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 Current and Future Doctors Seek Solutions to Primary Care Crisis
There's a crisis in primary care. Patients say they can't get an appointment with a doctor when they need one; primary care practitioners are closing their doors; and medical school students are shunning primary care as an avocation. It's healthcare's answer to the perfect storm. | |
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 Developing an Investment Strategy
As a busy physician in today's world, it's not enough to just work and save more of what you make than you spend. Wise investing is the key to making your money grow and work for you. | |
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 Even Physicians Can Have Problems Managing Debt
In today's economy, it's easy for anyone to accumulate a higher debt load than they're able to handle. According to financial experts, that's especially true for physicians. For example, it's not uncommon for physicians to find themselves with a home mortgage and a home equity loan, multiple car notes, even notes on other recreational items like boats or motorcycles, perhaps even a vacation home, and debt on multiple credit cards. | |
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 Want to Beat the Market? Go Against the Crowd.
When an asset class soars, buying more seems logical. Gold is up, so buy more. And the same "logic" goes for selling investments that have done poorly. Financials are down, so get out. | |
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 Bear Market Defense
As the stock market goes down, expenses take a bigger cut out of return. For example, a 1.5% expense ratio from a 10% return leaves 8.5% left for the investor. But 1.5% from a lower return, say 7%, leaves only 5.5% for the same investor. Note that the expense ratio is the same, but because of the lower return in the second example, the investor puts much less in her pocket. This is because 1.5% for expenses is a bigger cut from 7% than from 10%. Precisely, a 1.5% expense ratio divided by a seven percent return is 1.5/7 which equals 21% for expenses. On the other hand a 1.5% expense ratio divided by a ten percent return is 1.5/10 which equals 15% for expenses, a considerably lesser number. Obviously, what you pay in expenses can make a big difference in your return, and even more so when the market is down. | |
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 Preparing Your Portfolio for Retirement
Investing during retirement is entirely different than investing for retirement. Different strategies are required for the accumulation and distribution phases.
During the accumulation phase, it may be appropriate to take moderate risks in return for the prospects of higher returns. A young person with a very long time horizon until retirement and a high risk tolerance might invest her entire portfolio in stocks. During retirement, a much more conservative portfolio is generally called for. That’s because the requirement to generate periodic withdrawals to produce income introduces a risk that the portfolio might self-liquidate.
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 PFN Close-Up: Diversification
The age-old expression advises against putting all your eggs in one basket. If you're looking for a job, you don't respond to just one ad, you answer several because you don't know which job will be the one to come through. | |
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 The Scoring of Tax Breaks
Not all tax breaks are created equally. Due to the complexities and nuances of the continually evolving tax code, certain credits and deductions save you significantly more in taxes than others. | |
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 Unloading that Gas-Guzzler
You fell in love with the big behemoth on the dealer’s lot, but now soaring gasoline prices have cooled the affair. There are still 24 months to go on the lease, though, and getting out of it can cost you big bucks. A better idea is lease assumption—that’s legalese for trading your lease—and there are several web sites that can help you. | |
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 The Stop-Loss Order
A stop-loss order is a useful investing tool that’s lost some of its usefulness. Basically, a stop-loss order tells your stockbroker to sell a stock when the price falls to a pre-set level. It still works well in most situations, but it generally only works when the New York Stock Exchange is open | |
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 The Estate Tax Comeback
Back in 2001, the Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act triggered a gradual increase in the dollar threshold of estates subject to the estate tax. | |
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 Maximizing College Aid (Legally)
Susie just got her acceptance letter to a big-name university and now you’re trying to figure out how to pay for it and whether you could possibly qualify for financial aid. Tip: the key strategies to maximize financial aid eligibility are to reduce assets or income or both. | |
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 How Safe Is Your Money Fund?
Investors with a low tolerance for volatility and risk have been pouring money into safer havens, mostly money market funds. Assets held by money funds have rocketed into the stratosphere to $3.5 trillion, a 45% jump in just the past year. | |
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 Dueling Doctor Surveys
A survey that showed that a clear majority of physicians supported some sort of universal healthcare plan got plenty of publicity ink in the national media last month. The survey, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, showed that 59% of US doctors would like to see | |
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 Caring for Aging Parents
It’s called the Sandwich Generation—that group of middle-aged Americans who, in increasing numbers, are finding themselves caring for both their children and their parents simultaneously. And as the multitude of baby boomers storm into their 60s and beyond, more and more individuals—including physicians—are expected to join that unenviable clique. | |
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