Beach Reading on Personal Finance

I will be on vacation next week. Not at the beach exactly but at the lake with family.

I like to get a little recreational reading in when I am on vacation, taking me away briefly from the legal and technical reading that fills my workdays. I guess you could say that I am a “beach reader” because I am fond of those action paperbacks that you read, enjoy, then forget what the book was about a week later. Read more

Principles of Economics: Business, Banking, Finance, and Your Everyday Life (Book Review)

We Must Learn How Politicians are Exploiting Current Events

As I write this review, Congress is working hard to load the Wall Street rescue bill with dozens of extra provisions in a costly and misguided attempt to save segments of the middle class from themselves.  (Those that bought homes they could not afford.)  I’ve also read that some Democrats are clamoring for a provision that would cap compensation for corporate executives, striking another blow against the free market.  There will be others and it will be ugly.  Our economic system is being transformed in an accelerated devolution.  Read more

Yes, You Can Still Retire Comfortably! – A Book Review

I read a lot in the areas of personal finance.  As a baby boomer, I make sure to include large doses of reading in retirement planning.  Regardless of your age, you should do the same.  I recently finished reading “Yes, You Can Still Retire Comfortably!” which was authored by Ben Stein and Phil DeMuth and published in 2005.  This is my review of that book. Read more

Investing for Baby Boomers – A Book Review

“You’re Fifty – Now What?  Investing for the Second Half of Your Life” (Charles R. Schwab)

I admit it, I’m a baby boomer.  That means I read books with words like “fifty” in the title, including this one.  It could have been titled “Investing for Baby Boomers” (as I’ve listed it in the title of this post) because that is the essential focus of the book.  I suppose my title just doesn’t have enough “pop.”   The title tag line is a good one because I feel like I truly am in the second half of my life.  (Mathematically I’m probably more than half-way through, at least of the parts that I will remember!) Read more

Personal Finance Education – Books I am Reading

I read and study constantly in personal finance.  I am particularly interested in portfolio theory, asset allocation, retirement tax planning, and retirement withdrawal rates and portfolio survival. Read more