The financial news that actually matters
Social Security’s financing debate just took a sharper turn. A new Congressional Budget Office forecast moved up the expected depletion date for the program’s main retirement trust fund. The new estimate puts the Old-Age and Survivors Insurance fund, the account that pays retirement and survivor benefits, on track to run out of reserves in 2032….
Delaying Social Security is one of the few retirement decisions that can permanently raise guaranteed monthly income. For workers with strong earnings histories, the difference between claiming at 62 and waiting until 70 is not small. It can amount to well over $2,000 a month, every month, for life. That is where a six-figure lifetime…
Nearly 3 million people enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans were forced to find new coverage for 2026. That was after insurers pulled plans from markets around the country. This created one of the biggest disruptions the program has seen in years. The Medicare Advantage plan switch affected about 1 in 10 beneficiaries in non-employer HMO…
Social Security’s financing problem is no longer an abstract warning buried in an annual report. The latest projections now point to a much tighter timetable, with the program’s main retirement trust fund potentially reaching exhaustion early in the next decade if Congress does nothing. That does not mean Social Security disappears. It does mean the…
Retired workers collecting Social Security in 2026 receive an average monthly benefit of $2,076.41. On paper, that can still sound like a meaningful monthly cushion. In practice, a social security check rarely stretches as far as people assume once the most basic bills start hitting. For millions of older Americans, the problem is not one…
A major retirement-plan change is now in force for some older, higher-paid workers. The costly mistake, however, is assuming last year’s 401(k) catch-up election can stay on autopilot. Beginning in 2026, many employees age 50 and older who used to make pre-tax catch-up contributions must now make those extra contributions as Roth instead. That matters…
Employer contributions to 401(k) plans have become a more visible part of the competition for workers, and the numbers show why. Recent plan data indicates the average maximum employer match has climbed to 4.7% of pay, while Fidelity’s broad retirement-plan analysis has also put the average employer contribution rate at about 4.7%. For workers, that…
The latest Social Security overpayment crackdown has left some retirees confronting a jarring possibility: a benefits problem they did not know existed can suddenly turn into a demand for repayment that cuts deeply into the monthly income they rely on to cover housing, food, utilities, and medicine. That is the practical effect of a rapid…
A 62-year-old roofer in Memphis and a 35-year-old software developer in Seattle live in different economies, work very different jobs, and likely picture retirement in completely different ways. But they share one anxiety that has returned to the center of Washington’s fiscal debate: the possibility that lawmakers could ask Americans to wait even longer for…
The typical American worker is nowhere close to retirement ready. At least, not by the broadest measure now getting fresh attention in Washington and across the financial press. A new analysis from the National Institute on Retirement Security found that the median working-age American has just $955 saved in a defined contribution retirement account. That…