Here’s the Roundup the first weekend in October. Enjoy!
Schwab and Ameritrade are cutting stock trade fees to $0. What’s the catch? (New York Magazine). Even without commissions, brokers have ways of making money. (Note: Since this article was published, E-Trade has joined the fee-cutters too.)
Medicare shopping season is almost here (New York Times). This is the time of year when you can change your prescription drug coverage and also switch between original Medicare and Medicare Advantage.
How to downsize your RMDs (Kiplinger). Ideas for minimizing the unwelcome tax bills that follow Required Minimum Distributions from IRAs.
States fail to overturn SALT deduction caps in court (Forbes). Four states filed suit over the $10,000 cap on state and local taxes that can be deducted on the federal income tax form.
HSA fees drop, investment design shows improvement (InvestmentNews). The investment options in Health Savings Account continue to improve.
And from the bloggers and pundits...
The four most important things in investing (Dan Mikulskis, Real Returns). There aren’t any secrets, and the best advice is simple (though not easy to follow consistently).
The great fee war of the 2010s (Ben Carlson, A Wealth of Common Sense). More on the ongoing pricing battle in the brokerage biz.
Best bank account interest rates – Summary for October 1, 2019 (Ken Tumin, DepositAccounts). Investment fees may be falling, so are rates being paid on bank savings accounts on money-market mutual funds.
Show me the money (Jonathan Clements, Humble Dollar). A lot of the money you’ll accumulate for retirement (maybe most of it!) will be the raw dollars you sock away, not the investment returns you earn.
Americans spent more on taxes in 2018 than on food, clothing and health care combined (Terence P. Jeffrey, CNS News). Many of us overlook taxes when it comes to figuring our cost of living. That’s a big oversight.
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