Why Open Enrollment Season Is a Natural Moment to Revisit Your 401(k)

Open enrollment often concentrates attention on health coverage, payroll elections, and the employer’s overall benefits package.

Recent Blog Posts

Investors have been better off staying fully invested

Personal Investor

November 7, 2022

The best-performing portfolio over the past 120-year period stayed fully invested throughout both Democratic and Republican administrations. Those who invested exclusively during single-party rule by their preferred party or during divided government fared much worse. The more time investors dedicated to the markets, the better, and the less time they dedicated to politics the better.

Politicians don’t radically re-engineer the economy or dramatically alter economic growth

Personal Investor

November 4, 2022

Investors are concerned that a political party might drastically re-engineer the economy. The economy has been remarkably consistent in terms of consumption, business investment, and government spending as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) across multiple governments. Economic activity, as measured by the median annualized quarterly percent change in US GDP, has been very similar under both single party and divided government rule.

Monetary policy matters more

Personal Investor

November 3, 2022

Monetary policy has historically impacted Presidents in a positive or negative manner. Presidents Clinton and Obama (and for a while Bush II) benefited from prolonged periods of benign inflation and easy monetary policy. Strong market returns under President Obama occurred during single-party Democratic rule, as well as during a divided government.

IRS Announces Record Increase To Retirement Plan Limits For 2023

Retirement

October 25, 2022

WASHINGTON — The Internal Revenue Service announced today that the amount individuals can contribute to their 401(k) plans in 2023 has increased to $22,500, up from $20,500 for 2022. The IRS today also issued technical guidance regarding all of the cost‑of‑living adjustments affecting dollar limitations for pension plans and other retirement-related items for tax year 2023 in Notice 2022-55PDF, posted today on IRS.gov.

Growth of $10,000 over presidential administrations

October 21, 2022

What do you think about the upcoming elections? Check out this chart and see what the Growth of $10,000 over presidential administrations reveals.

Putting Pullbacks in Perspective

October 12, 2022

We can gain an important perspective on market pullbacks by considering post-World War II declines in the S&P 500® Index. The majority of declines fall within the 5-10 percent range with an average recovery time of approximately one month, while declines between 10-20 percent have an average recovery period of approximately four months. Pullbacks within these ranges are not uncommon, occurring frequently during the normal market cycle.