The financial news that actually matters
Most retirement savers picture their nest egg as locked away. Money goes into a 401(k) or IRA, sits inside familiar funds, and waits for retirement. However, the reality is less reassuring. Federal rules allow brokers and other financial firms to invest some of the cash and collateral tied to customer accounts in approved investments, and…
Nearly half of U.S. workers are still sitting on thin retirement balances, and the problem runs deeper than any single snapshot can show. Across federal data, academic research, and worker surveys, the pattern is consistent: too many households are saving too little, too many workers still lack a plan at work, and the people with…
Social Security checks are going up in 2026, but that does not mean retirees everywhere will feel the same relief. A uniform federal raise lands very differently depending on certain factors. Factors like where someone lives, rent, groceries, utilities, and out-of-pocket medical costs still vary sharply from state to state. That is what makes geography…
The seven-year countdown is no longer an abstract warning buried in a government report. It is now the central fact hanging over the future of Social Security retirement benefits. According to the Social Security Administration’s 2025 trustees report, the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance trust fund, the part of the system that pays retirement and survivor…
Medicare scam calls were already a familiar nuisance for many older Americans. During the most recent open enrollment season, they became something more dangerous. Recent reporting citing Better Business Bureau complaint data found Medicare scam complaints running 40% higher than a year earlier, while federal officials were separately dealing with a confirmed Medicare.gov account incident…
Turning 65 does not make a health savings account disappear, but it does change the rules in a way many workers miss until payroll or tax season catches up with them. Once Medicare coverage starts, new HSA contributions generally have to stop. That is true even for people who keep working and stay on an…
Financial advisors have long warned that borrowing from a 401(k) to fund a home down payment can solve one money problem by creating a bigger one later. The move can look sensible when buyers are scrambling to assemble cash in an expensive housing market, especially if a retirement plan loan seems cheaper or easier than…
For millions of Generation X workers, retirement at 65 is starting to look less like a milestone and more like a luxury. Americans born roughly between 1965 and 1980 are slowly moving toward a Gen X retirement crisis. That is because they are approaching retirement age with too little saved, less access to traditional pensions…
Workers who want the biggest possible Social Security retirement check in 2026 need more than a high salary in a single year. To qualify for the maximum benefit, they generally must earn at or above Social Security’s taxable wage cap for about 35 years, because the program bases benefits on a worker’s 35 highest-earning years…
Social Security’s financing problem is no longer an abstract debate for future lawmakers. The latest official projections show the program moving closer to the point where it can no longer pay full scheduled benefits from its trust fund reserves, putting pressure on Congress to act before automatic cuts become the default outcome. The warning is…