Re$cue Your Retirement

by Pamela Yellen

Paperback

Published January 1, 2019

Reviews

[Ebony · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bank on Yourself is an alternative to government-approved retirement investment plans namely 401(ks)s, IRAs, 403(b)s and Roth plans. These conventional retirement plans are subject to the unpredictable whims of the market where you have no control, limited access to the funds, potential tax hikes, and hidden/rising fees. I really enjoyed Yellen’s bestselling book The Bank on Yourself Revolution. Basically, Bank on Yourself is a divided-paying whole life insurance alternative retirement plan that is not subject to the market so you know exactly what you’ll make when and can borrow against your cash value without penalty (generally speaking). I am attracted to the idea of slow and steady. My personality doesn’t lend itself to the votality of the market. Her other book explains how the plans work in great detail, but I did learn a few things from this little book especially about 401(k)s. First, I didn’t know they were as new as the late 70s, and I didn’t know how they came to replace pension plans. It makes sense from a money grabbing standpoint to force people into 401(k)s instead of having to guarantee a pension which I also learned are generally underfunded by 27%. I also learned “for every matching dollar you’re given, you really only receive 10 cents or less in total compensation” (p. 11). I’ve never had a 401(k), but the matching always seemed like a good deal until now. I also know that rising taxes are a thing and what you pay for taxes now will rise in the future, but it never occurred to me that the government could take over retirement accounts. Yellen offers it as a possibility not an inevitability, but when she wrote “government-approved retirement plans are an incredibly attractive target for government control and ownership” because “they know precisely where your money is and how much you have there,” it made me pause (p. 45). Since we’re talking worse case scenarios Bank on Yourself plans could also be subject to taxes one day. There’s no law that says they can’t even though precedent for over 100 years shows they haven’t, and I’m sure the lobbyists would be apoplectic, but it’s a crazy world. See Coronovirus pandemic 2020. I think she wrote this book late last year. She starts chapter one with “I have no idea what the economic climate will be as you read this book. Absolutely no clue. We could be in a screaming bull market, or in the throes of a financial crash and recession, or somewhere in between. And the truth is nobody else knows either” (p. 5). I decided to read the book now to feel secure about the alternatives to conventional investing and to encourage others to be aware of their options and take advantage of them if they can.

[Cory Wallace · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great advice on how to outlive your money.