rescueme
Thinks s/he gets paid by the post
Only if they take those socks off my feet (e.g. taxes)I think there is a significant portion of this country that would rather go naked than see someone else get a pair of socks for free.
Only if they take those socks off my feet (e.g. taxes)I think there is a significant portion of this country that would rather go naked than see someone else get a pair of socks for free.
Only if they take those socks off my feet (e.g. taxes)
I see the thread hijackers have arrived.
Ponzi or Ponzi-like programs don't go on forever. They can't. All these claims in posts 86-98 have been hashed out ad infinitum elsewhere. No reason to go into that here.
i will start with the fact that you seemed to ignore my statement that the real value of SS is as longevity insurance.
Yes, I guess I did ignore it. It's arguably a valid way to look at SS, but I kinda ignored it because nobody thinks of SS in that way. Nobody. I've seen innumerable articles & papers discussing which age one should take SS, but have never seen even one article/paper about "SS is as longevity insurance".
The closest I've seen was the original paper about the SS Reset--and what it talked about was viewing the reset as an immediate SPIA.
just because you have not seen it doesnt mean "nobody thinks of SS in that way". it has been spoken of that way several times on this very board.
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then you ignore the fact that your income stream is only equal to the age 70 SS income stream for a period of time
Did the phrase "Break Even point" escape your understanding? Or the part where I discussed comparing the break-even point with the life expectancy?
neither of these escape my understanding but apparently the concept of not out living your money (which is a major concern on this board) escapes yours. and here i could exagerate (like you have) and say that nobody on this board uses the published life expectancy tables to determine how long they want their income to continue but instead i will say that most people on this board use a life expectancy far in excess of the published tables.
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Did you even bother to look at my spreadsheet?? no, i built my own. i think you didnt properly calculate (inflate) the amount of SS received at age 70, which explains the difference in our numbers
Well this is annoying (for me) and embarassing (for you). nope, mine didnt have the error yours appears to have You built your own spreadsheet and proceeded to think that mine had the same flaws as yours--when mine has a whole section devoted to that exact topic-the COLA-increased amount of the age 70 SS benefit. ok, lets see how correct yours is. what would be the starting SS pmt at age 70 of someone who could collect from SS $1000/mo at age 62 assuming 3% annual inflation?
And neither of these spreadsheets factors in a high-probability scenario. To wit: that SS benefits may be cut to ~80% of the currently projected benefit. Won't that put a crimp in the plans of people who delayed in order to get a higher amount! (If it ever happens. It might not, but it is a high probability.)
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"Would you call 3% return and 3% COLA realistic? a 3% return (nominal) when there is 3% inflation is a 0% real return "
I think that I covered that by adjusting the received benefits by the COLA. Maybe not. I dunno--my mind starts to swirl when trying to think about how to properly account for inflation & COLAs. I don't want to double count something. I think (but I might be wrong) that increasing the received benefits by the COLA while subtracting it from the return is double counting.
At any rate, you can make whichever assumption you want in my spreadsheet. If you think 6% nominal is 3% actual, then plug in 3% for the return instead of 6%.
Of course, if you want to debate about a spreadsheet that you haven't bothered to look at, then we have nothing to discuss.
the point i was trying to make was that when returns are quoted they are normally nominal returns which when taking inflation into consideration normally results in a lower real return.
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a 10% return ... yes it is unrealistic, what retiree do you think will have their ENTIRE porfolio invested in stocks until they die
Hmmm. The thrust of the argument now has switched from comparing the alternatives in pure financial terms to how you think retirees would choose to invest their portfolio.
A 10% (average) return IS realistic, because IN FACT that's what the historical S&P500 average is in the real world. Whether or not retirees would chose to invest in the S&P has no bearing on the matter.
a 10% return is not realistic for a retired person. we are talking about retired people, didnt you know that? and of course who is doing the investing is valid to the topic of what is a realistic return. very high returns can be obtained in business and real estate that are totally inappropriate to use for retirees.
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"your only professed value (which is questionable cus your numbers are incorrect) is that if you die young enough, your estate will be larger. the BE method just doesnt fit with the goals of most people retireing early (secure, stable income for life). "
A BE analysis is only a tool. It doesn't provide the answer to the question "When should I take SS". It provides a set of figures of the various alternatives and allows someone to decide which alternative he prefers.
A break-even spreadsheet is just another way to compute the Present Value of the SS benefits. Net present value - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
They'll both tell you the same thing, they just arrive at the answer in different ways.
A BE spreadsheet is more useful to most people (IMHO) because it shows the year-by-year comparison of the different ages (62 vs. 66 vs. 70). You can look at it and see for yourself the years when one is better than the other and by how much. Then you can plug in your own estimates for returns, COLAs, and look to see where is the cross-over point in comparison to your own estimate for your life expectancy.
well IMHO retirees (especially early ones) are more interested in stable lifetime incomes (i.e. having as good of a lifestyle as their money can buy them while not out living their money). i'll bet you are still working for a living.
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Okay dude, I finally have to say this:
Your bad grammar and bad spelling really detract from the weight of your argument. Presentation is important, because it shapes how people think of your accuracy.
People will say to themselves, "This person doesn't write properly, doesn't capitalize sentences, has a lot of spelling errors--even spelling errors in words in the topic of discussion ("retireing"). How confident am I that he isn't just as sloppy and erroneous in his arguments and calculations? Do I want to place my retirement in the hands of a person who can't even write properly?"
resorting to personal attacks are you? well i am sorry that i lack typing skills but you must not be very confident in your argument to feel you have to attack the way my ideas are presented.
... We can withdraw 4% during the years where the returns on this portfolio are good enough without needing SS. If we encounter a downturn, like the great recession of 2008, we'll stop taking anything out of our portfolio and immediately start taking SS. So, we effectively will use SS to reduce volatility in our Portfolio by switching to SS whenever that downturn occurs.
re: "SS is as longevity insurance".
just because you have not seen it doesnt mean "nobody thinks of SS in that way". it has been spoken of that way several times on this very board.
On this board? Perhaps. Even quite possibly. I don't recall seeing any such discussions (except yours) but it could well be that there have been such discussions that I've missed seeing.
You speak of age 70 1/2. Is this a recent change to begin in the future? As far as I know, the current age for maximum benefits is 70.My plan is to wait until the (currently) 70 1/2 year old point to maximize the SS monthly income and survivor's benefit for DW.
re: "SS is as longevity insurance".
You speak of age 70 1/2. Is this a recent change to begin in the future? As far as I know, the current age for maximum benefits is 70.
Ha