Coming Up Short

Coming Up Short

Author: Alicia H. Munnell

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2004-02-09

Total Pages: 236

ISBN-13: 9780815796343

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As the baby boom begins to withdraw from the labor force, ensuring a secure retirement income becomes an increasingly important issue, the number of people over age 65 is expected to double by 2030. That trend will continue, accompanied by worries about stock market volatility, corporate malfeasance, a rapidly changing economy, and the viability of Social Security. In Coming Up Short, two experts on retirement policy analyze 401(k) plans, the fastest-growing type of employer-sponsored pensions and a vital source of retirement income for the American middle class. Alicia Munnell and Annika Sunden chronicle the development of 401(k) plans, now the dominant form of private pensions. In accessible language, they explain how such plans work and discuss their popularity. For employees, these plans are appealing becuase they have more control over their own retirement funds, and the plans are portable. For employers, the plans are generally less costly than defined benefit plans. Despite those advantages, there are some significant downsides to 401(k) plans. These plans shift all the risk and responsibility to employees, who must decide whether to join, how much to contribute, how to invest, whether to "cash out" when changing jobs, and how to manage their nest egg in retirement. These are difficult decisions, and while in theory 401(k)s could be an effective savings vehicle for retirement, in practice many people make mistakes at every step along the way. Com ing Up Short discusses why these mistakes are made and proposes various reforms to ensure that the aging population will have adequate retirement income. Comprehensive and up-to-date, Coming Up Short is an essential resource on 401(k) plans for financial service professionals, policymakers, academics, and individuals planning for their own retirement.


Practical Guide to Research and Development Tax Incentives

Practical Guide to Research and Development Tax Incentives

Author: Michael D. Rashkin

Publisher: CCH

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 764

ISBN-13: 9780808014324

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CCH's Practical Guide to Research and Development Tax Incentives--Federal, State, and Foreign by Michael Rashkin, J.D., LL.M., provides something that has been missing in professional tax literature--authoritative, comprehensive coverage of this complex and evolving topic. This newly expanded resource is practical, easy to follow, easy to understand, and is particularly effective at clarifying and demystifying this complex subject. It provides well-written, detailed guidance on claiming the federal credit for increasing research activities and the deduction for R & D expenditures. In doing so, it explains the elements of qualified research, exclusions, computational rules, and basic research payment credits. Historically, the IRS has been vigilant in denying R & D credits. This resource explains how to satisfy the IRS's requirements, document the credit, and defend against IRS challenges. It also examines research incentives offered by individual states and describes the R & D incentives available in the major economies of the world, offering helpful charts that show the key differences among the various countries.


Handbook of Public Economics

Handbook of Public Economics

Author: Martin Feldstein

Publisher: Elsevier

Published: 2002-01-25

Total Pages: 744

ISBN-13: 0080544193

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The Field of Public Economics has been changing rapidly in recent years, and the sixteen chapters contained in this Handbook survey many of the new developments. As a field, Public Economics is defined by its objectives rather than its techniques and much of what is new is the application of modern methods of economic theory and econometrics to problems that have been addressed by economists for over two hundred years. More generally, the discussion of public finance issues also involves elements of political science, finance and philosophy. These connections are evidence in several of the chapters that follow. Public Economics is the positive and normative study of government's effect on the economy. We attempt to explain why government behaves as it does, how its behavior influences the behavior of private firms and households, and what the welfare effects of such changes in behavior are. Following Musgrave (1959) one may imagine three purposes for government intervention in the economy: allocation, when market failure causes the private outcome to be Pareto inefficient, distribution, when the private market outcome leaves some individuals with unacceptably low shares in the fruits of the economy, and stabilization, when the private market outcome leaves some of the economy's resources underutilized. The recent trend in economic research has tended to emphasize the character of stabilization problems as problems of allocation in the labor market. The effects that government intervention can have on the allocation and distribution of an economy's resources are described in terms of efficiency and incidence effects. These are the primary measures used to evaluate the welfare effects of government policy.


Savings Fitness

Savings Fitness

Author: Barry Leonard

Publisher: DIANE Publishing

Published: 2007-12

Total Pages: 32

ISBN-13: 9781422319024

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Many people mistakenly believe that Social Security (SS) will pay for all or most of their retire. needs, but the fact is, since its inception, SS has provided little protection. A comfortable retire. usually requires SS, pensions, personal savings & invest. The key tool for making a secure retire. a reality is financial planning. It will help clarify your retire. goals as well as other financial goals you want to ¿buy¿ along the way. It will show you how to manage your money so you can afford today¿s needs yet still fund tomorrow¿s. You¿ll learn how to save your money to make it work for you & how to protect it so it will be there when you need it. Explains how you can take the best advantage of retire. plans at work, & what to do if you¿re on your own. Illustrations.


The New Retirement Savings Time Bomb

The New Retirement Savings Time Bomb

Author: Ed Slott

Publisher: Penguin

Published: 2021-03-02

Total Pages: 450

ISBN-13: 014313454X

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AS SEEN ON PUBLIC TELEVISION New for 2021—The complete action plan from Ed Slott, "the best source of IRA advice" (Wall Street Journal), to help you make sure your 401(k)s, IRAs, and retirement savings aren't depleted by taxes by the time you need to use them. If you're like most Americans, your most valuable asset is your retirement fund. We diligently save money for years, yet most of us don't know how to avoid the costly mistakes that cause a good chunk of those savings to be lost to needless and excessive taxation. Now, in the midst of a financial crisis, there is more need than ever to protect your assets. The New Retirement Savings Time Bomb, by renowned tax advisor Ed Slott, shows you in clear-cut layman's terms how to take control over your retirement savings plan. This easy-to-follow plan helps you place your assets to avoid the latest traps set out by congress in addition to any that might be set down the road, so you can keep your hard-earned money no matter what. And, it's fully up-to date with information on the SECURE Act and everything you need to know about how the coronavirus relief bills will affect your savings down the road. This book is required reading for every American with savings and investments who is planning to retire, be it five years from now or fifty.


The Encyclopedia of Taxation & Tax Policy

The Encyclopedia of Taxation & Tax Policy

Author: Joseph J. Cordes

Publisher: The Urban Insitute

Published: 2005

Total Pages: 522

ISBN-13: 9780877667520

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"From adjusted gross income to zoning and property taxes, the second edition of The Encyclopedia of Taxation and Tax Policy offers the best and most complete guide to taxes and tax-related issues. More than 150 tax practitioners and administrators, policymakers, and academics have contributed. The result is a unique and authoritative reference that examines virtually all tax instruments used by governments (individual income, corporate income, sales and value-added, property, estate and gift, franchise, poll, and many variants of these taxes), as well as characteristics of a good tax system, budgetary issues, and many current federal, state, local, and international tax policy issues. The new edition has been completely revised, with 40 new topics and 200 articles reflecting six years of legislative changes. Each essay provides the generalist with a quick and reliable introduction to many topics but also gives tax specialists the benefit of other experts' best thinking, in a manner that makes the complex understandable. Reference lists point the reader to additional sources of information for each topic. The first edition of The Encyclopedia of Taxation and Tax Policy was selected as an Outstanding Academic Book of the Year (1999) by Choice magazine."--Publisher's website.