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Slick TV ads often make financial planning and wealth management sound simple, but it’s usually not. Managing wealth requires knowing a lot about highly technical topics, like taxes, government regulations, and finance as well as history, psychology and how to communicate with loved ones about sensitive issues. This article highlights some of the knowledge needed to manage wealth and why it’s often so daunting without the help of an independent personal financial advisor who is familiar with your situation.
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Understanding The Federal Reserve Mandate To End Inflation
The Federal Reserve System, the nation’s central bank, has a dual mandate to pursue maximum employment and maintain price stability. These two priorities are currently treated equally, but that was not always the case. In fact, the Fed’s bias toward maximizing employment was a critical driver of the stagflation that plagued the U.S. in the late 1960s and 1970s. Recognizing the need to balance price stability and maximum employment, in 1977, Congress revised the Federal Reserve Act.
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Fed Governor Kugler Details Inflation And Economic Outlook
The 12-month inflation rate, as measured by the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) index, was 2.6% in December, down from its peak of 7.1% in June 2022, and the six-month rate for PCE inflation was even lower, at 2%, which is the target rate set by the Federal Reserve.
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Why Rates May Not Be Cut Until June
The cost of a loan to buy a home, car, college education, and achieve the American Dream is staying the same for now. As expected, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said the central bank did not lower loan rates following the Fed’s Wednesday, Jan. 31, 2024, policy meeting.
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Practical Suggestions For Achieving Your 2024 Resolutions
New Year’s resolutions usually fail because they‘re often too hard to achieve. After six months, only 10% of people who make resolutions achieve them or remain committed to them, , according to a study by Dr. Mark Griffiths, a Chartered Psychologist and Distinguished Professor of Behavioral Addiction at the Nottingham Trent University. What can you do to make financial, medical, or other personal resolutions more likely to be achieved?
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A Sign Of Progress In Solving U.S. Economic Problems
The Federal Reserve appears to be pulling off a feat most experts did not believe it could: ending its aggressive inflation-fighting campaign of 11 interest rate hikes without tipping the U.S. economy into a recession.
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Fed Keeps Rates Unchanged; Expects Easing In 2024
To promote transparency and free markets, the Federal Reserve System began publishing the opinions of the 19 U.S. central bankers that decide interest rate policy.
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Have You Logged Into Your Social Security Account?
Have you logged in to your Social Security account? Creating an online account at SSA.gov is an important first step in understanding your retirement income situation. However, only about 60 million of the 160 million individuals in the U.S. labor force who have Social Security accounts have created a way to access the Social Security Administration’s website.
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The Great Fake Out Of 2023 Is Poised To Extend Into 2024
All year long, the economy and stock prices have fooled experts and consumers, outperforming expectations month after month.
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Test Your Financial Planning IQ
The five questions below are a challenge meant to allow you to assess your knowledge of investing, tax and financial planning. If you have been following our news stream, this quiz draws on familiar ground. The answers are below.
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Planning Briefs
PPP Update For Business Owners
Published Tuesday, June 9, 2020, 9:07 p.m. EST
The Paycheck Protection Program Flexibility Act (PPPFA) of 2020 modified terms of forgiveness for loans to businesses under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) on June 5, 2020.
Since its enactment into law only 10 weeks ago, PPP started has undergone two legislative revisions. Here's a short history a business owner needs to know about PPP:
Round 1. PPP is the principal federal financial aid program for business owners harmed by the epidemic. The program is run through the Small Business Administration and was part of the $2.2 trillion Coronavirus Aid, Relief & Economic Security Act (CARES Act) enacted March 27, 2020. PPP authorized $349 billion in aid to businesses, in the form of forgivable loans, but that ran out in less than two weeks.
Round 2. A second tranche of $310 billion in PPP aid was authorized by Congress and signed into law by President Trump a month later and it’s now being distributed to qualified businesses.
Cleanup. PPPFA cleans up rules and requirements of qualifying PPP loans. For example, the criteria for a loan to be forgiven was softened considerably in two key ways:
Instead of requiring a business owner to spend 75% of the loan on employee compensation and only 25% on rent, utilities and other costs specified under federal law, a business owner can spend as little as 60% on compensation and still qualify for loan forgiveness. You must use the loan proceeds for payroll, health insurance, funding an employee retirement plan, and interest on a mortgage, rent, as well as utilities.
Another important easing of the loan forgiveness rules enabled in the new cleanup law: You now have 24 weeks to spend PPP loans, instead of just eight.
PPPFA also fine-tuned how many employees you must retain to qualify for loan forgiveness and spells out more clearly whether you can hire different employees during the 24-week period and still be eligible to qualify for loan forgiveness.
Another enhancement in PPPFA: Loan recipients are able to defer their share of payroll taxes until 2021 when 50% of such taxes must be paid, with the remaining half due in 2022.
With businesses at risk due to the epidemic, PPP is a lifeline to business owners. However, PPP's three legislative iterations have complicated its implementation for business owners, who must certify that the loan is needed under penalty of civil and criminal fraud, while remaining cognizant of rules for loan forgiveness. It’s beyond the scope of this article to offer personal advice or complete details of the series of PPP laws. If you have questions about PPP or how it impacts your long-term personal financial situation, please contact us.
Nothing contained herein is to be considered a solicitation or research material. It is subject to change without notice. Strategies referenced herein do not take into account your personal objectives, financial situation or particular needs of any specific person. The material represents an assessment of financial, economic and tax law at a specific point in time. The sources are thought to be reliable but could be wrong about important facts.
The U.S. Government's response to the Coronavirus crisis implements new regulations and their precise impact may not be available at the time this was written or could be subject to change by U.S. Government agencies, such as the Internal Revenue Service or Small Business Administration.
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