By 2 Cents on October 24th, 2011 | Category: Book Reviews |  It’s about taking control of your future so that when you finally get there you’re not surprised at what it looks like. And it’s about making sure you know the truth and deal from a place of fact, not fear.
~ Gail Vaz-Oxlade
Planning for retirement can be confusing – so much so that many of us avoid it altogether. If you’re Canadian, you might be further confused by the fact that much of the information out there is directed at Americans. While the basic principles of retirement saving know no borders, there are significant differences in the types of retirement saving vehicles out there and their corresponding tax laws.
It goes without saying that avoidance is not a good retirement strategy. No worries. Gail Vaz-Oxlade’s latest book called Never Too Late: Take Control of Your Retirement and Your Futurecan help you set a course for [...]
Read on and enjoy … Never Too Late: Book Review and Giveaway
By 2 Cents on October 13th, 2011 | Category: Retirement |  The following is a guest post. Please go ahead and share your own thoughts in the comments section.
The current recession and bear market has created difficulties and decisions for private investors across the board, but reactions are slightly different depending on one’s age. Older investors have been switching over to safer investments, such as bonds and CDs. Middle age investors, reaching the peak of their earning potential, have sought to diversify their portfolio while riding the recession out. But what about younger investors? I’m talking about those people who are in their twenties or thirties, have only recently moved into stable jobs, and have limited investments in the market – if they have any at all. Should this demographic start investing now, when the market is low? Or should they wait until the economy is healthier before putting their money in?
Someone in that age range should [...]
Read on and enjoy … You’re Young. The Economy is Bad. Time to Invest in the Stock Market?
By 2 Cents on September 8th, 2011 | Category: 20 Cents |  I’m quite late with my August collection of articles thanks to a busy couple of weeks moving. I’ll write more about our experiences next week. Thanks to those who wished us well and to those who continued to read/check in/comment at Balance Junkie during my extended absence. We’re still settling in, but I’ll try to get to all of the emails, comments and requests I’ve been neglecting as soon as possible. Thanks for your patience.
In the meantime, I didn’t think it would be fair to deprive you of some of the great reading I discovered in between long hours of packing and unpacking boxes. Consider this belated collection my little contribution to an extended summer that is notably lacking in the weather around here.
1. Jeffrey Sachs, Professor of Economics and Director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University wrote about The Economics [...]
Read on and enjoy … 20 Cents from August 2011
By 2 Cents on March 9th, 2011 | Category: Investing |  Patience and perseverance have a magical effect before which difficulties disappear and obstacles vanish.
~John Quincy Adams
Inflation has been in the headlines a lot lately. Many point to food price spikes as a key factor in the eruption of bloody protests in the Middle East and North Africa. Instability in these regions has only added to inflation concerns as it has caused the price of oil to surpass the psychologically important $100 per barrel mark.
I recently wrote about where Canadians should invest if inflation rises and I included Real Return Bonds (RRBs) as an option. These are inflation-protected bonds issued by the Canadian government. They are analogous to the Treasury Inflation Protected Securities (TIPS) issued by the U.S. Treasury.
If you follow the financial markets at all, you likely noticed that bond prices have taken quite a [...]
Read on and enjoy … Inflation Protection: Are Real Return Bonds or TIPS the Answer?
By 2 Cents on February 21st, 2011 | Category: Saving |  The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.
~F. Scott Fitzgerald
Update: Thanks to Arjun at Investing Thesis for including this article in the Canadian Personal Finance and Investing Carnival #16.
Very few topics elicit the kind of virulent debate that the TFSA vs. RRSP argument has generated in Canada this RRSP season. To be honest, those of us who cover finance are probably a little tired of writing about the TFSA vs. RRSP war. I’m sure a lot of readers don’t care to read about it anymore. And yet we (including me, apparently) just can’t seem to let it go. (The RRSP deadline for the 2010 tax year is March 1, 2011, so it should be over soon. )
For years, [...]
Read on and enjoy … RRSP vs. TFSA: One Last Dip into the Debate
By 2 Cents on February 2nd, 2011 | Category: 20 Cents |  So the first month of 2011 is already over. How are those 2011 goals coming along? Are you still on track? I’ve had a couple of setbacks myself, but I’m not taking it lying down. I’m taking some corrective actions and I hope to be able to report that they worked!
Without further delay, here are a few of my favourite articles from January of 2011. This is a mere sampling of the great information out there. I highlight lots of other articles each day on Twitter. You can follow me @BalanceJunkie.
1. At Today’s Economy Blog, Kevin Press wrote about Muskoka Chairs and Unanswerable Questions. The article captured the retirement anxiety many of us feel at this time of year as financial services firms “pose virtually unanswerable questions about how much you need to save for retirement that leave people feeling like [...]
Read on and enjoy … 20 Cents from January 2011
By 2 Cents on November 17th, 2010 | Category: Economics |  The world is governed more by appearance than realities so that it is fully as necessary to seem to know something as to know it.
~Daniel Webster
Update: This article was featured in the Carnival of Wealth #13 posted at Personal Dividends. Thanks!
I used to think that accounting principles were sort of set in stone like 2 + 2 = 4. You take account of how much you have and how much you owe. End of story. Dealing with my own finances and watching some of the voodoo accounting to which we’ve borne witness over the past few decades has caused me to realize that there is more art than science to accounting practices.
What is my net worth? That depends on the value I assign to my assets. I might say my house is worth $300 000, but if I can’t find [...]
Read on and enjoy … Are Public Pensions the Next Bubble?
By 2 Cents on November 15th, 2010 | Category: Investing |  The following is a guest post by Rob Bennett. I encourage you to think about and comment on his ideas. I’m a big fan of Robert Shiller’s work myself. - 2 Cents
————————–
Here are some words put forward by Yale Economics Professor Robert Shiller in his book Irrational Exuberance:
“The valuation of the stock market is an important national — indeed international — issue. All of our plans for the future, as individuals and as a society, hinge on our perceived wealth, and plans can be thrown into disarray if much of that wealth evaporates tomorrow.”
We all have political views. And we all have investing views. Most of us don’t think of the two types of views as intersecting. Politics is the process by which we decide where we want to go as a society. Investing is personal. It’s the process by which each of us [...]
Read on and enjoy … Stock Investing Is a Political Act
|
|
Recent Comments