Bogleheads.org

I have family members (in their late 20s) whom I have tried to convince to save seriously for retirement. A couple of years ago I told the "twins story" from "The Wealthy Barber". I recently found out that argument wasn't enough, so I need to try again. If any of you have argumen...

I postponed taking SS until 70 and retired a couple of years after. It is inflation adjusted, so yes it grows in that sense (but not real terms), and earnings in those last couple of years also increased it in real terms. And for Brits who have a UK social security number and worked over there the U...

On Squawk Box this morning Jeremy Siegel was quizzed about academic's recommending "owning the world". He said he owned 1/3 US, 1/3 emerging markets and 1/3 rest of the world. We have 40-45% outside the US and I thought that was a lot. How common is it for Bogleheads to have around 2/3 of ...

We are obliged to take MRDs and these grow to a large % in later years. If one stays in the same tax bracket for a long time, is it worth rolling funds from trad. IRA to a Roth and pay the income tax now, rather than wait and pay the higher income tax on very large MDRs later? I assume that rolling ...

15.8% Data from Vanguard, about 90% VG stock index funds broadly diversified across domestic and int.

I am already taking MRDs on my IRAs. However I was surprised to learn that immediately after retirement an MDR is required this year based on the value of the 401(k) on 12/31/2012. My 401(k) has about 30% in the Roth 401(k) bucket. The plan rules are that I cannot change the 401(k) in any way (such ...

Thanks all, pkcrafter in particular. Wiki provided exactly what I was after.
Dave

Can anyone point me to a source that shows what % of a portfolio would have to be in each Morningstar style box for the diversification to match the US domestic stock market? (I assume it's not 100% divided by 9)

Dave

I am approaching retirement. We have 2 years of top-up money (diff. between Soc. Sec. etc. and total expenses) in near-cash (Evensky) in a taxable account - the short-term bucket. We have IRAs holding broadly diversified VG stock index funds (Berstein) - the long term (5+ year) bucket. I am not sure...

Hi, I understand that the benficiary of an IRA is controlled by the financial instution's records of beneficiaries for the account (and not by the "Will"). If the beneficiary of a traditional IRA is a foreign national I assume he/she will have to prove he/she is the right person and then p...

Thanks to you all, especially for the "Taxes WITHHELD are not time-sensitive" statement and others who backed it up. I'm in Texas and there is no state income tax.

Now I can go back to worrying about something else.

Dave

If I take my MDR in late December and have Vanguard withhold a lot of Federal tax, does the Fed accept that all that tax money arriving as a lump so late in the year fulfills "90% of the tax to be shown on your 2011 tax return" (Form 1040-ES). So that I thereby avoid estimated taxes paid q...

A number of author’s have criticized Bengen’s (1994) paper that argued that 4% (adjusted for inflation) could be safely withdrawn from ones savings with very low likelyhood of running out of savings during retirement. Most point out that using 4% leaves money on the table. Kitces’s (2008, http://www...

William Bernstein does not recommend small and/or value mutual funds (or ETFs) in taxable accounts. I really don't want to make the long term commitment (to avoid the early withdrawal fees) of Vanguard tax managed funds. Can anyone provide an estimate of the penalty of holding small and/or value fun...

Looking back we should have been able to see a few of the signs before recent crashes. What if the next crash is a cyber attack that prevents access to short term funds and financial institutions disaster recovery resources do make your retirment savings avilable for a year or so. We have 20% at Fid...

In reply to : "If Bill Bernstein writes it, its worth reading. No exception here. Even if you have read his other books."

I wonder if he's as good as the author of that "What wall street doesn't ..." book?

I liked his book "Intelligent Asset Allocator". Anyone read his new book, and have an opinion?

dave

I understand that when I use Yahoo to compare performance of tickers the graph is of that the price change alone and does not include the dividends that add to the owners wealth (although those individual dividends can be displayed). So I could compare two tickers and the upper line (rising more ste...