The financial news that actually matters
Plenty of Americans claim Social Security in their early 60s while still holding a job, expecting to collect a paycheck and a benefit at the same time. Many are startled when the Social Security check shrinks or stops. The reason is a rule called the retirement earnings test, and it applies only to people who…
When a former spouse dies, a divorce does not necessarily end the financial tie. Social Security allows a surviving divorced spouse to collect survivor benefits on a late ex-partner’s record, provided the marriage lasted long enough. It is a benefit that many divorced older Americans never realize they are owed, in part because it turns…
A marriage that ended years or even decades ago can still put money in a retiree’s pocket through Social Security. Many divorced older Americans assume that walking away from a marriage meant walking away from any claim on a former spouse’s record. It did not. The rule that allows it is one of the least…
The property list reads like an auction catalog: two Ferraris, a Range Rover, mansions in Miami Beach and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the contents of several financial accounts. All of it is being surrendered by a 37-year-old Miami man who admitted he lied on his tax returns. Beyond the eye-catching cars, the case is…
The promise is easy to remember: $2,000 checks for most Americans, paid out of the money tariffs bring in. For retirees on fixed incomes, a one-time payment of that size is not trivial, and the idea has circulated widely enough that some are already budgeting around it. The catch is that a presidential promise is…
“No tax on overtime” sounds like a bigger paycheck on the next payday. It is not — at least not in the way many workers expect. The break is real, but it is a deduction claimed when a return is filed, not an exemption that stops taxes from coming out of a paycheck. For an…
A retiree who heard the president declare that seniors no longer pay tax on Social Security could be forgiven for expecting a bigger refund and no benefit tax at all. The reality written into the law is narrower and more conditional. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act did not repeal the tax on Social Security…
For a decade, the sticker price of a marketplace health plan and the amount an enrollee actually paid were two very different numbers, because federal tax credits absorbed much of the gap. That cushion has thinned. The extra subsidies Congress layered on during the pandemic expired at the end of 2025, and the people feeling…
Many people claim Social Security at the first opportunity, then find a few years later that they have gone back to work, no longer need the check, or simply wish the payment were larger. There is a lever for exactly that situation. A retiree can voluntarily suspend benefits already in pay, let the monthly amount…
A surviving spouse can be entitled to a monthly Social Security survivor benefit based on a deceased partner’s work record, and for some couples that check is the difference between stability and hardship. Yet many same-sex and common-law spouses never apply, convinced that their marriage does not count in the eyes of the government. That…