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The Basics: What You Need to Know | |
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What Is a 401(k)? | |
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What Is a 401(k) and Where Did It Come From? | |
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Why Do Companies Offer 401(k)s? | |
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Taking Advantage of Protective Shells | |
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Defined-Benefit Plans | |
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Defined-Contribution Plans | |
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401(k) Versus Pension--What's the Difference? | |
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What Kinds of Protective Shell Retirement Plans Are There? | |
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How Can I Tell If My Company Has a Good 401(k) Plan? | |
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Why Should I Participate? | |
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The Rules: Understanding Your 401(k) | |
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Who Makes the 401(k) Rules? | |
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Understanding Your Company's 401(k) | |
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Common Features of 401(k) Plans | |
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Eligibility | |
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Contribution Rate | |
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Company Match | |
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Vesting | |
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Loans | |
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Withdrawals | |
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Hardship | |
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Age 59 1/2 | |
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In-Service | |
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After-Tax | |
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Nondiscrimination Testing | |
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Limits on Your 401(k) Contributions (IRS Code 415 and 401) | |
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Investment Options | |
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Valuation: What Is It and Why Do You Need to Know About It? | |
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How Safe Is Your 401(k) Money? | |
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Keeping Track of Your Money | |
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Plan Sponsor | |
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Trustee | |
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Investment Manager | |
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Safety in Times of Trouble--Creditors, Divorce, and Taxes | |
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Creditors | |
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Divorce | |
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Taxes | |
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Company Mergers | |
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When Bad Things Happen to Good Money | |
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Some Warning Signs | |
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Savings | |
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Your Best Chance at Retirement Is Your 401(k) | |
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Individual Responsibility | |
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The Power of Compounding | |
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Building a Plan for Your Future | |
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What Do You Want? | |
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What Do You Have? | |
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How Do You Get What You Want? | |
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Events That Might Sidetrack Your Retirement Strategy | |
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Developing Your Retirement Plan | |
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No One Plans to Fail--Some Just Fail to Plan | |
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The Retirement Planning Process | |
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Developing Your Retirement Plan | |
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Eight Steps to Financial Independence | |
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Determine the Impact of Social Security and Pension on Your Retirement Goal | |
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Allow for Inflation in Your Annual Income Needs | |
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Determine the Amount of Money Required to Achieve Your Income Goal | |
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Determine the Additional Money Required to Offset Inflation--Protect Your Pension Income During Retirement | |
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Identify and Project Your Current Retirement Resources | |
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Determine the Additional Money Required to Fund Your Retirement Goal | |
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Determine How Much You Need to Save Every Year to Meet Your Goal | |
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Close the Gap Between Current Savings Level and Level Needed to Meet Your Retirement Goal | |
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Using Software to Crunch Your Numbers | |
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Where Else Can You Save for Your Retirement? | |
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Pulling It All Together | |
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Saving Pre-Tax or After-Tax--Does It Really Matter? | |
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Understanding After-Tax Contribution | |
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Which Is Better--Pre-Tax or After-Tax Contributions? | |
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Before-Tax or After-Tax? Which Gives Me More Money? | |
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Save More and Have the Same Take-Home Pay | |
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Saving (After-Tax) Outside a 401(k) Plan | |
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Withdrawing After-Tax Money | |
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Pennywise and Dollar-Foolish! | |
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Better the Tax Devil You Know Than the One You Don't | |
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When After-Tax Contributions Make Sense | |
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Deciding What to Do | |
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Keeping Tabs on Your Account | |
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Knowledge Is Power--or at Least a Little Control | |
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What You Need to Know for Planning | |
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What You Need to Know to Keep Track of the Game | |
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Where Are Your Best Sources? | |
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IVR | |
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World Wide Web Sites | |
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Account Statements | |
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Pay Stubs | |
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Human Beings | |
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Some Not So Interesting Reading | |
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Check This Checklist ... Frequently | |
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Taking Out a Loan | |
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Loan Repayments | |
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Investment Earnings | |
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Punching Out for the Last Time | |
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Using a 401(k) to Achieve Your Other Financial Goals | |
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Sneaking Your 401(k) Past Uncle Sam | |
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Dumb Uses for a 401(k) | |
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Don't Use Your 401(k) as a Rainy-Day Fund | |
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Buying Insurance | |
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Education Funding | |
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Buying a Home | |
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Good Uses for 401(k) Plans | |
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Developing an Investment Strategy | |
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Your Other Financial Goals--Calculating How Much You Should Save | |
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IRAs Versus 401(k)s--Which Is Better? | |
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What Is an IRA? | |
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Are There Different Types of IRAs? | |
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Understanding IRAs | |
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Deductible IRA | |
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Do You Quality for a Deductible IRA? | |
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Getting Your Money out of a Deductible IRA | |
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Nondeductible IRAs | |
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Nondeductible IRA: The Plain-Vanilla Type | |
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Education Savings Accounts, a.k.a. Education IRAs (New for 2002) | |
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When Using Both a 401(k) and IRA Makes Sense | |
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Things to Consider for 2002 | |
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Mastering the Basics of 401(k) Investing | |
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Everything You Need to Know About Investing Your 401(k) Money | |
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The Road to Retirement | |
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The Basics of Investing | |
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Safety | |
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Income | |
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How Do Bonds Work? | |
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Growth | |
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What Do You Expect from Your Investments? | |
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What Is "Risk"? | |
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Understanding Risk | |
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Matching Your Goals to the Right Risks | |
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The Name Game--Understanding the Different Types of Mutual Funds | |
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How Much "Risk" Are You Prepared to Take with Your Investments? | |
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Getting to Know the Major Investment Categories | |
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Cash Equivalent Investments | |
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Fixed-Income Investments | |
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Asset Allocation Funds and Balanced Funds | |
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Growth Investing | |
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Where Is Your Money? Small Companies? Large Companies? | |
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Searching for the Ideal Investment | |
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Looking for Mr. Goodfund | |
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Understanding the Funds in Your 401(k) Plan | |
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Matching Your Investment Goals to Investment Types | |
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Investing in Growth Versus Value Funds: Which Is Better? | |
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Investment Options at a Glance | |
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What Is Morningstar? | |
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Oakmark Equity and Income I | |
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Van Kampen Emerging Growth A | |
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Royce Low-Priced Stock | |
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Reading the Labels--The "Nutritional Facts" of Your 401(k) Funds | |
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The Warning Signs: Is It Time for a Change? | |
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Changes in Management | |
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The Fund Gets Too Big | |
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Changing or Nearing a Goal | |
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A Change in Direction | |
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Change in Control | |
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Performance | |
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Taking the Long View | |
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Investing over the Long-Term: It Works! | |
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Timing the Market | |
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Real Rate of Return | |
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Playing the Odds Through Dollar Cost Averaging | |
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Betting on the Right Horse | |
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Picking Last Year's Winner--A Story of Annual Returns | |
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What Type of Investor Are You? | |
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What Investment Rate of Return Should You Use? | |
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Match Your Investor Profile to an Investment Strategy | |
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Building an Investment Strategy | |
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Too Much of a Good Thing--Rebalancing | |
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Notes to Historical Return Data | |
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Shopping at the Company Store | |
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Employee Stock Ownership Plans | |
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How Does the Stock Get in There? | |
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How Much Do You Get? | |
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Distributions | |
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Why ESOPs Are Offered at the Company Store | |
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Mix and Match | |
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Stocking the Shelves with ISOs, NSOs, and ESPPs | |
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ISOs | |
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NSOs | |
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ESPPs | |
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Tax-Sheltered Annuities | |
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What Is an Annuity? | |
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The Different Characteristics of an Annuity | |
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The Most Popular Items on the Menu | |
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Annuity Payout Options | |
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The Real Costs of Owning an Annuity | |
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Do Annuities Fit into Your Portfolio? | |
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Some Other Things You Need to Know | |
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The Good and the Bad | |
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Pros | |
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Cons | |
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Where to Get the Good Deals | |
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Taking Money Out of Your 401(k) | |
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Borrowing from Yourself | |
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Can You Borrow? | |
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How Much Can You Borrow? | |
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How Do You Borrow? | |
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What's It Gonna Cost You? | |
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What If I Can't Pay It Back? | |
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What Is the True Cost of Taking That Loan? | |
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Borrowing from Other Sources | |
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If You Do Borrow from Your 401(k) | |
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Cashing In or Out of Your 401(k) | |
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What's a Hardship? | |
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Just the Facts, Ma'am | |
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Safe Harbor Tests | |
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The Ten Percent Penalty | |
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Calling It Quits | |
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Transferring Your Old 401(k) into Your New Employer's Plan | |
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Transferring Your Old 401(k) into an IRA | |
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Getting the Funds Because of Hardship | |
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A Divorce Sure Can Mess Up Your Finances | |
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Disability | |
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Section 72(t) Withdrawals | |
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Retiring at Fifty-Five: No Penalty, No Worry | |
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What Happens If You Die | |
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IRS Publications That Are Yours for the Asking | |
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Roll, Roll, Roll It Over | |
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What Is a Rollover? | |
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Rollover: Getting Old Money to Do a New Trick | |
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Benefits of a Rollover | |
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A Problem with Regular Rollovers | |
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When You Can and Can't Do a Rollover | |
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What Can and Can't Be Rolled | |
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Some Picky Rules and Thoughts | |
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Leave It! An Alternative to Rollovers | |
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Places for Rollovers | |
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Using IRAs | |
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Leaving It All Behind: How Do You Decide? | |
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And Now It's Time to Retire | |
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What Is Retirement? | |
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Getting Ready | |
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Maximize Your 401(k) Contributions | |
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Tackle Your Debt | |
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Decide Where You Want to Retire | |
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Can You Afford to Retire Yet? | |
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Ready, Set, Go! | |
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Leave It | |
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Buy an Annuity | |
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Roll It Over, Rover | |
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Lump It | |
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A Handful of Choices | |
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Making Your Money Last as Long as You Do | |
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Minimum Distributions | |
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Pension Max | |
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Pension Maximization: Will It Work for You? | |
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Here's Our Advice | |
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No 401(k)? No Problem! | |
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Not a 401(k) in Sight | |
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A Simple Solution to the Problem | |
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The Simple IRA | |
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Simple 401(k) | |
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Keogh Plans | |
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SEP-IRAs | |
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Traditional IRAs | |
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Spousal IRAs | |
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Roth IRAs | |
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Nondeductible IRAs | |
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Getting Help | |
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Why People Fail to Plan | |
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Do You Need a Planner | |
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What a Planner Should Do for You | |
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What a Planner Expects of You | |
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The Areas of Financial Planning That Need to Be Included | |
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What to Look for in a Planner | |
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How Does a Planner Get Paid? | |
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How Much Will It Cost? | |
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Which Way Is Best? | |
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Choosing Your Financial Planner | |
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Before Reaching for Your Wallet | |
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Regulatory Compliance | |
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Who's Minding the Store? | |
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Where to Find a Planner | |
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What the Alphabet Soup Means | |
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Social Security and Medicare | |
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A Little History | |
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Will the Promise Be Broken? | |
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Pay-As-You-Go | |
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Who Knew? | |
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What Is Social Security, Really? | |
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You Must Earn Your Credits | |
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Taxes and More Taxes | |
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Number, Please! | |
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So How Much Is It? | |
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What Kind of Benefits? | |
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Retirement Benefits | |
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Early Retirement | |
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Delayed Retirement | |
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Family Benefits | |
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Spousal Benefits | |
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If You Should Become Disabled | |
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What Happens to Your Survivors? | |
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Supplemental Security Income | |
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Ready to Sign Up? | |
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Hi-Ho, Hi-Ho, It's Off to Work You Go | |
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Medicare | |
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What Is Medicare? | |
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Reading Material | |
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How to Avoid the Biggest Mistakes | |
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Saving | |
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Taxes | |
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Investing | |
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Retiring and Taking Money out of Your 401(k) | |
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Appendixes | |
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Worskheets | |
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Help, Help, and More Help | |
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Glossary | |
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Index | |