We're recording today, which is November the 19th, which is Thursday. So I'll talk about that in a second. A couple of rulings and procedures that came out from IRS that is, unfortunately, folks not going to make anybody happy. But we'll talk about that in a second.   I would really like for you guys to take a look at our partner, Decisions in Dentistry www.DecisionsinDentistry.com. Great, great, great clinical content, continuing education courses. They have been a wonderful partner of ours in working with us on the podcast and sharing great information for dentists on clinical dentistry.   Also our Academy of Dental CPAs, which is www.ADCPA.org. 24 CPA firms across the U.S. that represent over 10,000 dentists. We are, at Eide Bailly, one of the members of that group. And I've got some great information for you, too.   We are putting together here in Southern California a one year long series on the business side of dentistry, six local dental societies in Southern California, and I have no problem mentioning them by name - the Harvard Dental Society, the Orange County Dental Society, both the Los Angeles and the West Los Angeles Dental Societies, the San Gabriel Valley Dental Society and the San Fernando Valley Dental Society. I am putting together, through Eide Bailly, a wonderful, wonderful year-long series which is going to begin, put on your calendar, because I'm inviting all of my podcast guests, because the great thing about doing stuff virtually is anybody can join. You don't have to get on an airplane or book a hotel room and these are free. These are not going to cost anything and the information is going to be fantastic.   So the first one is going to be on December the 9th, which will be from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. and it's going to be on year-end tax planning and the research and development income tax credit for dentists. So if you would like to register, the page is either up or will be up very shortly. You can register for the webinar and if you register, they'll send you the link. You go to www.EideBailly.com/dentalseries.   And in fact, as part of this dental series, one of the series, which is going to be every month in 2021, we're going to start with December and then it'll start in January and February. And every month after that. One of the series is going to be these two gentlemen that you're going to hear today is going to talk about in much more depth than we can do on a podcast. We're going to be talking about financial planning and we're actually going to do a case study or two on the webinar with the software, which is really, really cool. So www.EideBailly.com/dentalseries.   And also if you're interested in the R&D tax credit www.eidebailly.com/dentalrd. Put in your information and our team will give you a call. So I want to talk before I get to Zach and Ryan. I want to talk about what came out yesterday and what came out yesterday. We knew it was coming. And in fact, our previous podcast with Mel Schwarz. Mel emailed me two days after we recorded and he said, Art do we need to rerecord because this is coming down the pike.   So I've been talking to you guys about the PPP loans and whether the expenses that you pay are deductible. Remember, your PPP loan is not taxable when you have it forgiven. So back in April, I think it was actually April, late April, early May, Treasury came out with Notice 2020-32 that said the expenses are not deductible, but they didn't give us any details. So I have taken the position on this podcast that if you have a forgivable loan, that and it's not forgiven by the end of the year and you're a cash basis taxpayer. I've been a CPA for a long time. 36 years. And the law says if you don't have a forgivable event, then those expenses are deductible.   Until yesterday. Revenue 2020-27 came up with two situations. Number one, it basically said that if you apply for forgiveness in 2020 but no decision has been made on your forgiveness. But you meet all the rules, you check all the boxes that you're going to get full forgiveness. Or you wait until 2021 and you meet all the rules. They basically say, and these are the words in the ruling that if you have a quote, reasonable expectation of reimbursement and I will read from the ruling, quote, if it's reasonably expected to occur rather than being unforeseeable, such a deduction is inappropriate.   Bottom line is, folks, if you meet all the rules and you're going to get forgiveness, then your expenses are not deductible for 2020. So if you got 100,000 dollar PPP loan, you better add 100,000 dollars to your taxable income for 2020, which is going to bring a lot of my doctors to not only where they were in 2019, but even higher. Very, very important doctors that you go to your CPA between the next six weeks, between now and the end of the year and figure out where you're at.   There is a revenue procedure, 2020-51, which is a safe harbor, which basically says that if you reasonably expect forgiveness and you're submitting for forgiveness, but all or partial forgiveness is denied. In other words, you don't get forgiveness, or if for some reason you choose not to file for forgiveness. I don't know any dentist in America that is not going to file for forgiveness. But if you just say I don't meet the rules, I fired everybody. I didn't bring them back, then no problem. Then you can deduct the expenses in the year that you are denied forgiveness. It doesn't tell me if you have no intention of submitting for forgiveness at all in 2020 can I deduct the expenses, it doesn't address that.   I did have a long conversation with Megan Mortimer yesterday from the ADA. I will tell you that the ADA, along with the American Restaurant Association, the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, the AMA organizations that represent dogs and giraffes and puppies and everything, they're all going to Congress and they're all basically pushing real hard. And folks, without getting into details at the moment, it's all political.   We may not see anything about this until January, February. So you may be looking at extending your tax returns to see what the government's going to do. We think they're going to make a law that says these expenses are deductible. It would hurt small businesses if they didn't. But we'll see what happens.   Alright. Well with that joyful news, folks? Let's get to our program today. My good friends, Ryan Weigel and Zachary Schnitzler from Eide Bailly are going to join us here in a second. Let me tell you a little bit about them. Ryan is a financial adviser. He is located in Aberdeen, South Dakota. He works with his clients on financial planning, including cash flow analysis, education, planning, insurance and risk analysis, retirement planning and asset allocation. And that's Ryan.   And Zach is in Fargo, North Dakota. Go North Dakota State Bison, by the way, I told him that earlier. Zach's an insurance specialist involved in insurance planning, employee retention solutions, planning for purchase and sales of businesses, succession and estate planning. So, Zach and Ryan, welcome to the Art of Dental Finance and Management.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Thanks Art. It's our pleasure to be here.   Art Wiederman, CPA Hey, nice to talk to you guys. Appreciate you taking the time today. So you guys are avid golfers, I hear. So I won't talk about the fact that I went out and played yesterday here in Orange County, because right now you're just playing like ice golf or indoor golf. How's that work?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP I'll let Zach go on that he's a he's a better golfer than I am.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS It kind of depends on the day. But up here in Fargo, we definitely started our indoor simulator league, and it's not even Thanksgiving time yet. So it's too bad.   Art Wiederman, CPA We'd love to have to get you out here to play some golf anyway. So. Hey, guys, why don't you. Again, we're talking today about financial planning, folks. We you know, I went through all the Certified Financial Planner courses, you know, a long time ago. And it takes, you know, a couple of years to do that. So in an hour podcast, we're not going to be able to go through every single detail. What my objective today is to make a call to action.   If you haven't done a financial plan, if you haven't figure out where you're going, we want you to take action after what we talk about today. You know, there's seven areas of financial planning. There's cash flow management, there's taxes, there's insurance, investments, retirement planning, estate planning and college planning. We're going to touch on them today. But we want you to take action. Basically sit down and figure out where you're at so that, you know, if you don't have a road map and you don't know where you're going, it's kind of hard to get there. So with that said, let's start. Ryan, tell us a little bit about your journey.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Yeah, so I'm a CPA, much like you are, and I'm also a CFP, as you alluded to. So my journey started with Eide Bailly, I think 12 years ago. I started on the tax side. I did tax work tax compliance work, and that led into a lot of planning. Just as you alluded to earlier. The dentists better be, the doctors you're working with, meet with their CPAs here between now and the end of the year, because there's a lot of the year-end planning needs to get done.   That brought on a lot of things that I enjoy doing, which was financial planning instead of just tax compliance planning. It was now financial planning, which also alluded to investments and insurance and so on. And so my career path changed about halfway through my tenure with Eide Bailly and it moved over to our financial services division. So my main role is financial planning for clients. And again, like I said, it involves a lot of pieces, investments, tax insurance and so on and so forth.   Art Wiederman, CPA OK, and Zach, other than you going to PGA school or whatever it is, what are you doing? What's your story?   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Yeah. So as you mentioned, I'm an insurance specialist specifically in the financial planning realm. So we're talking life insurance, disability insurance, long term care insurance type work. I've been in it my whole career almost ten years. Everybody grows up wanting to be an insurance person. I know that. But no, I have some great mentors right away to jump into the business. And before Eide Bailly, I was primarily a consultant with financial advisors as the insurance side is a very unique animal in itself and it requires specialized attention. So happy to be at Eide Bailly. And it's a great place to help our clients on a consultative type approach versus a sales type approach.   Art Wiederman, CPA Yeah, we don't sell. I've never sold. I mean, I'm a registered investment advisor. But guys, if I recommend a stock or a mutual fund, you should probably short it. That's kind of the way I feel about the whole thing. So, hey, Zach, we have to do the required reading of the disclosure. So why don't you get that out of the way and then we'll get another topic.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS We do. It'll be as fast as possible, I promise. Here we go. Financial Advisors offer Investment Advisor Services for Eide Bailly Advisors, LLC, a registered investment advisor, securities for Three United Planners Financial Services member of FINRA SIPC. Eide Bailly Financial Services LLC is the holding company for Eide Bailly Advisors LLC and Eide Bailly agents. Wholly owned and operated under Eide Bailly LLP, insurance products are offered or issued under Eide Bailly Agency, LLC. Eide Bailly Advisors LLC employees can also be licensed as insurance agents producers of Eide Bailly Agency, LLC. Eide Bailly Financial Services and its subsidiaries are not affiliated with United Planners. Not all products and services are available in all states. The views expressed are those of the author of the date noted are subject to change based on market and other various conditions are not a solicitation to purchase or sell any security and may not reflect the views of United Planners Financial Services. Keep in mind that current and historical facts may not be indicative of future results. Third party material is meant to provide general information and is not to be construed as specific investment tax or legal advice. Individual needs vary and require consideration of your unique objectives and financial situation.   Art Wiederman, CPA Okay, promise me you're not going to do that again.    Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Promise. We're done with that.   Art Wiederman, CPA So which stocks should I buy? Nah, I'm just kidding. Let's just blow up everything we just did.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Yeah. Right.   Art Wiederman, CPA So there you go. Okay, so let's start out with the basic question. Why does a dentist need a financial plan?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Well, you alluded to this earlier, Art. A roadmap, right? So I always try to tell clients is as we sit down with you and we try and gather your information, you've got many roads to go and we're trying to determine which road makes the most sense. And just because it makes sense today doesn't mean in two years it's going to still mean the same road. But what it does is it allows us to have a form of a road map to help answer a lot of questions. And those questions are, again, tax, investment, insurance, business succession, estate. So the whole goal is, hey, I've got this plan in place to answer questions. And it's not a product specific thing. It is a service specific.   Art Wiederman, CPA Right, so what we want to do is, is, you know, again, my experience in this, guys, is that, you know, the people that do this right they're looking at what the goals and the objectives are. And at some point down the road, everybody's got to get compensated for what they do. And at some point down the road, a product usually is involved, whether it's an investment product or an insurance product or something. But that's not where we start, right? That's not even close to it.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP No. You start with the financial plan first and foremost, and that's going to give you. The numbers don't lie in a plan is what I usually tell my clients. Because if it says you need life insurance, you probably need life insurance. I don't care who you talk to about that. There's probably a need of life insurance. Right. But the plan gives you the numbers and the numbers don't lie. And you kind of work through that scenario.   You know, the one thing I'll just say real quick, Art, is there's really four main steps that I use. I think most individuals that use this, but the first step to plan is we sit down and you listen. OK, what are the goals and circumstances? What is your profession? OK, you're a dentist. OK, what's the goal? How long do you want to work? Right. Then we kind of gather a lot of information from you. We might analyze that data and put together some creative plan. But as soon as tomorrow hits, my creative plan is done because your checking account just changed or PPP loan that you just talked about is now no longer a deductible expense. And that just changed the financial plan because now I have to pay more taxes. Right.   So there's this constant circle of what happens where we're constantly looking at everything. And that's why I always tell clients, hey, we're not doing a financial plan because the financial plan is the date stamp we're done. We're doing financial planning. Financial planning is this thorough thing that keeps going and it's constantly evolving. Right?   Art Wiederman, CPA So when you meet with your clients, you do the initial plan and I want you to get a little more into exactly what you're doing. How often should a dentist meet with his or her financial planner after we do the initial plan?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP So the initial plan is going to be, you're probably meeting six times from start to finish over a series of, it could probably be anywhere from, you could probably get it done as quick is four to six weeks or four to six months depending on how busy you are, how busy the planner is. But then going forward, there is no rhyme or reason, it's as needed.  I would say at a minimum, twice a year. I want to look in the spring how are my investments doing, how was my plan, what are my goals that have changed? And I better be looking at the end of the year too. You know, what are my tax implications? What do I need to do? Is there some retirement plan changes I need to make, have I updated my will, have I looked at my insurance lately? So at a minimum twice a year. But it could be 12 times. I mean, depending on each client, there's no specific rhyme or reason to it.   Art Wiederman, CPA Now you guys said there's four steps. How many of, you talked about the listening part. That's the first step, right?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Yeah. Yep.   Art Wiederman, CPA Where do we go from there?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Yes. Cause we're in the gather step. And in the gather is where we really sit down and we're trying to do not only the hard skills, the hard numbers, but the soft skills. So what is your actual net worth, their balance sheet look like. Then we're going to gather information. What insurance do you have? What investments you have? But that is a lot of the soft stuff. What is your goal? Is your spouse working? Does she have the ability to work? What do you want to do? Do you want to climb Mt. Everest in five years? Because that might change the impact or do you want to sell your practice for a ton of money at age 40. Or do you want to be a dentist, not care. Right.   So you got to gather the soft skills as well. Then we got to sit down. The third step is we need to analyze the data. We got to figure out what do you have. Right. And then our job from there is to create this because the fourth step would be to create this plan and create this fluid plan that keeps evolving. And then so right after we get done with the fourth step, which is great, you go right back into listening again.   Art Wiederman, CPA Yeah, and we see I want to talk about the mistakes, because we want to make people make sure that they don't get mistakes, they don't make mistakes. So what are the biggest mistakes you see working with your dental clients on financial planning?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP The first one is that and then take this with a grain of salt for anyone who's listening, but they don't have a plan, right? That's the biggest one. And it's not that they don't want to Art. It's typically because they're busy running their practice. Right. There's only so much time in the day. They might have kids and might have employees and they got practice and everything's going on and on. And so this thing just gets kicked to the side, which is a reasonable thing to think about. But at the same time, it's so important that you have to do it. So that's absolutely first and foremost, the biggest issue I see is that we don't have one. They bought some insurance because they were told it was a good idea, but they don't know if it's a good idea because they don't have the time.   Art Wiederman, CPA So let's talk about insurance for a minute, because this is, we're just going to go all over the place here with this. Then we'll hit everything. You know, I have some opinions about insurance, but we have life insurance and we have disability insurance and long-term care. Really, those are those are the main food groups. Let's talk about life insurance.   So when you guys look at a client, how do you determine, let's just briefly get into how much do they need and what type of insurance do you recommend?   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Well, let's kind of start at step one. I mean, what we are finding is in this industry, many folks are severely underinsured. And you know, that might even be with hypothetically one million dollars of death benefit, for example. It sure seems like a big number. You know, we use the word million in it. But when you calculate, let's say, income replacement for a 35 year old dentist. You know, how many years of income does that, we'll call it, you know, that person and that machine have for the rest of their career if something were to happen? And I'm not saying like a 35 year old needs to insure 30 years of income by any means. But all of a sudden, you know, using that example of, say, a million dollars doesn't go very far.   Art Wiederman, CPA No.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS So that's piece number one is it does seem like the majority of people, dentists included, are many times vastly under insured and don't understand, you know, how many years of income they should maybe be thinking about replacing if the worst case scenario happened.   Art Wiederman, CPA And a lot of this Zach is that really depends on, you know, if I have a husband and wife and one of them is the dentist and the other one is not working, I'm going to need a lot more than if both of my doctors, both of my husband and wife, both of the people who are husband and wife, sorry about that, are both earning two or three or 400,000 dollars a year.   You know, I have an interesting thing that I want to get your take on this is, in my mind and I'm overly simplifying it. I like for a dentist, I need enough life insurance, because remember, isn't life we get life insurance is to two purposes. Number one is income replacement. And number two is estate needs, which at the moment, unless you get an estate of about 24 million dollars, husband and wife, if you do your planning right, is not an issue. Right?   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Right.   Art Wiederman, CPA OK, so basically, I'm looking for enough money to pay off the mortgage, put a fund away for the kids for college, and then to have enough of a pot of money to keep potentially a non-working survivor's spouse able to live reasonably.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Right.   Art Wiederman, CPA Does that seem reasonable to you?   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Oh, absolutely. And the big thing is Art. I'll ask you a question. I mean, if somebody, dentists or anybody else hypothetically say, passes away and their income was 300,000, could a non-working spouse go find a new job that pays 300,000 dollars a year?   Art Wiederman, CPA Highly unlikely.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Very highly unlikely.   Art Wiederman, CPA Unless they are also a dentist or another type of profession. Yeah.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Hey there's something I want to hit on that really quick, guys. One of the things I see is let's just go back to your same example. We've got a dentist practitioner and a non-working spouse. I always see this. The dentist practitioner has insurance, the spouse has none. And I ask well why? Because they don't make any money. But then I'll ask them this. Well, what is the non-working spouse do? Well, they take the kids to school and they make sure the house is taken care of. And they do all these things so that I can maintain my business and I can be the breadwinner. Right.   There's actually a need over there because if the non-working spouse parishes, if something happens to them, you either got to hire a nanny or you can't be as productive in your business, right? So you don't have to go and get oodles of money and millions of dollars. That's not the point. But there is actually a need for both people. And you see that quite a bit, actually.   Art Wiederman, CPA And obviously, buying life insurance is cheaper when you're younger than if you're older.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Very much so. It's crazy how it follows almost the perfect exponential curve.    Art Wiederman, CPA So the bottom line is we need enough money to cover a surviving spouse and the family if they if, God forbid, the dentist passes away. And then again, because we could spend hours on this. Are you term insurance? You have permanent insurance, maybe a little comment on what people should be looking at just in a high overview.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Yeah. So first and foremost, you know, the younger dentists term insurance is super simple, very inexpensive. You can get high limits for low premium. I definitely recommend that all have at least some of that. Permanent insurance, it's a podcast of its own I think. It offers lots of different advantages, like potential for tax free income. But it is absolutely not for everybody. And that is a case by case basis. So permanent insurance will have some cash value that comes with it, although a much higher premium.   One thing Art I do want to quickly mention is we're talking about having enough. What is enough? Right, how many? What's the multiplier of income some are there are some agents out there that I know that are literally trying to get as much as possible from the insurance company. Myself, I am in the ballpark of close to seven times income plus debt.   Art Wiederman, CPA Yeah, that's about right. I was going to say, you know, seven to ten, but yeah. So for example, doctors, you know, if you're making 300,000 dollars a year, that's 2.1 million dollars. Is that enough to pay off your mortgage, put the kids through college and have a pot of money available for your surviving spouse so that he or she does not have to work and can be focusing on the family? I don't know. You got to run the numbers, right guys?   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS There's no question it's a case by case basis. The good news is I hate to say that there's good news during the COVID-19 pandemic because nothing seems like good news. Right. A lot of a lot of doctors and dentists are scared almost of applying for these limits because it comes with a very, very challenging underwriting experience. Might have to give blood. Your might have to order medical records. Well, due to the pandemic, companies have increased what's called accelerated underwriting, where people can get up to five million dollars of life insurance immediately with an online health portal. So it doesn't, you know, somebody you don't know doesn't necessarily have to come to your house and put a needle in your arm to see if you can get these high limits.   Art Wiederman, CPA OK, and I talking about disability insurance, what I tell people is as much as you can qualify for, you have comments on disability.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Yeah, no question. I agree with you there. And it's usually close to 60 percent of income is about what these insurance companies will offer. However, in most cases, disability and insurance would pay out tax free. So we don't necessarily need a super high, you know, close to 100 percent by any means.   Art Wiederman, CPA What do you think about long term care insurance?   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Well, for the, maybe the dentist on the second half of their career, it's a major issue in our world today of the cost of long-term care, whether it be nursing home, assisted living etc. You know, now we're talking after work life, right? We're planning for after it.   It's something that needs to be looked into. I mean, when I'm saying that it's a problem, it's costing just to get care upwards of 10,000 dollars or more per month. And it's going back to why we're doing this today, financial planning or planning for all aspects of life, short term and long term. It's all about asset protection. We're not necessarily, you know, don't need to talk to clients about, well, you want to go to a nursing home or do you want to do this? It's about protecting your assets. A six year stay at over 120,000 dollars in 2020 money, you know, not even counting inflation. It'd be 700,000 plus. And that's an issue.   Art Wiederman, CPA And how about this guys, not only for the doctor, but what about the doctor who's mother or father or both have not done a good job of saving and they need to go into a nursing home and you, the doctor, are the only child who has assets. Who's going to be paying for that? Do you see that happen?   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Correct. Oh, absolutely. There's no doubt. One other thing to mention. Art you're a CPA. Ryan, you are as well. Long term care, buying long term care insurance can come with some fairly unique tax advantages as well.   Art Wiederman, CPA We're not going to get into that today because that will be a 12 hour podcast.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Like I said. Yeah, that's time for another podcast. These topics could all have their own at some point.   Art Wiederman, CPA Absolutely. So talk about student loan debt. And that is a big deal. In the United States, the average student loan debt is and again, this is all over the country, is somewhere between 250 and 300,000 dollars is what it costs to go to the average United States dental school. In California, we have, I tell this story occasionally at my lectures, and I probably told it on the on the podcast, is that I had two doctors come up to me. I was speaking at the University of Southern California Dental School, oh, gosh, about five years ago. And these two young men come up to me and say, Mr. Art Wiederman, thank you so much for your lecture. We both did four years of dental school here at USC, plus a general practice residency. We are 550,000 dollars each in debt. What do you suggest?   And my answer to them was, guys, if you go walk around the corner to Hoover Street, there's a 7-Eleven, they sell lottery tickets. Other than that, I got nothing for you. How do you approach student loan debt?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Well, that's one way of spin that.   Art Wiederman, CPA It works really well, I mean, yeah, it's not very good, but it is a way to do it.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP So earlier when I discussed the gather meeting, which is our our second meeting with clients and their soft skills. This is some of the stuff that comes up. It's hey you're going to have to live like a college student for a few more years. I know you're making a bunch of money and I know it's great you want to you want to move on from that. You don't have the luxury to do that, unfortunately, because if we don't take care of the student loan debt soon, we don't have a game plan in place or plan in place for this stuff just keeps going. And the downfall is it's not like it's cheap interest.   The average loan, I think it's still like seven and a quarter. So you think about oh I can go get a house or a car right now in today's environment, two, three, three and a half percent. No, you're still at seven or seven and a quarter is the average and sometimes higher than that. So the only way to take care of student loan debt is to pay for it. That's first and foremost. The only way to pay for it is to have some detailed plan. And the easiest thing I've found for new grads for sure, is you have to just live like you're still in school. We just have to take care of it.   And, you know, we use a software, we've branded Eide Bailly Wealth One the meat and potatoes behind it is eMoney is the software we use. We can show what that means inside of a plan. And so once you can start to pictorially show that it kind of helps them understand. Yeah, I got to get this taken care of because if I don't get this taken care of that, then I can't get my retirement plan started. And if I can't get my retirement plan started, then I got to make a decision down the road of whether I need to buy long term care insurance or if I self-funded because I saved enough money along the way. Right. So it just keeps it rolling.   Art Wiederman, CPA Yeah. So this is why it's a, this financial planning thing is not a one time deal. It's on going because you're going to start your life out in your 20s. Doctors, most dental students, most folks graduate dental school somewhere between the ages of 25 and 30, give or take. You start later, you do it later. And at that point you might be single living with three guys or three ladies in an apartment somewhere and starting your life off as a dentist. And then the next thing you know, you get married, the next thing you know you have kids and next thing you know, you buy a house and you buy a practice. I have, I sell dental practices, guys. I have two 30 old dentists about four years ago, I sold the practice to. They had 800,000 dollars of student loan debt. They bought a practice from me for about one million, 250 thousand dollars. So they were two million dollars in debt at the age of 30 and they didn't even own a home, in Southern California.   Now, that's scary. So, again, in different parts of the country, it's going to be different. A home in Iowa is going to be different than a home in Southern California and the same thing with a practice. Let's get into, let's talk a little bit about estate planning, because, I mean, my experience, guys, is that you're looking at 60 percent of the people that I deal with do not have wills or trusts. I don't know what the, maybe your numbers are similar, but just some basics about why it's important and what people should be thinking about.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP The numbers that you mentioned, 60 percent is spot on, I mean, 60 percent of the people don't. And it goes back to the thing I said earlier is that you get busy in your practice. It's just another one of those things that you're going to get to someday. The simplest thing to start with, just get a wil. Go to a respected attorney, ask your older peers if you're a multi doc practice who they use, go get some wills established, that's just first and foremost.   But then as you're a more seasoned practitioner and you're getting more towards a later time in life, you've got to start doing estate planning. Estate planning, you mentioned earlier Art, unless you have 22 million dollars, you don't have an estate tax issue. But it doesn't mean that you can't do estate planning and estate planning is simply sitting down and trying to understand how do I want to divide everything up upon my demise. Right. And how do I want it to escape probate? How do I want it to go efficiently and certain pieces like that. So. Depends on the life cycle you're in. First and foremost, but a will has to be done. You just got to get it done. And then probably the next thing is, once we get a little bit further on it, what is my estate plan regardless of my asset size? Zach, anything you would add to that?    Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Yeah, for sure. Well, I think a lot of people do think about estate planning is it's you know, a tax mitigation thing. And it's not at all. There is an estate tax. And about a year or so ago, we had a campaign called Estate Planning for the other 99 percent. Right. But it needs to happen. There are things that people need to do. And it comes down to if it's not on paper, it's not a plan. My, I work for, like you said Art, in my bio, on succession planning and whatnot and estate planning. I think we did a we did a study and said about 70 percent of people said they had an estate plan or a transition plan. And then what was funny is the next piece was 50 percent said it was in their mind, OK, if they have a plan here. But ultimately, it's not a plan if it's not on paper.   Art Wiederman, CPA Yeah, that's like that's like my 330 yard drive similar to Dustin Johnson. That's in my mind. I just can't get it to my driver. That's my problem.    Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS There's no, it's a great analogy for sure. And as the only thing I can mirror as Ryan said is business owners and in this case dentists who own their practice, they're very good obviously at what they do. However, you know, they need help with things that like this that they aren't thinking about every day.   Art Wiederman, CPA So I'm going to take a break here, guys, and just share with everybody you. Yeah. Like I say, what I'm hoping this is going to do, ladies and gentlemen, is to be a call to arms to get some planning done. If you're working with an Academy of Dental CPAs member, if you're a client of them, you're in very good hands. They can handle that for you. If you're not, if you're not working with someone, if you haven't done any planning at all, I'm going have these guys give their contact information out and it'll also be in the show notes.   But what I want you to do is whether it's with your CPA, your financial planner, if you've got a great financial planner that you're working with, that's great. Let them do the plan. Call them up, call them up as soon as you hear this podcast and say, hey, Joe, hey, Susie, whatever their name is. You know, I've been thinking about it and I really want to get a plan on paper. And can you do that for me? And if you need some help, these guys can help you. So guys, give out your contact information if somebody wants to give you a call or email you.   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Yeah, my direct number once again, my name is Zachary Schnitzler, direct number is 701.239.8567. And if you remember, Art talking about my last name, it's a doozy. So I think we'll just say check the show notes for my email. It is ZSchnitzler@EideBailly.com. It's a tough one to spell. I'd say if it were a batting average, it'd be somewhere around each year I was batting average in the three hundreds of people who get it right.    Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Yeah, mine. You can contact my office at 605.225.8783. My email is rweigel@EideBailly.com.   Art Wiederman, CPA Well I appreciate it. And guys again, folks, I don't care who you do your financial planning with. If you got somebody good, like I say, go to them, call them. This is what I want you to do. My podcast is about a call to action to all of you to make your lives better and make your family's lives better. It's really important. If you don't have somebody you're working with or somebody you trust, you know, these guys definitely can help you, though, they're at the top of the class.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Hey, Art, I just want to say one thing real quick. If there's two things you take from this, if you don't have life insurance, I don't care who you go to, just go get some life insurance number one. Number two go get a will taken care of and then loop back. Right. Because if you die and you don't have those things, good luck. So let's take care of those. And then if you need to go do the financial plan. I would suggest doing a financial plan first and foremost. But hey, if you want to call the action, those are two things that can really help people quickly.   Art Wiederman, CPA Alright, well, I want to jump in to two or three more things that we'll have time for. Retirement plans. I mean, we've talked about SEPs and Simple IRAs and Profit-Sharing plans, Defined Benefit Plans. I mean, we don't have time to get into all of that here. But I want to go over. This is interesting. We were talking about this before we went on live here, is how much money do you need to save by the age of 65 to save one million dollars? So guys, you kind of jotted that out. So if you start at different ages, walk through starting at 25, and then 35, how much do you need to save on an annual basis say starting at 25.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP So if you're, so again, to get to the illusion of a million dollars. Right. This is assuming a 10 percent rate of return. If you're 25 years old.   Art Wiederman, CPA 10 percent?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Yeah. 10 percent return. So if you think of historical equities, 10 percent. If you want to go into 60 40 it's going to be much less than that. But this is a chart that we've used.  A 25 year old, 2000 dollars a year. That's it. 2000 bucks a year for 40 years. A 35 year old is 6000 dollars a year. 300 percent of the original balance. A 45 year old, you got to jump up to 16,000 dollars a year. 55 year old, you need 60,000 dollars a year. And then lastly, obviously, if you're 65, you'll need a million bucks that one year.   Art Wiederman, CPA And would it be right if someone wanted to be more conservative and say I'm only going to earn five percent those numbers are double, right?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Absolutely. Yeah. And just so you're aware, I wouldn't go out recommending that, hey, you should have a financial plan assuming 10 percent, because good luck, especially later on in life now. And when we do talk about hurdle rates and we do financial plans for people, what is my hurdle rate that I need to get at prior to retirement? What's my hurdle rate in the future? A lot of times we're using six to seven pre-retirement and four to five post-retirement. So these numbers I. Double this for sure, absolutely.   Art Wiederman, CPA Yeah, and again, most people who are 25 years old don't get the opportunity to start saving money. When you're, doctors, you're 25. You might be in your sophomore or junior year of dental school and you're on the student poverty plan. So, again, the sooner you can get in, the sooner you get into your own practice, the sooner you have the ability. And obviously for small business owners, including dentists guys, a qualified retirement plan is absolutely the best way to go, isn't it?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Absolutely. I'm going to get, typically, when you get a tax deduction up front, to get tax deferred growth, obviously you'll have to pick up the tax later on. But there's a lot of statistics out there. On average, it seems to be that if you have a taxable account, versus a tax deferred account, your rate of return can be upwards of 10 percent per year simply because of the tax savings over the long period of time. So absolutely.   Art Wiederman, CPA Well, and again, remember, folks, that, you know, 20 to 40 percent of the doctors who retire, they don't retire because they've saved enough money and they're ready to retire. They retire because they have a physical ailment. They have back, neck, shoulders. That's why ergonomics is so important in dentistry to make sure, exercise and stretching and yoga and all these things I talk to dentists all the time about this. But I have doctors getting to 55, 60, 65 and we probably get five to 10 calls a year from our clients. Art, I just I'm starting to feel something in my hands. I'm starting to feel something in my neck. I'm afraid I'm going to make a mistake. I need to retire, not because they want to, but because they have to. And if you don't do this planning, it's just so, so important to do this.   Okay, guys, let's talk about. Because of the disclaimer you gave earlier, what were there like 20 different names? But anyway, that's OK, we have to do that for legal purposes. Let's just talk on a 35,000 foot level. I mean, today the stock market is. Alright, let's see. So we have a new vaccine now. The Dow goes up a thousand points. The president tweets something, the Dow goes down 600 points. The commissioner of Internal Revenue says this. It goes I mean, it's there's no rhyme or reason lately for what's going on. So from a high level, what are you telling doctors as far as their investment philosophy? What a plan? How do you look at this?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP The first philosophy is you have to have a philosophy. Right? So that can be, I mean, that could be anything. And there's a whole bunch of different philosophies out there. Some are active, some are passive, some are factor it can be whatever you want. But you better have a philosophy, better stick to it, because just as you alluded to, the markets go up, down, sideways. But that's probably the first thing.   The next area that I always see is they don't have what I like to consider broad diversification, they don't have any diversification simply because everything is owned within my practice, which somewhat makes sense. I've got a practice that is worth money. I've got a building is worth money. I make my money from my practice. And this is, this isn't just dentists. This is any small business owner or practitioner out there. So you gotta try to start thinking about how do we shift money elsewhere out of that to alleviate that risk and increase my diversification.   Art Wiederman, CPA And diversifications, I mean, ever since I've been younger, that's what you hear is you hear it's you know, you don't put all your eggs in one basket, you diversify and you don't watch and flip out if the stock market drops. And that's another thing that kills me. Everybody says, oh, the market was down a thousand points, no 30 stocks were down a thousand points, not one of their 10,000 different types of mutual funds and stocks you can buy. And you've got the New York Stock Exchange, you've got the Nasdaq, you've got the American Stock Exchange. You've got I don't know how many different exchanges there are.   So what they talk about on the news is the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which are large cap stocks, the 30 biggest stocks. That's not the market. So what do you tell your doctors as far as you know? I mean, we get into you know, we got into 2008 and we got into I mean, talk about March, the pandemic hit. What happened to the markets? And what were you telling your clients?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Well, first thing we were doing was we're calling them, scheduling a meeting with them and looking at their financial plan. If let's just hypothetically say someone has a million dollars all invested in the market and it went down 37 percent or 40 percent. So they have 600,000 now in their account and they say, what the heck is going on here? My next question is, when do we need this money? If you're a 45 year old doc and you don't plan to retire until you're 55 or 60, you still got a long term time horizon. Right?   And even if I'm going to retire at 55 or 60, I still hope to hell you're going to live a little bit further than that. So that means I still have an even further, longer time horizon. So it gets back to this plan. And what is my goal? My goal is to invest to grow. Well then do I really care what the short term happens? If the long term is that my projection is the markets can be higher in 10 years, but I care what happens in the next month. I'm going to care. But I don't want that to blur my vision of the long term, because if I don't think it's going to be higher in 10 years, why do I have any money in it right now?   So, I mean, it gets back to just having the conversation, it also gets back to, you know, plan, I'm a big believer in a form of budget. A lot of docs that we talk to get and most people get lifestyle. More money I make, the more I spend. Right. So you don't have to have a detailed budget, I don't really care if you're spending all your money on whatever it is. But just how much do you spend. Everyone spends money on different stuff. How much do I spend? Do I have some cash on hand to be able to alleviate any issues that might come up AKA March and April or my practice might have been shut down for a little bit of time. And if that's the case so I don't know if I'm as worried about my retirement accounts again. Right. So that's what I tell my clients. Knock on wood. So far, so good.   Art Wiederman, CPA Well, a couple of rules of thumb that I've used on this podcast and my lectures in my entire life. 65/25/10 rule folks. You live on 65 percent of what you make. You're going to pay about 25 percent of your income in taxes. And what do you do with the other 10 percent? We save it. I always talk about that. Unfortunately, I get some of my clients who live on the 90/25/minus 15 rule. We talked about this yesterday, guys, they spend 90 percent of what they make. They scrimp and they go into debt for paying their taxes and they're always behind. And the IRS is not a bank you want to use. And then the other minus 15 percent is credit card debt. I mean, talk about credit card debt and the work that you guys do.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Oh, yeah, obviously, you can't out earn bad spending habits, but if you make 100,000 dollars, and you're spending 110. Good luck. You're never going get out of debt.   Well, what we typically do with credit card debt as we sit down and we might look at refis. So do I have access elsewhere to refi. Do I have a house that I could refi? I don't want to take a loan that I could pay off in three years and now extrapolate it out to 15 years. All that does is create more of an issue for most people. But do I have access to anything that can burden the amount of interest and make it lower? That's typically where we're looking. Otherwise we're getting pretty detailed within my budgeting because that all comes back to budgeting, Art.   Art Wiederman, CPA Alright, as long as I can get all the sports networks on my cable deal and I'll pay for that, as long as you let me have that, I'll let you cut back everything else.   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Well, I don't know. Hulu keeps going up.   Art Wiederman, CPA OK, I want to get to a couple more things, guys. Let's talk about saving for college. Again, I've got two boys that are 26 and 31. I am so proud of both of them of course. I talk about them on the podcast, you know, and I personally saved the money myself. I didn't set up these specialized 529 plans or anything. They didn't have them back when I was getting started 30, you know, 30 years ago. But I saved them and one went to art college in San Francisco. And that's not cheap. And that was Nathan. And Forrest went to Chapman University. He went to San Jose State the first year. I was thrilled to death. I was like 12,000 dollars a year out the door, including housing and everything.   Then he transferred to Chapman University, which is one of the best universities in the world. And then I just started crying. It was real sad. And but talk about how do you recommend doctors save for college? Are you looking at 529 plans? Are you looking at municipal bonds or are you looking at just winging it? You're probably not looking at winging it, but what are you talking, what should doctors be looking at as far as saving for college?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Yeah, there's two main pieces I'm looking at. A 529 and UTMA account. Or it doesn't have to UTMA (Uniform Transfer to Minor Act) it could just be a general savings account. The reason I use those two accounts is the 529 account is going to grow tax deferred and it's going to come out tax free to the extent that I have qualified expenses. And the IRS has been pretty good lately and they've expanded those qualified expenses. Um, the downfall is if I don't, let's say my kid doesn't go to school. Let's say you start saving this thing from when they're a year old. You're very fortunate and you put a big chunk away when they when they're born. Right. You have very good practice. You throw a bunch in. And it grows for 18 years. Now you got 100,000 dollars in there and the kid doesn't go to school.   Well, now, I going to take that out, not only subject to taxation, but a 10 percent penalty. I maybe could have put it in just a other account for them. I could have put it in a UTMA account or some other form of account that is not going to have a very high tax issue because there's some kiddy tax issues and we don't want to get into that. But I can get, there's some lower limits that I can get them money income tax free. And so it's a combination of those two accounts. That's really all I look at for clients. You know, you can do ESAs, you can do some of these other ones.   But 529 account, especially early on. Later on, if they're already sixteen years old. Well, you're not going to get a whole lot of growth when you're 16, your kid's going to school at 18. No matter what you're investing in, it's too risky to put it in stock market when they're 16 and all of a sudden your 100,000 goes to 50 and that's when you need to use it, not worth it. Right. Well, it kind of depends on the time frame of the kids, but those are the two accounts that I typically always recommend.   Art Wiederman, CPA And let's just clarify UTMA ask for a Uniform Transfer to Minors Act Account, which is an account, ladies and gentlemen, that allows you as the parent, I think it's up to age 25 now. Is it 25?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP I think it's still 18 or it's dependent upon the state that you're in.   Art Wiederman, CPA It allows you as the parent to put money into an account in your child's name, but you can maintain control of it. And so and then the 529 plan is a, you know, virtually every state has one. In California where I'm at it's called Scholar Share. The money is managed by TIAA CREF, which manages the teacher's retirement. But every state's got one of them. And you put the money in. And most states it's not tax deductible. And some of them for state taxes, you get a write off, federaly it's not tax deductible and the money grows tax free forever. As long as when you pull the money out, you use it for its intended purposes, which is to send the kids to college.   Well, guys, this time flies by. Unfortunately, we're getting towards the end. So last thing I want to ask is there's several things that we've talked about. What do you see in your very successful dentists as far as their financial planning and their financial plans?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Well, first off, they've got a plan, that's first and foremost right, that they've got a plan. The second thing is probably what I alluded to just a little bit ago about the markets. They think long term, they don't think short term. That the planning that we do or anybody, any successful financial planner doesn't have to be us, it can be anyone. They do a good enough job. They're thinking long term. They're trying to have you focused on the future. Right.   The other piece is they know their numbers. Now, I always tell practitioners, I don't need to know how to do a root canal, but I need to know why you're recommending a root canal to me. So I just need to trust you that you're telling me the right thing. I need to understand why we're recommending it and why we're doing it. I need to know a little bit about it, but I don't need to know how to do the actual procedure. That's why I've got you. That's why I hired you.   But they ask the questions. They know the plan. They know their numbers. And probably the last thing is they use a group of professionals. They're using an attorney to help them. They're using a CPA. They're using a form of an advisor, you name it. They're helping. They're using people that help them. So those are probably the things I would say probably the most successful practitioners do. Zach, anything you would add to that?   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Yeah. And specifically on the last bullet point, I call it the round table, OK? And successful professionals are going to have an expert in each field. And I also think it's important that all of these experts are also working together. It's not just individual to the specific dentist, it's they are on your roundtable and they are working together for your financial future.   Art Wiederman, CPA So doctors, I want you to use this analogy. I've been teaching for 36 years about the fact that your patients need to trust you and you need to care about them. Well, let's think about the same analogy of you working with a financial planner or a CPA or an estate attorney or an architect or someone who's going to paint your house. I mean, maybe that's not a good analogy. But the point is, is that, you know, we all have a good meter that we can monitor people with.   Again, if you're working with somebody who, you know, and you trust with your money, you work way too hard to just not look at your investment statements and not meet with somebody. So you've got to trust the person that you work with. So think about, all the things, doctors, that you do in your practice to elicit trust from your patients and then transfer that, the professional that you're going to work with, who's going to monitor, make and monitor your financial plan and help you get to the finish line. And that's what you really, really need to be doing.   Again, this is a call to action. You know, these guys are good. I've seen their financial planning program. It's really good. There's lots of really good financial planners out there. We want to give you information on the things that you need to be talking about, the things you need to be thinking about.   So we've come to just about the end of our time, guys. So one more time, give out your contact information and then we'll wrap it up. A lot of really, really good tips. We got to pretty much all the food groups today, I think. So, Ryan, how do they get a hold of you?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Ryan Weigel, 605.225.8783 or my email is rweigel@EideBailly.com.   Art Wiederman, CPA OK, and Zach?   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Yeah, Zach Schnitzler, Insurance Specialist 701.239.8567 Just for the heck of it, I'll spell out the email at zschnitzler@EideBailly.com.   Art Wiederman, CPA Well Zach, if it makes you feel any better, the state of New York spelled my name wrong on my birth certificate. They spelled Wei instead of ie. So, you know, I don't bug anybody about their names.   But guys, hey listen, thanks for taking the time, giving this really, really good information. Ladies and gentlemen, please take action. Go get your planning done. Do it for yourself. Do it for your family. Again, I don't care who you do it with. If you got a good person you're working with it. If you've got an ADCPA firm your working with. You know, if you do great. If you got them and you trust them, work with them. If you don't, you know, give these guys a call, they can they can answer your questions. You guys will do a complimentary, you know, call up front to talk about the doctor's needs and stuff like that, right?   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Absolutely. Correct.   Art Wiederman, CPA Sounds good. Well, and again, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for listening to our podcast. We're now over 100 episodes. I think this is number 102. And it is an honor and a privilege to present this information to you.   I do want to again remind you to register for our webinar series, www.EideBailly.com/dentalseries. And again, we're starting December 9th with tax planning and research and development credit. We're going to have several of the best dental management consultants in the company in the country coming on. I've got Jennifer Chevalier from Fortune Management. Gary Takacs, who you don't have to tell anybody who Gary is. I've got Kiera Dent. I've got Rachel Wall, who's one of the best dental hygiene consultants in the country.   We've got several of our folks from Eide Bailly talking about, these guys are going to be back. We're going to be talking about retirement plans, student loan debt. So it's going to be a killer series. I've been wanting to do this forever. And the fact that these dental societies have given me the opportunity to do that, it's an honor and a privilege. So make sure you register for that.   Go to our partner, Decisions in Dentistry magazine www.DecisionsinDentistry.com. They have a great website with great content. Their magazine is fantastic. There are up to date on all the COVID-19 protocols and consulting on what you should be doing in your dental offices on virtually every clinical topic. Their advisory board is a who's who of dentistry, not only in this country, but in the United States. What did I just say, not only this country, but in the United States, I'll be alright. Not only in this country, but in the whole world, actually.   And if you're not working with a dental specific CPA, you know, Eide Bailly is here.  My office is in Southern California. My number is 657.279.3243. My email is awiederman@EideBailly.com.  Give us a call. Again, if you're looking for a dental specific CPA anywhere in the United States, it's www.ADCPA.org.   Okay guys, stick around when we sign off, but thank you so much for your time and your great expertise, Zach Schnitzler and Ryan Weigel, really appreciate it, from Eide Bailly. I hope we gave you some great information today on financial planning.   And again, ladies and gentlemen, we're eight months into the COVID-19 pandemic, and I'm going to give you my same five word saying that I've been using since the beginning. Failure is not an option. Go out, manage your practice, manage your team, take world class care of your patients. And we're all going to get through this. You watch the news, you see Pfizer and what was it, Pfizer and Moderna. And I believe they're the two companies. They're getting pretty darn close to having a vaccine. And it sounds really promising. And, you know, life's about hope.   So we're all going to get through this. 2021 is going to be a better year for everybody. So with that, folks, thank you again. Please tell your friends about our podcast. And this is Art Wiederman for The Art of Dental Finance and Management with Art Wiederman, CPA signing off. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time. Bye bye.     Show Notes and Resources:   Eide Bailly’s Dental Practice Solid Financial Future for Dentists Decisions in Dentistry magazine ADCPA Planning for Financial Independence While Building Your Dental Practice Reducing Your Dependency on Insurance in Your Dental Practice (Webinar Recording)   Guest Info:   Ryan Weigel, CPA, CFP Financial Advisor rweigel@eidebailly.com   Zachary Schnitzler, CEPA, CLCS Insurance Specialist zschnitzler@eidebailly.com   Eide Bailly Financial Services   [photos on website]  

It's been a strange year for Alex Howes, as it has been for everyone. The U.S. national champion hardly got to race in the jersey he won last year — but since nationals was canceled, he gets to wear it again until the 2021 nationals. Howes also flew to South Africa to race Cape Epic as part of EF Pro Cycling's alternate program that puts its pro roadies in adventure races. But... that race never happened. The soon-to-be-father recently got back to racing. On this episode of Put Your Socks On, Howes talks about his long road with Jonathan Vaughters' team — the only pro squad he has raced for. Even before turning pro, Howes races on Vaughters' junior development team, TIAA-CREF. Also on this episode, Bobby picks Howes' brain at length for gravel gear tips...

It's been a strange year for Alex Howes, as it has been for everyone. The U.S. national champion hardly got to race in the jersey he won last year — but since nationals was canceled, he gets to wear it again until the 2021 nationals. Howes also flew to South Africa to race Cape Epic as part of EF Pro Cycling's alternate program that puts its pro roadies in adventure races. But... that race never happened. The soon-to-be-father recently got back to racing. On this episode of Put Your Socks On, Howes talks about his long road with Jonathan Vaughters' team — the only pro squad he has raced for. Even before turning pro, Howes races on Vaughters' junior development team, TIAA-CREF. Also on this episode, Bobby picks Howes' brain at length for gravel gear tips...

It's been a strange year for Alex Howes, as it has been for everyone. The U.S. national champion hardly got to race in the jersey he won last year — but since nationals was canceled, he gets to wear it again until the 2021 nationals. Howes also flew to South Africa to race Cape Epic as part of EF Pro Cycling's alternate program that puts its pro roadies in adventure races. But... that race never happened. The soon-to-be father recently got back to racing. On this episode of Put Your Socks On, Howes talks about his long road with Jonathan Vaughters' team — the only pro squad he has raced for. Even before turning pro, Howes races on Vaughters' junior development team, TIAA-CREF. Also on this episode, Bobby picks Howes' brain at length for gravel gear tips...

"It's different this time?" People have been saying this for generations and yet, the basic investing rules still apply.Don takes questions on:Gifting shares to kids from a parents taxable account.Better to refinance or keep investing?Does it makes sense to add a small cap value fund to portfolio? Is this TIAA-CREF fund a good retirement investment?

Follow along Paige Ruderman as she discusses the inspiring highs and motivating lows of living in your 20's. Health, lifestyle, career and more are the topics covered here on SO RUDE. We post new episodes every Tuesday so make sure to subscribe.This week the So Rude podcast welcomes Richard Jakotowicz Jr to discuss finances, student loans, investing, retirement and more. Richard has over 20 years of experience working in various financial planning roles at the JP Morgan Private Bank, TIAA-CREF, and at the University of Delaware. He specializes in creating comprehensive financial projections and managing diversified investment portfolios for his clients. He is also the Director of the Financial Planning & Wealth Management program at the University of Delaware where he teaches courses on Investing, Valuation, Derivatives, and Financial Planning. He leaves us with great tips such as, "Time in the market, is better than trying to time the market."Richard Company - https://www.benchmarkfg.com/ University of Delaware Page - https://sites.udel.edu/richj/Video for Graduating Seniors - https://capture.udel.edu/media/5+Rules+For+Investing/1_liksm64vIntro/Outro Music by Token Genius - 22vqxnaoMjpoShow Notes - https://paigeruderman.com/prepare-for-your-financial-future/Instagram - Instagram.com/sorude.podcastTwitter - twitter.com/sorudepodcastEmail us questions - sorudepod@gmail.com

There are superheroes and then there are super she-roes who are working to serve citizens from their financial woes and challenges. My special guest today works daily to help resolve financial crisis that occur with small businesses and individuals who often go it alone until it's too late. As small business owners and professionals, we are often unwilling to invest in an expert to help us handle the finances, avoid peril, and create wealth. Angie Toney is not your everyday financial professional, she specializes in resolving complex situations and helping her clients find balance their mental and physical health & wellness with their financial positions. Angie Toney is a native New Yorker, corporate exec turned entrepreneur serving clients as a health and wealth professional in the DC area. She utilizes a holistic approach to help small business owners in the health industry increase cash flow and reduce taxes and audit risk. Before launching her business, she was a director working with a local CPA firm providing audit and quality assurance services for local, state and federal government projects and the chief auditor for a chemical manufacturing company. Angie also worked as a consultant with Experis (formerly Jefferson Wells) and as a senior auditor for the not-for-profit insurance and investment organization, TIAA-CREF. She earned a BS in Accounting from Mercy College in Dobbs Ferry, NY, and an MBA from the University of Phoenix. She is a Certified Public Accountant / Personal Financial Specialist (CPA/PFS) and holds a Certified Fraud Examiner (CFE) license. Angie is also a certified health coach earned from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. As a health coach, she practices a holistic approach to health and wellness, which examines all areas of an individual’s life, including financial matters, to see how they are connected and impact each other. Reducing financial stress can have a profound impact on health. Angie is a mother of two living in Northern Virginia outside of Washington DC. Outside of work, she enjoys various types of volunteer work including mentoring youth and participating in adult literacy/training programs. She is an active board member and volunteer with the Loudoun Volunteer Financial Council, a member of the Urban Financial Services Coalition – UFSC (formerly known as the National Association of Urban Bankers), and a volunteer with Operation HOPE, the nation’s leading nonprofit social investment banking and financial literacy empowerment organization with a mission to eradicate poverty. Angel Financial Services Website: https://www.angelfinancial.services/ Angel Financial Services Blog: https://www.angelfinancial.services/blog/ --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/viewfrom5throw/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/viewfrom5throw/support

About this episode:In this week’s episode, we interview the founder of Scratch Labs, Dr. Allen Lim, and talk with him about "embracing the suck," self-care, training consistency, and his approach to nutrition. Guest Bio – Dr. Allen Lim:Dr. Allen Lim received his doctorate from the Applied Exercise Science Laboratory in the Department of Integrative Physiology at the University of Colorado. Allen worked on the Pro Cycling Tour as a sport scientist and coach for the Phonak, TIAA-CREF, Slipstream, Garmin, and Radio Shack professional cycling teams. More recently, Allen founded Skratch Labs, a boot-strapped sports nutrition company, that was ranked in 2014 as the 3rd fastest growing food and beverage company in the USA by Inc., 5000. Allen has co-written three cookbooks with Chef Biju Thomas - the Feed Zone Cookbook, the Feed Zone Portables, and the Feed Zone Table - all of which help to give people the basic skills and knowledge to prepare real food from scratch as part of a physically active lifestyle. Allen has served as a consultant for the Chinese Olympic Team at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, for the US Olympic Cycling Team at the 2012 and 2016 Olympic Games in London and Rio, and for organizations and individuals ranging from the Joe Gibbs Racing Team, Kansas City Royals, and President George W. Bush. A sought-after speaker, Allen has given two TEDx talks, guest lectures regularly at the University of Colorado at Boulder and has been a key note speaker for organizations like the American College of Sports Medicine, Training Peaks, Map My Fitness, Strava, The North Face, The Colorado Outdoor Industry Leadership Summit, Under Armour, and the Gold Lab Symposium.Read More About Dr. Allen Lim:https://www.skratchlabs.com/pages/about-ushttps://www.instagram.com/allenskratch/https://twitter.com/allenskratchEpisode Highlights:Embracing the suckSelf-care and how to sustain performance in the long-termHow Dr. Allen Lim helps elite athletes perform at their bestListen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, or on your favorite podcast platform.

Thomas W. Jones is the Former Vice Chairman, President & COO at TIAA-CREF, the largest pension system in the country. He was the former Vice Chairman of Travelers, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and Freddie Mac, and the Former Chairman & CEO of Smith Barney Asset Management. He was the former CEO of Global Investment Management at Citigroup and Former Treasurer at John Hancock Insurance Company. Thomas W. Jones is currently the Founder and senior partner of venture capital investment firm TWJ Capital and author of the new book From Willard Straight to Wall Street: A Memoir.  Podcast Highlights   Who is Thomas W. Jones?    Thomas W. Jones was on the cover of Newsweek in 1969 as an iconic revolutionary while studying at Cornell. As a student, Thomas felt that America was at a crossroads and that his generation was tasked with the job of raising the price of oppression. Due to his effort and the effort of countless others, America chose to embrace the spirit of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and has made significant progress over the last 50 years towards equality. In a certain way, Thomas’s life story and career in business is like a microcosm of the story of the growth and development of America as a whole.   Did the fight look like what you thought it would?   Thomas was pleasantly surprised when America took the path of opening up opportunity instead of the path of oppression. He believed the toughest fight would be in the business world and he figured that he would have almost no chance at success, but he needed to try. He had to approach business in a way that he provided his own psychological support, because he knew he wasn’t going to receive any from the outside. He discovered that if you actually deliver a true 100% commitment, there is a large gap over time between the people who are delivering only 95%. The 5% gap seems small but it compounds over the years and people start to notice. For Thomas, this meant people in the upper echelons of business recognizing that he was getting the job done and eventually taking him on in a mentorship type of relationship.   Where does your motivation and fortitude come from?   It takes a certain level of self belief and self confidence to take on tough challenges. For Thomas, his confidence came from his experience in school. At that time, the philosophy of school in dealing with a gifted child was to accelerate them, and that meant that Thomas had skipped two grades. This meant that he was much younger than his peers and once he had entered high school he encountered a number of bullies. It was then that he decided that he wouldn’t let others define who he was. That self possession developed into the mentality that even if he was facing insurmountable odds, Thomas might as well try to get it done. Most people never figure out what they are capable of because they never actually put 100% into trying to be their best. You can never know what you can do until you give 100% effort. It’s a wonderful gift that you can give to yourself to learn what your highest potential is. When you learn what your capacity is, you will be able to channel and master it, and you will find arenas where you can give 100% and be successful. Thomas’s faith discipline has been another crucial element. Even in the midst of a crisis, praying and trying to see the good in the situation allowed Thomas to continue to fight. Life is going to have times of trial, and having s

Jason Hartman talks with Thomas Jones, former vice chairman and director of TIAA-CREF, former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Global Investment Management at Citigroup, and former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Citigroup Asset Management. He was also the former Vice Chairman of Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Jason and Thomas discuss Thomas' entrance into real estate, why Thomas is so bullish on America long term, and what sets America apart from the rest of the world. Key Takeaways: [2:09] Thomas and his bride actually started by bidding on 2 burned out buildings in Boston [7:27] Thomas is perennially bullish long term, so dips in the economy are buying opportunities for him [9:39] The changes on Wall Street over the years [13:48] The most disappointing aspect to the reforms that have been made since the Great Recession [18:57] One of the things that really sets America apart is the excited entrepreneurial spirit [23:13] America faced a metaphorical crossroads in the late 1960s [26:03] Our nation doesn't give itself enough credit for how far we've come, even though we still have a ways to go Website: From Willard Straight to Wall Street on Facebook From Willard Straight to Wall Street

Jason Hartman talks with Thomas Jones, former vice chairman and director of TIAA-CREF, former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Global Investment Management at Citigroup, and former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Citigroup Asset Management. He was also the former Vice Chairman of Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Jason and Thomas discuss Thomas' entrance into real estate, why Thomas is so bullish on America long term, and what sets America apart from the rest of the world. Key Takeaways: [2:31] Thomas and his bride actually started by bidding on 2 burned out buildings in Boston [7:49] Thomas is perennially bullish long term, so dips in the economy are buying opportunities for him [10:02] The changes on Wall Street over the years [14:11] The most disappointing aspect to the reforms that have been made since the Great Recession [19:19] One of the things that really sets America apart is the excited entrepreneurial spirit [23:35] America faced a metaphorical crossroads in the late 1960s [26:25] Our nation doesn't give itself enough credit for how far we've come, even though we still have a ways to go Website: From Willard Straight to Wall Street on Facebook From Willard Straight to Wall Street

Paul Volcker, former head of the Federal Reserve, passed away December 8. Jason Hartman takes a look back at some of the biggest moments of Volcker's term and what it meant for the United States. Then Jason talks with Thomas Jones, former vice chairman and director of TIAA-CREF, former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Global Investment Management at Citigroup, and former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Citigroup Asset Management. He was also the former Vice Chairman of Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Jason and Thomas discuss Thomas' entrance into real estate, why Thomas is so bullish on America long term, and what sets America apart from the rest of the world. Key Takeaways: [3:47] Paul Volcker, the former Fed chair credited with "Breaking the back of inflation" has passed away [6:04] Interest rates in 1980 spiked at over 18%, with inflation at 13% Thomas W Jones Interview: [11:50] Thomas and his bride actually started by bidding on 2 burned out buildings in Boston [17:08] Thomas is perennially bullish long term, so dips in the economy are buying opportunities for him [19:21] The changes on Wall Street over the years [23:30] The most disappointing aspect to the reforms that have been made since the Great Recession [28:39] One of the things that really sets America apart is the excited entrepreneurial spirit [32:55] America faced a metaphorical crossroads in the late 1960s [35:44] Our nation doesn't give itself enough credit for how far we've come, even though we still have a ways to go Website: www.JasonHartman.com/Ask From Willard Straight to Wall Street on Facebook From Willard Straight to Wall Street

Paul Volcker, former head of the Federal Reserve, passed away December 8. Jason Hartman takes a look back at some of the biggest moments of Volcker's term and what it meant for the United States. Then Jason talks with Thomas Jones, former vice chairman and director of TIAA-CREF, former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Global Investment Management at Citigroup, and former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Citigroup Asset Management. He was also the former Vice Chairman of Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Jason and Thomas discuss Thomas' entrance into real estate, why Thomas is so bullish on America long term, and what sets America apart from the rest of the world. Key Takeaways: [3:47] Paul Volcker, the former Fed chair credited with "Breaking the back of inflation" has passed away [6:04] Interest rates in 1980 spiked at over 18%, with inflation at 13% Thomas W Jones Interview: [11:50] Thomas and his bride actually started by bidding on 2 burned out buildings in Boston [17:08] Thomas is perennially bullish long term, so dips in the economy are buying opportunities for him [19:21] The changes on Wall Street over the years [23:30] The most disappointing aspect to the reforms that have been made since the Great Recession [28:39] One of the things that really sets America apart is the excited entrepreneurial spirit [32:55] America faced a metaphorical crossroads in the late 1960s [35:44] Our nation doesn't give itself enough credit for how far we've come, even though we still have a ways to go Website: www.JasonHartman.com/Ask From Willard Straight to Wall Street

Tom and Don dissect Paul Merriman’s article about accumulative investments and again confirm the power of compounding and patience! They talk to callers about the pros and cons of actively managed funds, why index funds are still a good way of investing your money and why you should be skeptical of the perplexing zero cost funds. We also touch on retirement money and the tax considerations when it comes to switching funds, always keeping your best interests at the forefront of the conversation. The payback of keeping money in an accumulative investment despite ups and downs. Weighing up low cost index funds against actively managed mutual funds. Thoughts on investing in Vanguard’s Wellesley Income Fund and STAR Fund. The misconceptions around active investing versus passive and index investing. Find out why you have to be uncomfortable around free funds. The only time it might make sense to touch your retirement money. Tax implications for rolling over a traditional IRA into a Roth IRA. Vestory — https://vestory.com/ Warren Buffett — https://www.forbes.com/profile/warren-buffett/#167f8a646398 Paul Merriman — https://paulmerriman.com/ Vanguard — https://about.vanguard.com/ Fidelity — https://www.fidelity.com/ TIAA-CREF — https://www.tiaa.org/public

This episode we speak with Tom Jones, author of the new book, From Willard Straight to Wall Street: A Memoir. Tom Jones is founder and senior partner of venture capital investment firm TWJ Capital. He previously served as Chief Executive Officer of Global Investment Management at Citigroup; Vice Chairman, President, and Chief Operating Officer at TIAA-CREF; and Senior Vice-President and Treasurer at John Hancock Insurance Company. Jones received Masters degrees from Cornell University and Boston University, and holds honorary doctoral degrees from Howard University, Pepperdine University, and College of New Rochelle. We spoke to Tom about his pivotal experiences at Cornell University 50 years ago, his career on Wall Street, and his thoughts on the state of race relations in our country. As a loyal listener to the podcast we’d like to offer you a special 30% discount on Tom’s book. To receive your discount please go to cornellpress.cornell.edu and use the promo code 09POD.

Marty Rodgers of Accenture stops by the show to discuss the concept of lifting as you climb. He also tells us his career journey, from the beginning all the way to his current job at Accenture, and talks about the difference between mentorship and sponsorship. Check out Marty on LinkedIn and Twitter!TRANSCRIPTZach: What's up, y'all? Look, I got a question for y'all. I'm kind of talking to--I'm talking to us right now, recognizing that we have allies listening in, we have various types and hues of melanin who check out the podcast, but I'm kind of talking to us right now. Have y'all heard of the phrase "all skinfolk ain't kinfolk?" Have you ever heard of that phrase? Okay, so if you haven't heard of that phrase--this is education for everybody now, so shout out to everybody who listens and checks in with the podcast, but the idea of all skinfolk not being kinfolk means that just because someone looks like you doesn't mean that they're actually out--looking out for you, right? And the whole idea of all skinfolk not being kinfolk is really illustrated and articulated well in corporate America. You know, for me, I think because I am one of the few if--I mean, arguably the only person in my family really actively in corporate America doing what I'm doing, coming into these spaces, and I see other folks who look like me. Initially, early in my career, I would run up on 'em and be like, "Oh, what's going on, man? Da-da-da-da-da. What's going on, brother?" And they'd hit me with, "I'm not your brother. I'm not your pal, buddy. Go find something else to do," right? Like, they hit you, and you'll be like, "Whoa, what is this?" All skinfolk not kinfolk, and so as I had those experiences and disappointments in my professional journey, finding folks who were actually kinfolk became all the more satisfying, right? And so I'm really excited because even though this Black History Month has been trash, with Jussie and Gucci and whoever else making blackface clothes and folks just wiling in general, people having actual--putting on blackface in 2019 or acting as if the '80s was, you know, 89 years ago. This episode is really powerful for me, man. And yeah, Ade isn't here this week. She'll be back next week. So I'm kind of sad, but this is a silver lining, because I got to actually have a conversation with someone who really epitomizes the concept of lifting as you climb. This man, his name is Marty Rodgers. Marty Rodgers is a managing director out of the D.C. offer at a firm called Accenture. Great man. You're gonna hear about his profile, hear about his story, and so I'm really excited for y'all to check this out, okay? So don't go anywhere. The next thing you're gonna hear is us getting into this interview with Marty Rodgers. Now, look, the computer crashed and we had to redo the interview, but I want y'all to know--and I say it in the conversation--he did actually show us mad love at the top of the interview about Living Corporate. He actually checked out the platform and stuff. He's actually a fan. Shout-out to you, Marty Rodgers, and shout-out to all the folks listening. I want y'all to check this out. Talk to y'all soon. Zach: So for those of us who don't know you, would you mind telling us a little bit about yourself?Marty: Sure, absolutely, Zach. So in terms of my background, I've always wanted my career to go back and forth between for-profit, non-profit, and government. I very much believe that all three sectors would be required to come together, to work together, to understand each other, to understand the respective, you know, why each sector exists, what their purpose is, how they're incorporated, what their incentives are, and then all three would have to figure out a way to work together on the greatest issues and challenges of our time. So whether that's the environment or civil rights or education or health care, we've got to find a way to get all three of these sectors to come together to tackle those great challenges. And so when I was coming out of undergrad--I went to the University of Notre Dame, and as I was getting ready to graduate, a guy named Dr. Cliff Wharton became the first African-American CEO of a Fortune 500 company. He became the CEO of TIAA-CREF, and Dr. Wharton had a distinguished career at the UN and also in non-profits before assuming that position, and also as an educator as well, and so he kind of embodied kind of what I wanted my career to be, and so that's very much what I set about the course of doing. So my first row and assignment I started working with Aetna Life and Casualty. I was doing economic research and economic portfolio analysis for a big real estate investment--holdings that the insurance company had. That was really awesome and great, because it happened at a time and a moment in our--in our country when the SNL crisis was happening and properties were getting dumped and affecting our portfolios, and so I'd have to do lots and lots of research on the impact of those--of what government was doing and its impact on the private sector, and so I did that for a while, and I had an opportunity to go to work for one of my mentors in the non-profit space, a woman by the name of Dr. Marian Wright Edelman. She was the president and founder of the Children's Defense Fund, and I originally started and worked for her as her--on her staff as her assistant. That was an awesome experience for me. I got to work directly with her, learn from her, and here was a person that had and is still changing the country. She was the first black woman lawyer in the state of Mississippi and had worked to help create Head Start and a whole variety of other programs for children. That was a great experience. It was the first time I was working really on helping her launch a race-specific campaign for African-American kids called the Black Community Crusade for Children, and we launched that in a whole series of freedom schools all across the country. And then I left there--I kind of had the advocacy bug at that point and went to Capitol Hill. In fact, that was another great experience where I got to work for another mentor of mine, somebody who I'd always looked up to and respected. I went to work for a guy, senator Harris Wofford, who--he's a white guy who had gone to Howard and became one of if not the first graduate of Howard Law School. He went on to work with Dr. King. He went to work with Robert F. Kennedy and John F. Kennedy. He headed up civil rights in the Kennedy administration and [inaudible] the Peace Corps and was the college president of a couple universities, and so, like Cliff Wharton, he was somebody who I had looked up to and wanted to be more like, and so it was a great opportunity to go work for him and with him. He was very passionate, having co-founded the Peace Corps, about the idea of bringing the Peace Corps home to serve American families and American communities, and so that's very much [what we did together?] was--we worked together. I was in charge, as his staff person, of working on the Americorp legislation and creating a program called Americorp to allow young people a chance to make a difference through full-time national community service efforts, and then we also worked together to create in turn--since he was a friend and an adviser to Dr. King, we worked with congressman Louis to turn that holiday into a national day of service, and so that was my time on the Hill, learning, you know, how does legislation work, how does politics work? How do you get things done on the Hill? And then after that, after spending, you know, almost 5 years trying to convince people about the importance of service and giving back and making a difference, I thought it was quite hypocritical that I hadn't served myself, and so I went and I did a stint serving Native-American kids out in New Mexico and then went to grad school, and then it was after grad school that I joined Accenture, and I've been at Accenture for 21 years, and the great thing about Accenture is it's allowed me to continue to do those things that I was passionate about, and that is, again, moving back and forth between for-profit, non-profit, and government. So I started my career at Accenture in the for-profit space, working in our financial services group. I moved over and joined our government practice, then I started our non-profit practice and launched that literally 10 years ago, almost to the month, and then after that I've now moved into our health and public service group, which is a little bit of a combination of both.Zach: So first of all, that's amazing, all of the things that you shared. Of course there's a clear pattern of service and partnership, and I also, think, Marty, what's really interesting about when you share your story and just your introduction, a lot of us, we have a perspective on one of those three spaces, if it's, like, the legislative space or the non-profit space or the for-profit space, but--and I'm certain that you've heard this many times before. I think your perspective in having such dynamic and deep experiences in each of those spaces gives you a unique perspective, especially when it comes to effectively actualizing change and supporting and lifting as you climb. And so as you know, today we're talking about mentorship versus sponsorship. And, you know, before we started recording the call, and we didn't get--we didn't get this because the computer crashed, but, you know, you said a lot of great things about the podcast, so thank you for that. But everywhere I go--so when I joined--when I started with Accenture, and I've been to some other firms, but everyone has either heard of you or they've worked with you or they aspire to work with you, and so I'm excited to talk to you about this topic, because when your name comes up, often times, especially within the black consultative community, there's a desire for you to be a mentor to them or a sponsor for them, and so I'm curious, could you explain a bit in your mind about the difference between mentorship and sponsorship?Marty: Sure, absolutely. And there really are--it's critical to know the difference between the two and to understand the difference between the two, especially as you're navigating your career. So as I think about mentorship versus sponsorship--and they're both important, but again they're both very different--I think it's important to kind of realize that at different points of your journey you're gonna need mentors, and at different parts of your journey you're gonna need sponsors, and in some cases they can go back and forth. You know, you can have a mentor that can be a sponsor and a sponsor that eventually becomes a mentor, but they are fundamentally different, and if I can take a second just to kind of delineate how I think about that. Let me go through that. So first--and again, just for you and the audience, Zach, it's just I think helpful to think of it just really quickly in a couple of kind of compare and contrasts. So first, mentorship is someone who speaks with you, and sponsorship is someone who speaks about you and for you. Mentors advise. Sponsors advocate. Mentors support. Sponsors steer. Mentors are folks that can help you think about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and that can include work, but it doesn't have to exclusively be about work, whereas sponsors talk about career and work, right? Like, that's the purpose of a sponsor. Mentors help you translate kind of the unwritten rules, whereas sponsors are the rules. Mentors have mentees. Sponsors have employees. Mentors talk about paths. Sponsors talk about trails. And then a couple other last ones as I was kind of quickly thinking through this, mentors are someone you look up to, right? And they're folks you want to be like. So for me it was senator Wofford, it was Marian Wright Edelman, it was Johnneta Cole. It's Cliff Wharton. It's all of those folks, you know, that have shaped who I am and who I want to become and who I want to be like and who I look up to, aspire to be like. Sponsors, that's not a requirement, right? But a requirement of sponsorship is power, right? So my mentors have been my heroes and my sheroes. Sponsors don't have to live up to that high of a status. And then lastly, as I described in the beginning, mentors can be sponsors and vice versa. So that's sort of, like, how I quickly kind of think through the compare and the contrast of all of those.Zach: No, absolutely. You know, I'm curious, what do you think are some of the biggest misconceptions around mentorship? So a lot of times--I rarely ever in conversation, when we have our conversations about our careers and career management with my colleagues and even folks that are non-managers and things of that nature, do I hear people say, "Man, I really want him to be my sponsor." Like, most times we're like, "I need somebody to mentor me." What do you think are some of the largest misconceptions when it comes to black and brown professionals? Or just professionals in general of course, but what you think when you say the word "mentorship" and the expectations. What do you think are some of the largest misconceptions around that?Marty: Well, especially for mentorship, right? Well, let me just actually start with both. So both mentorship and sponsorship are two-way streets, and I think a popular misconception is, you know, it's kind of a one-way relationship, but both--the key thing is that it IS a relationship, right? And there are costs and risks and investments of time, of capital, of attention, on both sides, and both sponsorship and mentorship require kind of nurturing care and feeding, and you can't have a mentorship or a sponsorship relationship where all of the value is going in one direction. It's got to be--it's got to be both ways, and so that for me is the biggest misconception. Like, there's this perception that, "Hey," you know, "I'm gonna get something from my mentor," versus, you know, what are you gonna give your mentor? Or "Hey, I'm gonna get something from this sponsor," versus what are you gonna give your sponsor? I talked earlier about, you know--one of the things I like to say is, you know, mentors can help guide you on a path, right, and talk about paths. You know, like--and again, like, that whole notion of life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Your path is a bigger thing than just your career and just your--you know, your work and your job, and a path is--it's something that you're cutting yourself. It's your way of moving forward, and a mentor can talk to you about the ups and downs of that journey and how that happens. A sponsor is really about the trail, right? And when you talk about trails, you're following after someone that's already blazed that trail. You're going--you know, with a sponsor you're sort of the protege. You're the person that they're investing in, that they're expecting something from, that you're gonna be a reflection on them. And again, that's the notion that--for a sponsor, you're an employee, right? And you're somebody that they are investing in 'cause you're gonna do something for them and for the firm, and it's a--it's a transaction. And again, that's not--that's not the same type of relationship that you would have necessarily with a mentor, where a mentor is more somebody you're gonna--you're gonna want to be like and look up to.Zach: That's just so perfect, man. And first of all, Marty, it's 4:00, so are we okay to go for another 10 to 15 minutes?Marty: Yeah, yeah, yeah. We're good. We're good.Zach: Thank you so much. So let me ask you this. What was a moment for you--'cause you talk a lot, again, when you kind of talked through your journey just before grad school and before joining Accenture, you mentioned your mentors a lot and the multiple mentors that you've had. Did you ever have a moment where the difference between mentorship and sponsorship impacted your early career?Marty: Yeah. I mean, I think the story, Zach, that really kind of brings home the difference between mentorship and sponsorship would actually be when I first was made a partner--and maybe we will come back to that at the end, right? But when I was made a partner--now we call them managing directors--you know, I was sort of, to be blunt, kind of clueless. I was potentially--there's far too many of us, as black and brown folks, that--you know, my attitude was not what it should be, and what I mean by that is I was of the mindset of, you know, "Hey, I'm doing what I need to do. They should make me a managing director or a partner, and if they don't, you know, it's not why I get up in the morning, so, you know, their loss," right? Somebody, one of the folks that I was reporting to who, you know, now I would call more of a mentor, said, "You know what? That's probably not how you want to think about it, and if you want to accomplish a lot of the things you want to accomplish for other people, for other causes, for other things you say you believe in, then I need you to care about making it to partner, to managing director." When I started on that journey, I had no clue, you know, what was the process was. I was sort of, to be blunt, almost disinterested in the process. I just kind of figured--again, it would happen if it happened. When I was first up for managing director, for partner, I got what we call the paperwork without even knowing that I was up that particular year. I filled out the paperwork. Not even--you know, kind of rushed. Didn't even really think much about it, and went through the process, if you will, and Zach, the crazy thing was I was brought into meet with one of our executives, who told me that particular year I was not going to make managing director, that I was--hey, I had a good run. Glad I was part of the process, but I wasn't going to make it. And hey, you know, it was one of those things where I was like, "Okay," you know? "No big thing." I wasn't--I didn't even know this process existed. I wasn't sure of the process. I wasn't gonna lose sleep about it, right? 2 weeks later I was called back into that same person's office and was told, "Hey, guess what? You actually are gonna make it." And the difference between that and two weeks later was a sponsor had got the list, didn't see my name on it, and had decided, "Hey, nice list, but it's missing somebody," and that's the difference between a mentor and a sponsor.Zach: Wow. And that's just so powerful, because I've--you know, from mentors that I've spoken with about--the higher that you climb on these ladders and levels of leadership, you know, the more of that type of support you're going to need, right? And that there needs to be more and more consensus on who makes that list. So that's a powerful example. Marty: Absolutely, and in this particular case, right, and this is something more and more corporations are wrestling with, dealing with, and trying, and we do it formally here at Accenture, but this was a person who had been named as my sponsor that I didn't know that they were my sponsor. So they had--they had been kind of assigned to be my sponsor, and I didn't know until much later that they had been formally assigned to be my sponsor.Zach: Wow. And that's also particularly amazing, and I would imagine humbling for you, Marty, in that, to your point, you weren't even super invested in the process at the time, right? Like, your attitude was not one of, you know, "I need to get this." You know? And so for that to be the case, that's just--that's incredible, but I think it also speaks to your earlier piece when you were talking about people being invested in you that sometimes--I know for me, at least in my career, there have been people who have been more invested in me, in me getting to a certain place [that I was?] at a time because they had the insight and wisdom to know what me getting there meant, and that's invaluable.Marty: And that's the key thing for a sponsor, right? A sponsor has to decide, "Hey, I'm going to give some of my capital to you, and the reason I'm going to give you that capital, the reason I'm going to invest in you, the reason I'm going to sponsor you, is because you in turn are gonna be a good reflection on me," and/or "You're gonna be a good reflection on the firm, and net/net." Normally what that means is, in for-profit firms, you're gonna help us make money.Zach: Yeah. So, you know, in my career, I've seen--the folks who go the furthest, they have sponsors, right? Of course. And frankly I've seen people of color attempt to build sponsor relationships and fall flat a little bit, and so I'm curious, what are some tips that you have for black and brown professionals--particularly millennials, but of course Gen X and baby boomers as well--who are seeking sponsors, and what advice do you have for senior leaders and executives who may not be used to engaging professionals that don't look like them and really establishing those types of relationships?Marty: So [that was?] kind of a two-part question there, Zach. So if I take the first part, right, in terms of the black and brown folks that are seeking sponsors. Well, the first should be, again, to remember that it's a two-way street, and there has to be mutual value shared in both directions, right? And you have to know that when you enter into that relationship, you are a reflection of your sponsor, and that bears with it certain responsibilities, right? And you have to help them, and they have to help you, so to speak. Second thing is you have to ask the question, you know, "Where do I find a sponsor," right? And a sponsor ultimately, going back to those original definitions, right, has to have power. They have to have a seat at the table. They have to be in the room when decisions are being made, and that usually means you've got to look at the org chart, and you've got to look at, you know, who has the budget, and who has the chair, and who has the--you know, the P&L statement to--or, you know, who's filling out the final performance reviews, and how high up in the ladder are they doing that, right? So that would be kind of a second point. Like, you've got to know where to look, and make sure that you're actually identifying folks that are at the table. And then the last part of that is--I always encourage folks to--just like with mentors, you've got to have more than one, and you've got to look for multiple sponsors, because--especially in a lot of organizations nowadays, folks are moving around all of the time at the top, and so you never know, you know, who's gonna shift where when, and the worst-case scenario is, you know, you're planning and investing in a certain sponsor that then moves, and that person no longer has influence where you need them to have influence and you don't have any fallback. So you want to have multiple sponsors in multiple different places, multiple different folks that can speak for you at the table and can be at the table as things move and change. And my last thought in terms of our folks as they seek sponsors, I think it is incumbent upon young professionals in particular to put themselves out there and to realize that that takes courage, but you've got to put yourself out there in terms of being willing to sign up for assignments that you might not--you know, that are stretch assignments that have risk in them. You're gonna have to do a lot of networking and additional relationship development above and beyond kind of your day job. The table stakes, the price of admission, is that you're gonna, you know, perform exceptionally well and what you're doing day in and day out. The last part of that is your sponsor is going to--in terms of that relationship, they're going to be helping you remove obstacles and barriers. They're gonna be helping pick you out for certain assignments, and they're gonna in some cases be helping--they'll help you get that promotion, but you're then responsible, not just for what you were doing before. Now you're responsible for achieving in that new role, and that--you know, that's sort of your next test case, and then that relationship will continue to develop or evolve based on how you perform after that, that kind of first reach-back or reach-in. So it's an ongoing evolution, and that relationship and that dynamic will change over time, and so I think sometimes we get into these relationships and we think they're sort of--they're always the same and they're always sort of static in terms of the relationship. What you'll find is those things actually change, especially as you climb and as your relationship and the proximity sometimes between you and the sponsor, that gap, closes. In terms of the second part of what your question--and sorry for being a little bit long-winded, Zach, but in terms of the second part of your question, senior leaders that are--you know, in terms of how they can best engage with young professionals that don't look like them, I always talk about the opportunity to create space and to have grace. So space and grace, and there's really a need for both, whether it's our employee resource groups or it's our offices or whatever profession you might be in, or if it--or even sometimes those senior leaders themselves, to create the space to come together to get to know folks, to have an opportunity to interact with folks and see who those folks that have that promise, that have that ability to rise, are and can be. And so in the case of folks that don't look like them, that creation of space is really essential, where both a person of color, but also they themselves can feel comfortable in that interaction, and then the grace is, you know, there are gonna be some moments where neither of you feel comfortable, but that's okay. It takes a little bit of courage, but that's part of the price of being a leader at your firm.Zach: Right, right. So I'm a new manager at my company, and I've been recently promoted to manager--Marty: Congratulations, that's awesome.Zach: Thank you, Marty. I appreciate it. It's been about--Marty: You see, man? You just keep climbing. It's awesome. And you keep giving back, which is this podcast. Represent.Zach: Right? Man, you're gonna make me blush on this podcast, man. They're gonna see it through the app, man. Thank you. But it's been about a year, but let me be honest. In my career, often times--and I'm gonna have a bit of an inside conversation outside the house, but often times when I see folks that look like us--and this is has been my experience--they're more--they more often act like referees than they are true avenues of support, and so--and interestingly enough, some of the most prominent mentors that I've had, they've shared that some of the biggest roadblocks have been from them being at a junior level and from people who were at a senior level that do look like them, and so I'm curious, you know, what advice do you have for black and brown leaders to better lift as they climb? And what, if any, roles do non-minority leaders play in helping to support that culture? And I know I'm giving you a lot of, like, two-parter questions, but the reason why I'm asking that second part is because I do believe that there's some type of--there's a reason why we don't always lift as we climb. There's some type of factor in that, and so I'm curious to know if there's a greater cultural influence at play for that. So that's the purpose of the B part of my question.Marty: Yeah. So it's a great question, so let me just kind of unpack it. So first, I love the expression "lift as you climb," which comes from Mary McLeod Bethune, right? And ultimately, right, that's what life should be about. I always talk about the difference between ambition and aspiration, and in our world and our society and in way too many of our corporations we talk about them as though they're the same thing, and they're fundamentally different. Ambition comes from the Latin, and it literally--"Ambit" means to walk around, and what it meant, Zach, was back in the day, you were gonna walk around and you were gonna buy votes. You know, you were gonna, like, literally pay people off to vote for you, and it had a very negative connotation. And aspiration is also from the Latin, but it comes from the Latin word that means to breathe, to give air to, to give life to, to give oxygen to, and we have to be people of aspiration, and we need our firms and our companies to be companies of aspiration, right? And fundamentally what that boils down to--when you're ambitious you believe kind of in a scarcity model. You believe "I've got to hold you down so that I can lift myself up," whereas aspiration is about lifting as you climb. It's about abundance. It's about saying, "Hey, I only get lifted up by those coming after me, and it's my responsibility to reach back, give back and make a difference, to pay it forward." And so--and that I'm only there as a result of others that made my being there possible. And so with that mindset it becomes incumbent upon all of us to, you know--especially as leaders of color--to realize that we're sitting in chairs and we're occupying chairs as a result of others that came before, and sometimes we get in those chairs, and there's this sense of, "Well, hey, I'm the only one, and if there's another then they're gonna have to knock me out or knock me down." And again, that's a scarcity model. That's an ambition model. That's not an aspiration model, and we have to realize that, you know, we have to be about the business of lifting others and making a difference in that way. In terms of advice and roles for non-minority leaders, I think the simplest thing can sometimes be just an expectation of something that simple. You know, sometimes there's this whole idea of, you know, "Well, gee, if I'm here--" You know, when I first started and took on a leadership role at Accenture and was leading several of our accounts here, I very consciously wanted to have the most diverse accounts, right? And I believed if I could create the most diverse accountsand if I could create accounts that were the best accounts at the firm that people would be fighting, you know, against each other trying to get on these accounts, and if I had the best talent, then the rest would take care of itself, and some of that has to be the same spirit and ethos that non-minority leaders would have in terms of creating a culture that rewards people that recognize diversity, that bring in diversity, and say to minority leaders themselves, "You know what? You are diverse, and if you bring in more diversity, that's a good thing. And if you're helping advance other diverse leaders, that's a good thing, and we're gonna reward that." And that's a positive thing. It's not a negative thing. It's not a scarcity model. It's an abundance model.Zach: Marty, this has been a great discussion. Before we go, do you have any parting words or shout-outs? In fact, and I don't want to put you on the spot, but I know that--I know that I have a colleague who--this is from years ago, and you might not remember saying this, but she made mention of the fact that you said something like we as a people--that black people, we're, like--we're the blue note. Do you recall that statement? I wasn't there, but she said you had a statement--Marty: I have lots of statements, but yes.Zach: Man, could you just wax poetic on that please? Because--and I don't--the reason why I ask is because I wasn't there, and she wasn't even able to fully articulate what you said, but her eyes glowed when she said it, and I was like, "Man, when I speak to him--" And this was literally 4 years ago. I said, "When I speak to Marty, I'm gonna ask him to talk about this."Marty: Hm, okay. Well, the concept of the blue note comes from jazz, right? And so there's this idea that--and it's something that, you know, in our firms nowadays, and Accenture is no exception, we talk all the time about the need for innovation, right, and the need for creativity and the need for--you know, as things are going along, there might be a disruption, or there might be something that comes along that creates dramatic change, and so really that's the idea of the blue note in jazz, right? It's the moment of improvisation. It's the moment when you don't know where or how the story's going to--the music and the story is going to unfold, and really that is--you know, whether you read Cornel West or Eric Dyson or others, that's really been our history, right? That's our story, of every time we've been on a journey as a country we have served in the role of the blue note, the improvisation that moves our story forward around the realization of those very first principles that were first embedded in the Declaration of Independence and in the Constitution. And so, you know, whether it was--you know, our battle, originally as enslaved people or later in terms of the Civil War and fighting for freedom or the battles for reconstruction or through civil rights, or now even today as we move forward with Black Lives Matter and other movements to more fully recognize the process of more fully recognizing our humanity and more fully recognizing our citizenship has been one that has caused the country to confront and to look at itself and its values in the mirror, and we've been that blue note to help the country evolve its definition and its story as we've gone along.Zach: Man, I love that. I love that, and now it's captured on this podcast. Marty, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us today. I'm beyond honored. I appreciate your time. We definitely consider you a friend of the show, and we hope to have you back.Marty: All right. Well, thank you, Zach, very much for having me. It's been an honor to be a part of it, and if I can ever be of help to folks on a journey, feel free to hit me up on LinkedIn or Twitter or otherwise. Happy to be of help.Zach: All right, Marty. Appreciate it. Peace.Marty: Take care. Bye-bye.

My guest in this episode is Ernest Nesmith. Ernest brings over 15 years of financial services experience that include wealth management, insurance planning, and tax consulting.  He has held the Series 7, 63, and 66 investment securities licenses and also holds his Life and Health Insurance License.  Ernest leverages the experience gained working in the corporate divisions of three Fortune 100 companies that include Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, and TIAA-CREF as well as working independently as a financial advisor.

In this episode, podcast host and author of “Control Your Retirement Destiny” Dana Anspach covers Chapter 7 of the 2nd edition of the book titled, “Company Benefits.” If you want to learn even more than what there is time to cover in the podcast series, you can find the book “Control Your Retirement Destiny” on Amazon. Or, if you are looking for a customized plan for your retirement, visit us at sensiblemoney.com to see how we can help.   Chapter 7 – Podcast Script Hi, this is Dana Anspach. I’m the founder and CEO of Sensible Money, a fee-only financial planning firm. I’m also the author of Control Your Retirement Destiny, a book that covers all the decisions you need to make as you plan for a transition into retirement. This podcast covers the material in Chapter 7, on company benefits. If you like what you hear today, go to Amazon and search for Control Your Retirement Destiny. Or, if you are looking for a customized financial plan, visit sensiblemoney.com to see how we can help. Let’s take a look at company benefits, and how you make the most of them. ————— Company benefits used to be simple. Our grandparents, and in some cases our parents, worked for the same company for 25 or 30 years and retired with a gold watch and a pension. Today, instead of pensions, most people have 401(k) plans. Now, you must decide how to invest your money, and when to take it out. In addition, you may have deferred compensation plans, stock options and various insurance benefits – ALL of which require you to make decisions. Company benefits are far more complex than they used to be. There are too many benefit programs out there to cover them all. Today we’re going to focus on the most common benefit option – the 401(k) plan. The goal is to show you how to use this type of retirement plan in a way that BENEFITS you the most. There are four key things I want to cover:The creditor protection rules that apply to your 401(k).The age-related rules that impact when you can access your money and how it is taxed.How to pick investments in your 401(k).What to consider when you are deciding whether you should leave your funds in your 401(k) plan, or roll them over to an IRA. First, creditor rules. Your 401(k) assets cannot be touched by your creditors, even in the event of bankruptcy. Hopefully, you’ll never need these rules. But, let me share with you a few real-life situations and how these rules apply. Suppose you get a great business idea. You are 100% sure it will work out – but in order to get it going you need a little cash. “Hey,” you think, “I’ll just borrow it out of my 401(k) plan.” Or, maybe cash in the 401(k) account. Bad idea. If your business does not work out, your 401(k) money is gone. Instead of using 401(k) money for a start-up business, use credit cards, or a bank loan. If you use a bank loan, and your business doesn’t work out, the worst case is that you file for bankruptcy—your 401(k) assets would then remain protected and still available for your retirement. Another situation that many people found themselves facing in 2008 and 2009 was a job loss. After losing their job, they, of course, didn’t want to lose their home, so many cashed in their 401(k)s to continue making their mortgage payments. Unfortunately, many used up all their retirement funds and then lost their home anyway. Making objective decisions about one’s home can be difficult, but as difficult as it may be, you need to look at the long-term consequences of any financial decision. In a job loss situation, you may spend a substantial amount of retirement money trying to keep a home that you end up losing. One lady I spoke with said, “The stupidest thing I ever did was cash out my 401(k) plan to try to keep that house.” Your 401(k) money is for retirement. That’s it. Don’t use it for any other purpose—particularly if you are in financial trouble. Using your 401(k) money before retirement voids a valuable form of protection that is available to you. You know why pensions worked out so well for prior generations? Because they COULD NOT use them before retirement. You need to treat your 401(k) plan the same way. ————— Next, let’s talk about some of the odd age-related rules that apply to 401(k) plan withdrawals. While you continue to work for a company, most of the time you can’t withdraw money from that 401(k) plan. Some plans offer hardship withdrawals, some offer loans and sometimes there is something available called an in-service withdrawal if you are age 59 ½ or older – but most of the time while you are still working there – you can’t access the funds. But let’s say you change employers and now have money in a 401(k) plan from some place you previously worked. Then what can you do? Usually you have a few options:You can leave it there.You can roll it over to an IRA and there are no taxes when this is done correctly.You can roll it to a new 401(k) plan and there are no taxes when this is done right either.You can withdraw it and pay taxes and possibly penalties. Let’s talk about option 4, withdrawing it. That’s where the age-related rules come in. When you withdraw money from a 401(k) plan you are taxed on it. If you take money out of a 401(k) plan before you reach the age of 59 ½, in addition to regular taxes, a 10% early withdrawal penalty tax also applies. Here’s what many people don’t know. There’s an odd rule about the age of 55. Let’s say you leave your employer AFTER you reach the age of 55, but before age 59 ½. Even though you are not 59 ½ yet, you can now access the money in that old 401(k) plan without paying the early withdrawal penalty tax. This early access rule DOES NOT apply if you roll the funds to an IRA or to a new plan. It also DOES NOT apply if you leave that employer BEFORE you reach the age of 55. Here’s what you need to remember. If you leave an employer after you attain age 55, but before age 59 ½, don’t automatically move the funds to an IRA or to a new employer plan. If you want to preserve your ability to access the funds penalty-free, you’ll leave the funds, or at least a portion of them, in your prior plan. And, if you’re a public safety employee – this early access rule kicks in at age 50 instead of age 55! In general, a public safety employee includes firefighters, police, emergency medical service employees, as well as air traffic controllers and customs and border protection officers. The IRS has a comprehensive list that you can check to see if you qualify for this definition. When you move past the early-access age of 50 or 55, the next important age is 59 ½. Once you attain age 59 ½, the penalty tax on withdrawals goes away. Regular income taxes, however, still apply. And, keep in mind, a rollover or transfer, where you move money from one plan to another, or from a 401(k) to an IRA, does not trigger taxes. I talk to many people who think if they withdraw funds from a plan at all – even in the form of a rollover – that they will have to pay taxes and possibly penalties. A rollover or transfer is a special rule in the IRS code that allows you to move money from one retirement plan to another WITHOUT triggering the taxes or penalties. The last critical age is 70 ½. At this age the IRS requires you to begin withdrawing money from 401(k)s, from IRAs, and from other types of retirement plans. There is a formula you must use each year to calculate the required withdrawal. This formula uses your year-end balance, along with the divisor that is based on your age. Here’s an example: Lynn is retired and reaches age 70½. Her IRA balance on Dec 31st for the previous year is exactly $350,000. Based on her age, the divisor Lynn must use is 27.4. She takes the year-end balance of $350,000 and divides it by 27.4 to calculate the $12,773.72 that she must take out. When she takes it out she will pay taxes on that amount. The distribution period decreases every subsequent year. For example, when Lynn is 88 years old, she will divide her retirement account balance by 12.7 to determine how much she must withdraw. If her account balance is still $350,000 that would be $27,559 that she must take out. You can always withdraw more than the required amount, but if you withdraw less, you could be subject to a 50% excise tax on the amount you did not withdraw in time. Yikes – 50% is a hefty tax. You want to make sure you take your required distributions (RMD). One thing to keep in mind - with a required distribution the money has to come out of the IRA account, but that doesn’t mean you have to spend it. One option is you can distribute investments, shares of a mutual fund or a stock, for example, and just move them out of your IRA account, into your brokerage account. Since the money came out of the IRA, it satisfies the RMD, but the funds remain invested. Another option is to make a charitable distribution. There’s something called a Qualified Charitable Distribution or QCD. You can distribute funds right from your IRA to a charity. There are some tax benefits to this, and it’s beyond the scope of this podcast for me to go into all the details, but if you don’t need the money from your IRA, it’s something you might want to look into. But what do you do if you are still working at 70 ½? Well, if you are not a 5% owner of the company you work for, you may be able to delay your required minimum distributions from your current employer plan until April 1st of the year after you retire. In this situation you are still required to take distributions from other retirement plans, just not from the one from your current employer. Next, let’s talk about how to make better investment decisions in your 401(k). If you are like a lot of people, you collect investment accounts over time. Maybe a 401(k) at one place, but then you leave that employer and leave the 401(k) plan there. You might open an IRA a few years later while you’re self-employed. Then start another 401(k) at a new employer a few years after that. And if you’re married, your spouse may also have their own collection. Rarely is this collection of investments aligned toward a common goal. Instead, most people tend to pick investments in a rather random way. Some look at what has recently had the highest performance and pick that. Other people go with something that sounds familiar. Some ask a co-worker. And, some are more thoughtful and do a little bit of research. Even if you are the research type, do you look at your investment portfolio as a household, or do you look at each individual account on its own? Suppose, for example, that your 401(k) plan offers a great low-cost S&P 500 index fund, while your spouse’s 401(k) plan offers only high cost growth funds, but also has a safe option called a stable value fund? Or if your single, maybe it’s that you have one set of funds available in a 401(k) and other choices in your IRA. If you are investing as a household, rather than balance each account, you might load up on the S&P fund in one account, while using more of the stable value fund in the other account. Although each account is not balanced, as a household, it creates a structure that may result in a better long-term outcome. If married, age differences also come into play. What if one half is ten years younger? It may make sense for the younger partner to have a more aggressive allocation, as it is the older of the two who will be the first to have to start taking required distributions. Whether single or married when you look at your investments at a household level, you can make choices that can lower the overall fees you pay, better align the investments to a specific outcome, and you can take advantage of options that may be available inside of one account but not in another. The last thing to talk about regarding 401(k)s is what to do when you leave your employer? Do you leave the funds there, or roll them to an IRA account or to a new plan? Most of the time, I think moving the funds is the best choice; however, first, let’s talk about three situations where moving the funds may NOT be the right thing to do. First, as we already discussed, if you leave your employer after you turned age 55 but before age 59½, if you move your 401(k) plan before age 59½ this will void your ability to access funds penalty-free. If you won’t need the money during that time, this won’t be relevant. But if there’s a chance you might need to take withdrawals, you may want to wait until age 59½ before you proceed with the rollover. Second, if your 401(k) plan offers a unique fixed income or guaranteed account option, that might warrant keeping funds in the plan. For example, some plans offer something called a guaranteed insurance contract (GIC) that pays an attractive fixed rate of return. Other plans, such as the options in the public education system through TIAA-CREF, offer a fixed account that usually pays a competitive rate. Some 401(k) plans offer stable value funds. All of these investment options are not easily replicated outside of the plan. If your plan offers these types of options, think twice before you roll it over. Third, don’t move funds out of an old 401(k) if you don’t know where to move the funds and don’t feel capable of making this decision right now. For example, maybe your 401(k) plan had something called a target date fund. The “target date” is a calendar year, and you pick a fund with a year that is closest to the year you think you might retire. So, if you will reach age 65 in the year 2035, you would pick a Target Date fund with the year closest to 2035. This type of fund automatically invests for you and makes changes to the investments as you get closer to the target year. For those who don’t know what else to do, I think these can be GREAT choices. So, if you don’t want to go through the process of finding a financial planner, and don’t want to do your own research, leaving the funds in a place where they can easily remain invested in a Target Date fund can be better than trying to guess about picking new investments - and it is much better than making a rushed decision and hiring the wrong kind of person to help. What if none of these three situations apply to you? Then my view is that rolling the old 401(k) to an IRA or to a new plan makes sense. Here’s why: First, it is a lot easier to keep track of. When it comes to address changes and beneficiary changes, you now have one less place where you have to do paperwork. Second, it is much easier to invest. When your accounts are scattered across old plans, next thing you know you get a notice from one plan or another that they are changing the 401(k) provider, or switching out one fund option for another. Each time this happens you have to realign your investment allocation. When you consolidate accounts, this process is easier to manage.Third, in an IRA, you have choices that are not available inside 401(k) plans, such as CDs and individual bonds. If you are building a customized portfolio designed to help your money last as long as possible, having this broader set of choices may help you build a better plan. And now, you are in control of the investments – so if your employer changes fund companies it won’t impact you. One thing to watch out for with rollovers - from the time the funds leave one plan, they must be deposited to another qualified account within a 60-day time frame. The paperwork must be done right to avoid the taxes – so take your time and read the fine print when doing rollovers or transfers. We’ve now touched on the basics of 401(k) plans. We’ve talked about the creditor protection rules that apply to 401(k)s, the age related rules, what to think about when choosing investments, and we’ve looked at how rollovers work and when it does and does not make sense to do them. ————————— Thank you for taking the time to listen today. The printed version of Chapter 7 of Control Your Retirement Destiny has additional content that covers numerous types of stock option plans and deferred compensation plans as wells a pension plans. Visit amazon.com to get a copy in either electronic or hard copy format. You can also visit sensiblemoney.com, to see how a staff of expert retirement planners can help.    

Financial Planning expert Nick Hopwood, CFP® and Jim Pilat, AIF® talk about the 403b investment landscape, focusing on a NYT article from a few years back. Fortunately we have arrangements with non-profit institutions such as Universities, school districts, and hospitals which all us to represent employees such as teachers, professors, doctors, and nurses with their 403b accounts at investment companies such as Fidelity and TIAA-CREF.  If you're looking for a second opinion on your workplace 403b account, please give us a call at 734-681-7575. Peak Wealth Management is not affiliated with any non-profit or Fidelity or TIAA-CREF.  Peak Wealth Management is a financial advisor located in Plymouth, MI. We believe by providing education and guidance, we inspire our clients to make great decisions putting them on a path toward fulfillment and their own definition of true wealth.

During this Dollars and Cents segment, MSUFCU Senior Financial Educator, Ian Oberg discusses Michigan's 529 College Savings Program with Sal A. Vassallo, Tuition Financing Consultant for TIAA-CREF. Dollars and Cents is sponsored by MSUFCU. The reference to any product, service, trade name, trademark, or manufacturer, is not an endorsement by Capital Area District Libraries. [**Michigan Education Savings Program**](https://misaves.com/) **Email:** [**sal.vassallo@tiaa.org**](mailto:sal.vassallo@tiaa.org) [**Article referenced on podcast**](https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackfriedman/2018/06/13/student-loan-debt-statistics-2018/#7809946731) [**Michigan State University Federal Credit Union**](https://msufcu.org/) **Email**: **[ian.oberg@msufcu.org](mailto:ian.oberg@msufcu.org)**

Episode 8: TIAA-CREF Retirement Plans Vastly Underperform by Secure Retirement Strategies

On October 21, 2017 a pretty damaging New York Times article came out about a company — TIAA or TIAA CREF — that we have long admired. We discuss.  The Finger-Pointing at the Finance Firm TIAA 403(b)wise Meridian Wealth Management Moreland & Arbuckle

Recently some allegations have been raised against one of the largest financial services companies on the planet, TIAA-CREF. For years, TIAA-CREF (now just TIAA) has operated as a non-profit helping to manage the retirements of...

Warren Buffett once said on CNBC: “The world—there’s always uncertainty. Now the question is, what do you do with your money?” Buffett may have been talking about public markets – even personal – investing. But even on the institutional side, given that we are continually surrounded by uncertainty and given that stuffing cash under a mattress – while relatively certain – carries no financial return, how should today’s institutional investors think about uncertainty? More specifically, is there a way to consider uncertainty –use it as an investing philosophy – to drive outsized returns? And if so, where can we turn for a guide? It turns out there is a small group of long-horizon end investors who consistently perform well in private markets. Their superior performance in this area of investing has contributed heavily to their overall superior long-term performance. That group is endowments. And if investing into uncertainty feels like a potentially uncomfortable approach, it’s also one that Daniel Feder has discussed, practiced, and succeeded with for years. Feder is the Managing Director of Private Markets at the Washington University Investment Management Company. That’s the group that runs the endowment for Washington University in St. Louis. Previously Feder served as Managing Director of Private Markets for the Sequoia Capital Heritage Fund, an endowment-style investment fund sponsored by Sequoia Capital. He also served as Senior Investment Manager in the endowment services area at TIAA-CREF, and Managing Director at Princeton University Investment Company, the investment office for Princeton University’s endowment, where Dan led the development of a $4.0 billion global private equity and venture capital portfolio.

Quianna Rodriguez is the Founder of Happy Work Week where she provides people and organizations with coaching solutions that creates confidence, direction, and a precise plan of action for success. As a Master Certified Coach, Certified Career Coach, and Group Coach, she is committed to provide unparalleled service and performance that demands lifelong breakthroughs. For over 10 years she provided Technical Writing, Education & Training, and Information Technology expertise to both military and corporate agencies. Quianna continues to educate and train others by providing corporate seminars and workshops at companies such as TIAA-CREF and is currently a Professional Development Instructor at the Carolina School of Broadcasting in Charlotte, North Carolina. Recently, Ms. Rodriguez was on our show talking about Millennials And The Modern Workplace. During our conversation, Ms. Rodriguez talked about: – The story behind how she went full time with her business Happy Work Week – How feels millennials are changing today's workplace and if companies are investing in millennials – Her thoughts about and comments on various myths about millennials and the workplace including leadership, guidance, job satisfaction – Her call to actionscompanies, older people and millennials in regards to millennials and the modern workplace You can find out more about Ms. Rodriguez via: Website Twitter Facebook Instagram Please feel free to email us at dr.vibe@thedrvibeshow.com Please feel free to “Like” the “The Dr. Vibe Show” Facebook fan page at “The Dr. Vibe Show” Facebook Fan Page Visit our website at http://www.thedrvibeshow.com/ God bless, peace, be well and keep the faith, Dr. Vibe

Quianna Rodriguez is the Founder of Happy Work Week where she provides people and organizations with coaching solutions that creates confidence, direction, and a precise plan of action for success. As a Master Certified Coach, Certified Career Coach, and Group Coach, she is committed to provide unparalleled service and performance that demands lifelong breakthroughs. For over 10 years she provided Technical Writing, Education & Training, and Information Technology expertise to both military and corporate agencies. Quianna continues to educate and train others by providing corporate seminars and workshops at companies such as TIAA-CREF and is currently a Professional Development Instructor at the Carolina School of Broadcasting in Charlotte, North Carolina. Recently, Ms. Rodriguez was on our talking about The Modern Workplace. During our conversation, she talked about: – Life growing up in Ohio and how is she the same/different than her mother – Her experience in the military and what did she learn from it and why she left – The experience teaching young kids – Why did get into coaching – The story behind Happy Work Week and the Work Week Challenge – Memories of her first client and that most of her clients are men – How are men and women responding to the modern workplace – Some of the challenges in today's workplace You can find out more about Ms. Rodriguez via: Website Twitter Facebook Instagram Please feel free to email us at dr.vibe@thedrvibeshow.com Visit our website at http://www.thedrvibeshow.com/ God bless, peace, be well and keep the faith,  Dr. Vibe 

Welcome to the Autism Advantage podcast! I’m your host, Tom D’Eri, the COO and co-founder of Rising Tide Car Wash. In case you’re not familiar with what we do, we employ a fantastic team of individuals with autism, allowing us to empower our staff while offering a fantastic experience to customers. We believe that individuals with autism are an incredible untapped resource for many business, and this show is dedicated to proving that employing these people can create real competitive advantages. My fantastic guest today is James Emmett, who is one of the world’s leading disability employment consultants. James is and has been the driving force behind many large corporate programs for people with autism and other disabilities at major companies such as TIAA-CREF, Best Buy, Walgreens, Pepsi, and Office Depot. He was also instrumental in helping us at Rising Tide Car Wash get off the ground. In 2004, James met Randy Lewis, the senior vice president at Walgreens. Randy invited James the opportunity to help plan out the Walgreen outreach initiative that focused on people with autism. This experience helped James realize how much potential there was within corporate situations for people with autism. Since having learned about this incredible potential, he has taken that awareness to other companies and created opportunities there. There are so many benefits for a company when it comes to hiring people with autism. James has seen an increase in morale among the incoming employees with autism, but also the current employees at a company that launches an autism-related initiative. Companies also experience their cultures changing to be positive and forward-thinking. These are just a few of the many great benefits that James describes. I’m excited to have James on the show because he offers such a different perspective than many of our previous guests. Instead of having opened a new business geared toward employing people with autism, James’ extensive experience is with working within existing organizations to create employment opportunities for individuals with autism. Don’t miss this great episode, in which we also talk about some of the specific advantages of employing people with autism, why hiring these people can help create systems that turn out to be better than the existing ones for neurotypical employees, how important it is to have community support, and much more. In This Episode: [01:37] - What inspired James to work with large companies and help them harness the advantages of employing people with autism and other disabilities? [03:18] - James describes what it’s like to work with these companies and create programs for employing people with autism. [04:44] - We hear about the realizations that people come to in terms of the specific advantages of employing people with autism. [06:53] - Tom draws out something unique about what James have said: that individuals with autism and other disabilities have faced barriers their whole lives, and have needed to learn to break through them. They bring this grit and resilience to their employers. [07:23] - James talks more about how this familiarity with breaking through obstacles translates to the work environment. Tom then relates what James has said to the way that they hire people at Rising Tide Car Wash. [10:28] - When James is talking to a new client, how does he communicate the specific benefits that he and Tom have been discussing? [13:18] - James talks about how translating what happens at a few sites to the broader organization works. [15:19] - Tom digs into how the ripple effect from making changes at one distribution center can change things for many more people. [16:24] - We hear more about how James has convinced people that this will positively affect the daily operations of a business. [19:38] - How would James recommend that someone who works at an organization that doesn’t currently have a disability employment program go about starting something and creating change at their company? [21:42] - Tom elaborates on the advice James has been giving about getting support from the community. [22:43] - James hopes that within the next ten years is that every Fortune 500 company will have a disability inclusion strategy. [25:24] - How can listeners get in touch with James or hire him as a consultant to help them navigate their disability employment strategy? Links and Resources: JEC James Emmett & Co James Emmett on LinkedIn @JamesEmmett on Twitter ADVICE Randy Lewis Disability inclusion at Walgreens TIAA-CREF Best Buy Walgreens Pepsi Office Depot Tom D’Eri Rising Tide Car Wash Rising Tide U Autism Advantage University of Miami-Nova Southeastern University Center for Autism & Related Disabilities FAU Center for Autism & Related Disabilities Broward County Public Schools The Dan Marino Foundation Autism Speaks New York Collaborates for Autism The Poses Family Foundation

Mike Pacchione (bonus points if you can pronounce his last name without making a "ch" sound) taught Public Speaking for seven years before starting at Duarte in 2012. Since then, he has facilitated nearly 200 workshops for some of the biggest brands in the world. A quick list includes Google, Nike, Twitter, Microsoft, Slack, Boeing, StateFarm, PepsiCo, Liberty Mutual, American Express, Gilead Sciences, MedImmune, Capital One, Bank of America, TIAA-Cref, DirecTV and similar companies.  He still teaches on the side while also advising startups on investor pitches. He has presented at Nike, South by Southwest, the Northwest Communication Association, the Oregon Entrepreneurial Network and several startup incubators in Portland, Oregon (where he lives). His work has been included in Toastmasters Magazine and he has appeared on podcasts such as The Speakers Lab, Domino Effect and Academic Life in Emergency Medicine (ALiEM).

Jill Christensen - If you're not having fun at work you're disengaged 6:30-8:00 p.m.: "The Topic of Conversation - Radio Podcast" Hosted by Rob Scoggins Jr. (Sponsored by Reed Art & Imaging) This radio program/podcast includes a 30-minute meet-and-greet session, then a one-hour recording of the show. Rob's guest is Jill Christensen, founder and president of Jill Christensen International. In her career of 25-plus years, she has led global internal communications teams at industry-leading Fortune 500 companies, including Avaya and Western Union. She also has advised executives, and directed communications employee engagement programs, in seven industries, with companies such as AT&T, Lucent Technologies, Arrow, Novartis, TIAA-CREF, CSG International, Orica Mining, and the City & County of Denver. http://thetopicofconversation.com/ Music By: Bensound.com

TIAA-CREF has reached a $3 billion close on TIAA-CREF Global Agriculture II LLC, a global agriculture investment partnership. The post TIAA-CREF Unveils $3 Billion Global Ag Investment Vehicle (Premium Content) appeared first on Global AgInvesting.

Join the interview in progress featuring Seth Hanford, Manager of the Detection & Response Team at TIAA-CREF and chair of the CVSS Special Interest Group (SIG). Hear the latest updates on the specification and what to expect during conference week. Seth will be leading the CVSS v3 Hands-on Training session on Wednesday, June 17th at 10:30. There is also a scheduled CVSS Birds of a Feather session set for Monday, June 15th at 11am.

This morning, I put out a note on the Patreon page for questions from the patrons and I received four: 02:38 I'm currently in the "Financial Stability" stage of building wealth. Where do you recommend keeping an emergency fund &/or savings for large purchases? 17:36 My only major financial goal is to buy a small condo in Hollywood in about 6-7 years. I am 33 years old, single and don't plan on starting a family. I have about $170K in investments/retirement and am on track to have an additional 80-90K saved for the condo in about six years. I want to make a 50% down payment on a $200K condo (so basically a 100K down payment).   My dream is to have a super low monthly mortgage payment (around $500 - 600 per month). That would be very freeing for me! I want the flexibility in life + career that low monthly expenses would give me. Am I crazy to make such a big down payment? I know its almost half of my net worth, but it feels right for my lifestyle choices.   I'm tired of being stuck in the super-high trendy-city apartment renting hamster wheel ;)  30:19 I have a 529 for my oldest son. I am planning on transferring that to my wife as she will be going back to school in August of 2016. She is a teacher, once she graduates with a specialist degree she will receive an automatic $5,000 annual pay raise. We estimate the program will cost $15,000 and can be completed in 18 months-24 months. The 529 plan is currently invested very aggressively (based on our oldest son's age of 6). I am planning on immediately changing the investment to the guaranteed option (1-1.25%). Am I missing any other investment options? We use Georgia's 529 plan which is TIAA-CREF based. It seems an easy choice to me. What else am I missing? Any other thoughts? The current value is $12,700 and we contribute $600 per year. If we are short during the last semester or two, we plan on paying with excess cash flow we hope to save up by then.  40:34 If you were at a "Financial Stability" stage 3.5 in the US (debt is eliminated and about 50% of basic items are addressed) and were planning on moving overseas for 2 years (in 2 years), what steps would you take to secure your financial future? Enjoy the show! Joshua New Charter University http://new.edu/info/tuition/ Become a Patron of the show! http://radicalpersonalfinance.com/patron

I’ve been privileged to have many amazing women on the show! And today’s guest is no exception. Manisha Thakor is a founder of MoneyZen.com and a financial literacy advocate for women, who co-authored two critically acclaimed personal finance books: On My Own Two Feet: A Modern Girl’s Guide to Personal Finance and Get Financially Naked: How to Talk Money With Your Honey. Manisha is a Chartered Financial Analyst who spent over 20 years working in the financial services industry. In 2009, she launched her Financial Education practice. And in 2012, she started her independent Wealth Management practice, MoneyZen.com which recently merged with Buckingham Family of Financial Services. Today, in addition to her current role with Buckingham as a Director of Wealth Strategies for Women, she also serves as a consultant to TIAA-CREF’s Women’s Engagement Initiative and is on the National Board of the Girls Scouts. Three takeaways from our interview: -- How Manisha got hooked on personal finance -- Her best stress-reduction secret -- Her go-to investing approach … an approach she only RECENTLY realized is the BEST way to go …after many years in the industry. For more, visit SoMoneyPodcast.com

Gail Blanke is founder, president, and chief executive officer of Lifedesigns, LLC, a company whose vision is to empower men and women worldwide to live truly exceptional lives.A renowned executive coach and presentation skills trainer, Ms. Blanke has advised CEO’s, presidential candidates, college presidents – and a jazz musician. Current clients include executives at GE, NY Presbyterian, Merck, TIAA-Cref, Bank of America, McGraw Hill, Feeding America and Gannett.

Gail Blanke is founder, president, and chief executive officer of Lifedesigns, LLC, a company whose vision is to empower men and women worldwide to live truly exceptional lives.A renowned executive coach and presentation skills trainer, Ms. Blanke has advised CEO’s, presidential candidates, college presidents – and a jazz musician. Current clients include executives at GE, NY Presbyterian, Merck, TIAA-Cref, Bank of America, McGraw Hill, Feeding America and Gannett. - See more at: http://www.eaglestalent.com/Gail-Blanke?gclid=CjwKEAiA2dSkBRCX8KmK5YrFviwSJACeYweC0wIEZR44ykuFj9Xx3YSjx2tss9r2oK4wu6zj1WmlJBoC6Kjw_wcB#sthash.V9WNM3Ao.dpuf

Gail Blanke is founder, president, and chief executive officer of Lifedesigns, LLC, a company whose vision is to empower men and women worldwide to live truly exceptional lives.A renowned executive coach and presentation skills trainer, Ms. Blanke has advised CEO’s, presidential candidates, college presidents – and a jazz musician. Current clients include executives at GE, NY Presbyterian, Merck, TIAA-Cref, Bank of America, McGraw Hill, Feeding America and Gannett. - See more at: http://www.eaglestalent.com/Gail-Blanke?gclid=CjwKEAiA2dSkBRCX8KmK5YrFviwSJACeYweC0wIEZR44ykuFj9Xx3YSjx2tss9r2oK4wu6zj1WmlJBoC6Kjw_wcB#sthash.V9WNM3Ao.dpuf

Gail Blanke is founder, president, and chief executive officer of Lifedesigns, LLC, a company whose vision is to empower men and women worldwide to live truly exceptional lives.A renowned executive coach and presentation skills trainer, Ms. Blanke has advised CEO’s, presidential candidates, college presidents – and a jazz musician. Current clients include executives at GE, NY Presbyterian, Merck, TIAA-Cref, Bank of America, McGraw Hill, Feeding America and Gannett.

Email questions about a TIAA/CREF, dividend funds, and should a couple pay off their house or invest more into their portfolio.

THIS EPISODE Mike and old friend Chad Hartley get together after the Belmont Criterium in Charlotte, NC, to catch up and swap stories over a bourbon or two.In a career that's spanned decades, Chad first started racing BMX as a teenager, turned pro at age 19, and after a stint with Jittery Joe's joined Mike on TIAA-CREF (later to morph into Slipstream/Chipotle and finally Team Garmin). Teammate, training buddy, prankster, and all-around good guy, Chad lived with Mike in Silver City back in the day, and in spite of Creed's derision, has followed the team director path, currently as rider-manager with Athlete Octane Cycling (formerly Sharecare), a team focusing primarily on domestic criterium racing.Following a lengthy reminiscence of their best "pantsing" episodes – including a brawl in a Cracker Barrel – the guys share what is perhaps the best-ever Mike "Meatball" Friedman story.Lest you think this conversation is all about punking, Mike and Chad have a thoughtful and fascinating conversation about racing then and now, and how the pro peloton and the nature of racing has changed, along with a timely and germane debate about the pros and cons of stage racing vs. criterium racing and how the nuances can sometimes be not so apparent to outside spectators.You will be utterly engrossed by this free-wheeling conversation between really good friends, teammates, and colleagues.As always, Open Mic with Mike Creed is presented by The Colorado Cyclist, Mike's very first professional cycling team in 1998. Thanks to everyone at Colorado Cyclist for their support of Mike over the years, and a big thank you to them for stepping up and sponsoring the podcast and offering $50 gift cards to our Twitter contest winners. Please visit their website at coloradocyclist.com and give them a follow on Twitter at @Co_Cyclist to show your appreciation for everything they do for us.Right now, place any order with them over $100 and receive a gift certificate worth 10% of your order. Call (800) 688-8600 for details.(Please note: when redeeming your gift certificate, please include certificate number, password and dollar amount in the comments box at final checkout.)Colorado Cyclist is now offering free shipping on any order over $40 via UPS ground to the lower 48 states!!!We're also grateful for the continuing partnership with Chris Smith and Lazer Helmets. Every podcast we'll be giving away either a Lazer helmet or pair of Lazer sunglasses. All you need to do is mention @LazerHelmets or @Lazer_Vision on Twitter with a clever tweet that conforms to the week's contest rules. If your tweet is chosen, you'll win a Lazer item.This week we're giving away a pair of Lazer shades. You just need to tweet at @Lazer_Vision and hashtag #LazerVision or #OpenMic why you need these glasses or where you would use the glasses. A winner will be selected next Thursday and announced on Friday before the week's podcast.Good luck, and as always, thanks for listening!  

THIS EPISODE Mike and old friend Chad Hartley get together after the Belmont Criterium in Charlotte, NC, to catch up and swap stories over a bourbon or two. In a career that's spanned decades, Chad first started racing BMX as a teenager, turned pro at age 19, and after a stint with Jittery Joe's joined Mike on TIAA-CREF (later to morph into Slipstream/Chipotle and finally Team Garmin). Teammate, training buddy, prankster, and all-around good guy, Chad lived with Mike in Silver City back in the day, and in spite of Creed's derision, has followed the team director path, currently as rider-manager with Athlete Octane Cycling (formerly Sharecare), a team focusing primarily on domestic criterium racing. Following a lengthy reminiscence of their best "pantsing" episodes – including a brawl in a Cracker Barrel – the guys share what is perhaps the best-ever Mike "Meatball" Friedman story. Lest you think this conversation is all about punking, Mike and Chad have a thoughtful and fascinating conversation about racing then and now, and how the pro peloton and the nature of racing has changed, along with a timely and germane debate about the pros and cons of stage racing vs. criterium racing and how the nuances can sometimes be not so apparent to outside spectators. You will be utterly engrossed by this free-wheeling conversation between really good friends, teammates, and colleagues. As always, Open Mic with Mike Creed is presented by The Colorado Cyclist, Mike’s very first professional cycling team in 1998. Thanks to everyone at Colorado Cyclist for their support of Mike over the years, and a big thank you to them for stepping up and sponsoring the podcast and offering $50 gift cards to our Twitter contest winners. Please visit their website at coloradocyclist.com and give them a follow on Twitter at @Co_Cyclist to show your appreciation for everything they do for us. Right now, place any order with them over $100 and receive a gift certificate worth 10% of your order. Call (800) 688-8600 for details.(Please note: when redeeming your gift certificate, please include certificate number, password and dollar amount in the comments box at final checkout.) Colorado Cyclist is now offering free shipping on any order over $40 via UPS ground to the lower 48 states!!! We're also grateful for the continuing partnership with Chris Smith and Lazer Helmets. Every podcast we'll be giving away either a Lazer helmet or pair of Lazer sunglasses. All you need to do is mention @LazerHelmets or @Lazer_Vision on Twitter with a clever tweet that conforms to the week's contest rules. If your tweet is chosen, you'll win a Lazer item. This week we're giving away a pair of Lazer shades. You just need to tweet at @Lazer_Vision and hashtag #LazerVision or #OpenMic why you need these glasses or where you would use the glasses. A winner will be selected next Thursday and announced on Friday before the week's podcast. Good luck, and as always, thanks for listening!    

THIS EPISODE Mike gets together with Skratch Labs saveurs Allen Lim and Biju Thomas, and the trio talk about everything from soup to nuts (well, really, rice cakes to smoked barbecue). We learn some fascinating parallel immigration stories from Allen's and Biju's childhoods, and discover the early experiences that shaped their respective drives to succeed. The guys share stories about how they got their start in cycling, and reminisce about the seminal years together on the TIAA-CREF team.We learn from Allen Lim – whom Creed asserts actually invented the idea of "marginal gains" – that it's less about marginal gains and more about removing the limiting factors - the bottlenecks - to performance and training, and how those innovative principles became the foundation for not only Lim's methodology as a DS, but the very core tenets to this next adventure with Biju and Skratch Labs.Along the way we also get some funny stories about Creed using the Secret Salty Drink Mix sleeves as pixie sticks, as well as some special training involving holding your breath (really, it's science...).You're sure to find this engaging conversation a fascinating departure from what you might have expected.Open Mic with Mike Creed is sponsored by The Colorado Cyclist, Mike's very first professional cycling team in 1998. Thanks to everyone at Colorado Cyclist for their support of Mike over the years, and a big thank you to them for stepping up and sponsoring the podcast and offering $50 gift cards to our Twitter contest winners. Please visit their website at coloradocyclist.com and give them a follow on Twitter at @Co_Cyclist to show your appreciation for everything they do for us.Be sure to call them at 1-800-688-8600 and mention the podcast for 15% off your purchase.

THIS EPISODE Mike gets together with Skratch Labs saveurs Allen Lim and Biju Thomas, and the trio talk about everything from soup to nuts (well, really, rice cakes to smoked barbecue). We learn some fascinating parallel immigration stories from Allen's and Biju's childhoods, and discover the early experiences that shaped their respective drives to succeed. The guys share stories about how they got their start in cycling, and reminisce about the seminal years together on the TIAA-CREF team. We learn from Allen Lim – whom Creed asserts actually invented the idea of "marginal gains" – that it's less about marginal gains and more about removing the limiting factors - the bottlenecks - to performance and training, and how those innovative principles became the foundation for not only Lim's methodology as a DS, but the very core tenets to this next adventure with Biju and Skratch Labs. Along the way we also get some funny stories about Creed using the Secret Salty Drink Mix sleeves as pixie sticks, as well as some special training involving holding your breath (really, it's science...). You're sure to find this engaging conversation a fascinating departure from what you might have expected. Open Mic with Mike Creed is sponsored by The Colorado Cyclist, Mike’s very first professional cycling team in 1998. Thanks to everyone at Colorado Cyclist for their support of Mike over the years, and a big thank you to them for stepping up and sponsoring the podcast and offering $50 gift cards to our Twitter contest winners. Please visit their website at coloradocyclist.com and give them a follow on Twitter at @Co_Cyclist to show your appreciation for everything they do for us. Be sure to call them at 1-800-688-8600 and mention the podcast for 15% off your purchase.

Baruch College School of Public Affairs presents a series of events at the Third Annual Public Affairs Week. Two panelists speak on "The Financing of Public Higher Education: Is it in Peril": John W. Wiley, Chancellor, University of Wisconsin at Madison, and Dr. Paul E. Lingenfelter, President, State Higher Education Executive Officers. David Birdsell, Dean of Baruch College School of Public Affairs makes the welcoming remarks. Rosemary Markowski, Director of Institutional Counseling Services, TIAA-CREF speaks briefly after Dean Birdsell's opening remarks. Moderated by John McGarraghy, Professor, School of Public Affairs, the event takes place on March 30, 2006 at Baruch Vertical Campus, 14-220.

Roger W. Ferguson, Jr., President and Chief Executive Officer of TIAA-CREF speaks on the topic: Keeping a Long-Term View in Challenging Times

Institutional Investors? Expectations of Boards, TK Kerstetter, President, Corporate Board Member, Stephen Brown, Director, Corporate Governance, TIAA-CREF

Come and learn tips from Andrea R. Nierenberg, bestselling author and world-renowned business authority, she is the force behind The Nierenberg Group. Called a “networking success story” by The Wall Street Journal, With a stellar 25 years as a leader in sales and marketing, Andrea is an in-demand business expert both at home and abroad. Her company partners with an array of the world’s leading businesses, including Citigroup, Time Inc., TIAA-CREF, The Food Network, Omnicom, Coach, Deutsche Bank, Tiffany and Douglas Elliman Real Estate, to name just a few. Andrea is the author of three bestselling books—all of which have become essential reading for businesses worldwide. Nonstop Networking: How To Improve Your Life, Luck and Career —used by companies as a business development textbook and a top seller at Amazon.com. Million Dollar Networking: The Sure Way to Find, Grow and Keep Your Business — the ultimate textbook for her corporate clients. Savvy Networking: 118 Fast & Effective Tips for Business Success — a critical tool for professionals looking for simple ways to boost their business. Andrea speaks in cross-cultural settings international companies and conferences. Her travels have taken her to 45 countries. Andrea has been featured in The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, Selling Power, Sales & Marketing Management, Inc. Magazine, The Associated Press, Chicago Tribune, Entrepreneur, and Training & Development. Her corporate experience and wealth of expertise makes her a familiar face on television with numerous appearances on popular outlets such as Bloomberg Business Television, Time-Warner’s Fortune Business Report, Fox News Chicago, Wall Street

As the retirement service provider for The University of Alabama, TIAA-CREF supports the financial well-being of those working in the academic, medical, cultural and research fields, and provides an expanding range of investment and insurance products. The “Great Recession” may have run its course, but the road ahead for the economy and the markets may still have some twists, turns and unexpected speed bumps ahead. While GDP is up, personal incomes are down. Corporate profits have risen, but job creation remains elusive. Meanwhile, interest rates and inflation may be poised to rise. Given the mix of economic signals, what does the path to long-term recovery look like? In a post-recession environment, do we need to reinvent the way we plan and save for retirement? Where can we turn for a sense of direction and guidance to navigate the new challenges looming on the horizon?

Joining Doug is Roger Ferguson, President and CEO of TIAA-CREF. For over 90 years, TIAA-CREF has been helping those in the academic, medical, cultural and research fields plan for and live in retirement.

P. Brett Hammond's lecture was given on April 2, 2009. P. Brett Hammond is a Managing Director and Chief Investment Strategist for TIAA-CREF and serves as the company’s ambassador on issues relating to the macro economy, financial markets, and long-term investing. He is also chair of the Research Council on Global Investment, an organization of senior leaders in pension and investment management. Hammond is a member of the Forbes.com Intelligent Investing Channel’s All-Star Investor Panel and a frequent resource on topics relating to long-term investing for outlets including The New York Times, Washington Post, Associated Press, CNNMoney, Pensions & Investments, International Herald Tribune, CNBC, and Bloomberg Television. Prior to joining TIAA-CREF, Hammond held positions at the National Academy of Sciences, UCLA, and UC-Berkeley. He received a Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.