While high tax Northern states are desperately attempting to find ways around new rules in the tax reform legislation passed at the end of 2017, the South is cheering them on. The problems stem from high state and local income and property taxes in the North that will no longer be fully deductible for federal tax purposes. Meanwhile, in the low tax South, those issues aren't a concern, and a lower federal corporate rate looks great to the states that have made themselves attractive to big employers with Right to Work laws and low state taxation. Cameron McWhirter and Arian Campo-Flores … [Read more...]
It’s Only ‘Safety First’ That Will Make You Money: Part I
Originally posted February 28, 2017 on Yoursurvivalguy.com. Billionaire investor Warren Buffett, on the heels of releasing his annual report, said, Monday, that the stock market isn’t in a bubble and “measured against interest rates, stocks actually are on the cheap side compared to historic valuations.” In the same interview, he also warned “That doesn’t mean the stock market can’t go down 20% tomorrow.” A buying opportunity he’d welcome with open arms. It’s good to be Warren. It’s funny how life works because, coincidentally, later that day I was speaking with clients who live in the … [Read more...]
RIP Warren Miller
Legendary ski filmmaker Warren Miller died last night at his home on Orcas Island, WA. He was 93. He will be missed. When I was growing up in Mattapoisett, MA the closest mountains were around a four hour drive away. We would go skiing on long-weekends and most February vacations. I remember the ski trips in junior high with the ski club. It was my first taste of freedom. Before each season it was a big deal when a Warren Miller movie came to town. It was usually shown around October at our junior high school. I remember leaving the auditorium with my friends and how pumped up we … [Read more...]
A Difficult Phrase to Say: “Enough Already, I’m Retiring”
When a client of mine called it quits from a successful career working for start-up companies in California, he was young enough to keep working, but old enough to realize the cost was too high. He was stressed out, out of shape, out of the country at times, and plain old tired of the endless hours it takes to get a company off the ground. But not having something to do every day can be terrifying and not having a steady paycheck even more so. Sometimes it’s hard to say, “enough already, I’m retiring.” But he did it. He retired. We talked about part-time work and nothing came of … [Read more...]
Investors Don’t Care About a Concert in the Park: Profits are the Goal of Business
When investment managers get too cute with your money, guess who pays the price? The answer is you, obviously. Andy Kessler has written an epic takedown of the "Socially Responsible Investing" movement over at The Wall Street Journal. Here's a bit of it: Profits are the best measure of a business’s value to consumers—and to society. No one holds a gun to the customer’s head. If the buyer weren’t glad to pay the free-market price, he would make the product or perform the service himself. Yet this idea is questioned all the time. A case in point is Amazon, currently worth $625 billion based … [Read more...]
Even Nolan Ryan Had a Hard Time Transitioning to Retirement
He had been planning his retirement for years. Hall of Fame pitcher Nolan Ryan wanted to be a cowboy after hanging up his baseball uniform. But he found the transition to retirement a lot harder than he thought it would be. It wasn't the long rides or the tough work of being a rancher that were hard on Ryan, it was the loss of his past life that gave him trouble. He missed going into the ball club and being part of a team every day. In my experience with clients transitioning from work to retirement, Ryan is not unique. Many people entering retirement are greeted by mixed emotions, even … [Read more...]
You’ve Read the Last Issue of Intelligence Report Now What? Part III
In his first issue of Richard C. Young’s Intelligence Report, Dick wrote, “Hugh Johnson is known worldwide as an expert and writer on gardening and wine. In Connoisseur’s June/85 issue Michael and Ariane Batterberry wrote about Johnson’s ability to communicate to his readers saying he ‘never pontificates,’ and that Johnson feels ‘once inflamed by a subject, the wise outsider will write a book about it before he learns too much and becomes an insider, so entangled in arcana that he can no longer strike through the nub of things.” “I hope my Intelligence Report will achieve Johnson’s worthy … [Read more...]
The Truth Behind the S&P 500: Part VI
I have grave concerns with the S&P 500 (See parts one, two, three, four and five of my series dedicated to those concerns). You can see in my chart below the index would need to fall by 38% based on yesterday’s closing value to trade at a normalized valuation. Doing as well as the S&P 500, or the market, is a double-edged sword. Receiving market performance guarantees you’ll never beat it. Believe me you’ll want to beat it when it crashes, because the grief from losses far outweighs the jubilation from gains. Originally posted on Yoursurvivalguy.com. … [Read more...]
Which State Won America’s 2017 Migration Games?
Each year Americans from all parts of the country make the decision to leave their home states looking for greener pastures in others. The destinations aren't always the same, but one thing is constant, when opportunity arises, Americans move to meet it. The Tax Foundation points out that states are competing with each other for citizens, and that one way they do that is by attempting to offer the best tax rates possible. Vermont led the nation in terms of inbound migration as a percent of total moves in 2017. Using migration data collected by United Van Lines, Margan Scarboro … [Read more...]
How Will Americans Pay Tax on Their Crypto-Currencies?
As I explain in my four part series on bitcoin (read parts one, two, three, and four), I'm a skeptic of crypto-currency trading and I don't own any crypto-currencies. I believe, much like Warren Buffett told CNBC on Wednesday, that the crypto-craze won't end well. The IRS has given some guidance on how to account for sales of crypto-currencies, but keeping track of all sales may be hard. Brian Fung explains in The Washington Post: The most recent IRS guidance on the matter is from 2014, when it said taxpayers should treat their virtual currency like property. Under that rule, taxpayers … [Read more...]
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