More than half of Americans younger than 65 had health coverage through an employer in 2020, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Families with job-based health insurance contributed an average of $5,600 toward the cost of health coverage last year, with employers paying more than $15,000, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. The foundation expects to release its report on 2021 costs in November.

Given all the moving parts, employers are taking different tacks to manage costs next year.

Nearly a third said they would consider narrowing the network of doctors and other providers available to patients, Willis Towers found. (It surveyed 378 employers of varying size, representing almost six million workers, in June and July.) A quarter of employers said they charged extra for covering a working spouse, if additional coverage was available through the spouse’s employer, and 9 percent said they were planning to add such “spousal surcharges” in the next year or two.

And in a trend to make care more affordable for lower-wage workers, some employers may vary their contributions to employee health care premiums, based on the employees’ jobs and their level of pay. Employers may contribute less to higher-paid workers’ health premiums, shifting more cost to them, and contribute more to lower-paid workers, to help them pay for the care they need. About a fourth of employers do this now, and 8 percent more are planning on doing it in coming years, Willis Towers found.

“It’s aimed at affordability,” which is a “hot topic,” Ms. Stone said.

The financial services company Synchrony, which has a large number of hourly workers, has used tiered premiums for years. The company’s entry-level tier offers health coverage starting at $2 a week for an individual and $10 a week for a family of five; higher-tier employees might pay twice as much or 10 times as much. The plans have the same type of coverage across tiers; just the premium varies, said Aaron Brown, the company’s senior vice president of total rewards.

“It’s the right thing to do, to make sure health care is affordable for our employees,” he said. Employees seem receptive; the company says the share of employees who elect medical coverage is consistent across wage levels.

Employers see mental health as a top priority, said Mr. Bernstein of Mercer, and are responding by increasing the number of covered therapy visits, and offering digital tools to help increase access to providers. Online services like Ginger, for example, let workers schedule remote visits quickly and offer exercises to help reduce anxiety.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/08/your-money/health-benefits-employer-costs.html

If you haven’t heard from the department by February or seen updates on the statements and records that FedLoan, the entity that services people who are already enrolled in P.S.L.F., provides, call or send a message to FedLoan for guidance. If that doesn’t yield any information, send a note to the department’s ombudsman office and request a review. And if that doesn’t work, contact your senators’ or congressperson’s constituent service representatives and ask them to intervene on your behalf.

And if you have had the right type of loan all along but are hoping for a payment review, you should fill out the standard P.S.L.F. form if you haven’t done so yet or haven’t certified your employment before because you didn’t think you needed to.

What if I end up with credit for more than 120 payments when this is all over?

You should get a refund, automatically, according to the department’s website, as long as you haven’t already received full forgiveness (say, a year or two ago). If you already have, there won’t be any refund forthcoming even if the current waivers mean that you, in theory, made too many payments before your forgiveness.

Where can I get help in the meantime?

The P.S.L.F. journey has proved lonely and infuriating for so many people. Many of them commiserate on Facebook in a Public Service Loan Forgiveness program support group, where you can learn about others’ successes, failures and tactics. The Reddit group about the program can offer similar camaraderie. Both places should have frequent updates from individuals posting about what they’ve heard from which entities about their progress or lack thereof.

The Student Loan Borrower Protection Center offers resources for borrowers, and the Institute of Student Loan Advisors tries to answer debtor questions. Many financial planners now specialize in student loan advice, too.

How could this all go awry before the Oct. 31, 2022, deadline?

Where to start, really?

Given all the past problems, it is a bit of a stretch to think that the Education Department will be able to quickly sort data on hundreds of thousands of people or more and pick out the ones who are eligible for waivers. But at least it is trying.

Meanwhile, FedLoan has announced its intention to get out of the business of servicing these loans altogether. The Education Department did not say what entity might replace it or when.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/article/public-service-loan-forgiveness-changes.html

“They could ignore the debt limit,” he said. “It is a question that has never been adjudicated because it hasn’t come up before.”

But previous administrations have rejected that approach, he said, and legal experts don’t agree about whether it would actually work.

What about Social Security?

Social Security — which reaches tens of millions of Americans through retirement, disability and survivor benefits — is a bit different from other programs because it is largely financed through a dedicated payroll tax. It also has its own trust funds, which may give it more flexibility, some experts said.

The taxes coming into the program aren’t enough to pay all of the benefits, according to Jason J. Fichtner, chief economist at the Bipartisan Policy Center, who held several positions, including acting principal deputy commissioner, at the Social Security Administration. But since the checks are sent out on a staggered basis, the agency could wait for more cash to come in, which would result in delayed payments.

But there’s also at least one other possibility. If the Treasury redeemed the special-issue bonds from the program’s trust fund to pay benefits — and then quickly replaced them with newly issued bonds — that wouldn’t raise the debt ceiling, Mr. Fichtner argues.

It’s not clear whether the Treasury agrees with his assessment.

What else could happen?

If the United States were to default on its debts — that is, stop making payments on the Treasurys it has sold — there would almost certainly be major consequences in the global markets.

The immediate effect would be that portfolios held by investors as varied as pension funds and holders of 401(k)s would face a market tailspin. Even after any debt-ceiling standoff were resolved, global investors would demand higher interest payments on U.S. Treasury bonds — so the government’s borrowing in the future could become more expensive.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/06/business/debt-ceiling-social-security-medicare.html

Then, a few basics. If you’re seeking regular allowance distribution and management, most services can handle that. But if you’re paying your children for chores and want to check tasks off on a line-item basis before pushing money onto a kid’s card, that’s a feature that you should select for specifically. Gohenry does this, and FamZoo helped pioneer it.

Also, what financial behaviors do you wish to encourage — or change? Many parents like to reward savings with automatic interest-rate boosts or goal-based bonuses. “That allows parents to exaggerate the point to make the point,” said Tim Sheehan, Greenlight’s co-founder. So check for that feature if it’s important to you. Greenlight offers it, and FamZoo has a strong offering, too.

Then, there’s the goal of overarching financial literacy. Tanya Van Court, the founder of Goalsetter, has poured resources into that side of her business. “A card is actually an incomplete solution,” she said.

Goalsetter allows parents to pay their kids extra for doing well on financial literacy quizzes and hold money back when they don’t complete them. She’s also trying to persuade credit bureaus to reward 18-year-old Goalsetter customers who are particularly well informed.

“It’s not fair that some kids get added to their parents’ American Express accounts and develop a fantastic credit score when they haven’t spent a dime,” she said. (Step already has a system in place to allow young users to begin building good credit.)

Consider the help you may need, too. “Everyone underestimates customer service,” said Mr. Dwight, of FamZoo, which has a fairly modest roster of 13,000 family clients. “When your teenage daughter is stuck at a gas station, you kind of don’t want a bot.”

He would say something like that, given that his is a sort of home-brewed product, where he and his partner respond to customer inquiries themselves. FamZoo also earns bonus points for the granularity of the F.A.Q. on its website, which bestills my dorked-out heart for the way it anticipates nearly every use (and misuse) case. Test out any start-up you’re considering by sending a message with a question to see what kind of response you get.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/02/your-money/kids-debit-cards.html

What’s causing problems are jet cancellations. “Most of these jet cards, if the operator cancels it because of a mechanical issue, they guarantee you a replacement aircraft at no cost,” Mr. Gollan said. But if the jet operator cancels because it doesn’t have a jet, he said, “your broker could say, ‘Sorry we lost this plane, but we have three new quotes.’ Instead of paying $18,000 to go up to New York, you could pay $28,000.”

Your choice at that point? Get a refund and fly commercial or pay the extra and go.

“Jet operators have been inundated with requests,” said Gregg Brunson-Pitts, founder and president of Advanced Aviation, a boutique jet broker. “We have had to be creative.”

Since the lockdown was loosened last year, charter prices are up 15 percent, but customers are not balking, Mr. Brunson-Pitts said. Yet in the rush to fly private, he said, would-be fliers needed to ensure that their broker is working with reputable jet owners who properly maintain the planes and train the pilots.

Jet cards are supposed to provide more of a guarantee. Fliers have already paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for the hours and want the plane when they want it, usually on relatively short notice.

But those, too, have been in high demand. Even higher prices didn’t cool interest.

“After a couple of price increases that didn’t slow down sales to a pace that we were comfortable with, we halted jet card sales altogether and went to a wait list,” Mr. Gallagher of NetJets said. “We could have tested that price elasticity further, but I didn’t want the perception of a money grab in a hot market. We saw how the demand was building in the summer.”

Kenny Dichter, chairman and chief executive of Wheels Up, another provider, said he didn’t see the jet card market cooling. “People are putting money down for travel into 2022,” he said. “The demand we’re seeing now is the result of the stubbornness of this Covid crisis.”

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/01/your-money/private-jets-demand.html

Caution flags and other guidance could help, and some of Robinhood’s educational materials are pretty good. They reiterate that necessary point that holding on to investments for a long time can earn you piles of compound interest.

Nevertheless, the company doesn’t offer individual retirement accounts, which can help turn small investments into big nest eggs. Roth I.R.A.s come with tax benefits that are of particular use to college-age, lower-income savers.

In July, Robinhood’s chief executive, Vlad Tenev, said it might add such offerings. A company representative had no additional information to add about any decision or timeline.

Still, there is reason to be skeptical of Robinhood. It recently paid about $70 million in restitution plus a fine — the biggest in the history of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority — to settle charges of misleading millions of customers and letting others trade investments that were not appropriate for them. And late last year, it paid $65 million to settle Securities and Exchange Commission charges that it had misled users about its use of payment for order flow.

In both cases, the company neither admitted nor denied the charges and findings.

“Investing early is important to building wealth long term, but research shows that the vast majority of young adults have never invested in the stock market,” the company said in a statement. “We want to help educate and empower all investors, including college students, about investing.”

According to Robinhood’s own survey data, its customers are already more racially diverse than those of more established brokerage firms like Fidelity and Charles Schwab. Kudos for that.

But Robinhood has gotten a lot of mileage out of portraying itself as the champion of newer investors and its boast of “democratizing” finance. It has even panned critics who question whether it has the best interests of beginners at heart.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/25/your-money/robinhood-colleges.html

Caution flags and other guidance could help, and some of Robinhood’s educational materials are pretty good. They reiterate that necessary point that holding onto investments for a long time can earn you piles of compound interest.

Nevertheless, the company doesn’t offer Individual Retirement Accounts, which can help turn small investments into big nest eggs. Roth I.R.A.’s come with tax benefits that are of particular use to college-age, lower-income savers.

In July, Robinhood’s chief executive, Vlad Tenev, said it might add such offerings. A company representative had no additional information to add about any decision or timeline.

Still, there is reason to be skeptical of Robinhood. It recently paid about $70 million in restitution plus a fine — the biggest in the history of the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority — to settle charges of misleading millions of customers and letting others trade investments that were not appropriate for them. And late last year, it paid $65 million to settle Securities and Exchange Commission charges that it had misled users about its use of payment for order flow.

In both cases, the company neither admitted nor denied the charges and findings.

“Investing early is important to building wealth long-term, but research shows that the vast majority of young adults have never invested in the stock market,” the company said in a statement. “We want to help educate and empower all investors, including college students, about investing.”

According to Robinhood’s own survey data, its customers are already more racially diverse than those of more established brokerage firms like Fidelity and Charles Schwab. Kudos for that.

But Robinhood has gotten a lot of mileage out of portraying itself as the champion of newer investors and its boast of “democratizing” finance. It has even panned critics who question whether it has the best interests of beginners at heart.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/25/your-money/stocks-and-bonds/robinhood-college-tour.html

“It’s almost impossible, if you’re 65, to correct something that happened 30 years ago,” Mr. Certner said.

The outlook for the legislation is uncertain. A similar measure that was introduced last year failed to advance, and Congress is currently preoccupied with major legislation like President Biden’s infrastructure spending bill.

Here are some questions and answers about Social Security statements:

Why should I check my statement?

A discrepancy in your earnings not only can affect your future benefits, but it can also raise a flag about possible identity theft. If earnings are much higher than your records show, it could indicate that someone has been working illegally using your Social Security number.

Statements also help you plan for retirement. You can see how much you can expect to receive in monthly benefits, and how much more you would get by waiting until your “full” retirement age, rather than collecting benefits at age 62. For most people born in 1960 or later, their full retirement age is 67. And if you delay taking your benefits until age 70, your monthly payments will be even higher.

How can I check my statement online?

If you are 18 or older, you can create an online mySocialSecurity account. When you log on, you can review your statement online or print it out. You can also request an annual email reminder to log on and review your records.

What if I find an error on my statement?

Earnings may be “missing” for several reasons, according to SocialSecurity.gov. Your employer may have reported your earnings using the wrong Social Security number, or you may have married or divorced and changed your name but forgotten to report it to the agency.

The first thing to do is to collect proof of the missing earnings, such as a W-2 wage statement, a pay stub or a tax return. If you don’t have any documents, you can write down the name of your employer, the dates you worked, how much you earned, and the name and Social Security number you used. Then contact Social Security to correct the error. The process “could take some time” and involve contacting former employers, the agency says.

Cindy Hounsell, president of the Women’s Institute for a Secure Retirement, urged people to at least save their W-2 forms, in case they need them to correct their earnings record. If a former employer goes out of business, it may be difficult or impossible to obtain them later.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/24/your-money/social-security-benefits-mail.html

Mr. Dunne bought a yearling last year for $50,000 and resold it for $1.2 million as a 2-year-old in the spring. (Across the board, pinhookers made over $36 million buying yearlings last September at Keeneland and selling them in the 2021 spring sales.)

Yet Mr. Dunne has had plenty of losses over the years, he said. “More horses don’t make the 2-year-old sales than the yearling sales because they have to do more to get there,” he said. “Athletic prowess is the differentiator. But it’s guesswork.”

Even with online buyers finding their way into the industry, it’s not as Wild West as it might sound. Many had agents assess the horses in person last year before buying. But as buyers got more used to the process this year, that wasn’t always the case. Some bought the horses online as they would buy a work of art at Sotheby’s or Christie’s.

“We’ve had horsemen doing things the same way for decades,” Ms. Arvin said. “It was getting them comfortable that this was good. A lot of sales, there was hustle and bustle. We were concerned to take it on the internet and lose that excitement. In the end, it’s the love of the horse and the environment.”

And since many of the horses stayed in Kentucky or at least the United States for training, she said, the people on the ground were probably going to advise the buyers, whether they were in person or online, about where to train the horse.

Whether that hobby pays off is still to be seen. After all, wealthy buyers have waded into an area of the horse market that has traditionally been risky.

“As pinhookers, we create a good commercial market in the beginning,” Mr. Woods said. “Then the buyer comes along and gets to see these horses trained and gets a better indication of what the horse will be on the racetrack. Be it good or bad, people can then decide if they’re going to spend a lot of money on a horse or if the horse they thought they liked isn’t that good.”

Those answers are a few years away.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/24/your-money/horse-auctions-online-buyers.html

Es bien sabido que los informes de las agencias contienen una buena cantidad de errores. Si encuentras algunos, haz el reclamo. Para empezar, contacta tanto a las agencias de información crediticia como a las empresas de servicios financieros que puedan haber proporcionado la información incorrecta (la CFPB tiene una buena guía al respecto).

Y en cuanto a tu declaración de impuestos, nunca está de más organizar todos los datos fiscales que puedas durante los últimos meses del año de calendario. Es un registro de tu pasado reciente y una ventana a tu futuro a largo plazo (por ejemplo, a través de cualquier anotación sobre ahorros para la jubilación). El proceso también puede servir como recordatorio de que a menudo hay al menos una cosa más que puedes hacer en el presente para ayudarte mientras le entregas menos dinero a varios organismos gubernamentales.

Prepárate ahora y podrás presentar la declaración de impuestos lo antes posible en 2022 y obtener rápidamente cualquier reembolso que te corresponda. Una advertencia: a Donna Trainor, planificadora financiera y contadora de Atlanta que ha realizado un extenso trabajo pro bono con personas en peligro de perder sus casas, le preocupa que los beneficiarios de los nuevos pagos mensuales de crédito fiscal no se den cuenta de que es una especie de anticipo. Conseguirlo ahora significa que puede que no recibas un reembolso por la misma cantidad de impuestos que lo habitual, por lo que tendrás que restar esa expectativa de tu presupuesto de 2022.

No te limites a contemplar la catástrofe

Ahora, hablemos sobre lo que sientes.

Incluso para quienes están acostumbrados a la incertidumbre financiera, la pandemia podría haber incrementado el tipo de pensamiento catastrófico que puede llegar a deteriorar tu capacidad para planificar y establecer prioridades.

En Hollywood, los trabajadores parecidos a la gente de teatro como nuestro mentor financiero Stephen, a menudo terminaban paralizados por el miedo incluso si eran exitosos, dijo Leighann Miko, cuya empresa de planificación financiera suele trabajar con personas que brincan de un trabajo a otro.

“El temor era que la situación tardase mucho más en mejorar”, comentó Miko. “La gente llegó a pensar que iban a tener que buscar otro tipo de empleo”. Lo que en realidad querían evitar era lo que ella calificó de “Plan Z”, es decir, trabajos anteriores en diferentes industrias que esperaban no tener que volver a aceptar nunca más.

Miko ve una especie de cicatriz psicológica en la gente que la rodea, incluso en las personas que ganan 600.000 dólares al año. Sí, lo sé, pobrecitos, pero ellos saben muy bien que incluso sin pandemia, siempre corren el riesgo de tener un año con solo 30.000 dólares en ingresos. Para ayudar a aquellos que no pueden concebir hacer otra cosa que no sea sus trabajos de ensueño, por los que han luchado tanto, Miko hace planes y estrategias y trata de hacer que los sigan.

Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/es/2021/09/20/espanol/finanzas-pandemia-consejos.html