Proglibocrats (Progressive – Liberal – Democrat) never see a tax they don’t like.  It’s just in their nature, but now they have crossed a personal line. Authored by Proglibocrat Representative Rosa DeLauro, representative from Connecticut (D) and co-sponsored by two other losers with nothing else to do with their D.C. staffs, the so-called SWEET Act introduced in Congress last week seeks to impose a 1% tax on every 4.2 grams of caloric sweetener added to beverages.  Come on, I’ve had to give up cigars, McDonald’s fries, chocolate candy bars, creampuffs, and numerous other delicacies and staples of life, but I’m able to hang onto some semblance of my taste buds enjoying diet Coke.  Now I’m supposed to feel dirty about it .  WHAT THE HECK !

Good planners those Oakland A’s of baseball fame.  They trade popular outfielder Yoenis Cespedes today just before the league’s trading deadline, forgetting the 10,000 T-shirts recently purchased for a promo fan giveaway night in Cespedes’ honor on Saturday.   Maybe they can charge $10 instead of $9 for a beer for a few games to make up the loss.       WHAT THE HECK !

No wonder Average Joe finds it hard to comprehend the investing landscape, and just how he/she will cope with buying a new house, or funding college, or prepping for retirement.  On the heels of a great Q2 GDP number on Wednesday, and expectations of another good jobs report tomorrow, the DJIA plummets over 300 points today (nearly 2%), wiping out all the gains of 2014 in one 6 1/2 hour trading session.    The reasons are many, mostly involving the consequences of government fiscal policy, but to the newbie investor who just added to the equity fund in his/her retirement fund,   WHAT THE HECK !

As my friends and family members know, I am a big chicken when it comes to owning stocks these days, given multiple worldwide political hotspots  and a job-starved, regulation-happy, debt-burdened domestic economy.  Oops,  forgot to mention the lack of leadership in Washington.    My trepidations have thus rendered me rather useless in helping others take care of their retirement planning, as several will quite willingly attest.

A finance prof at a small Philadelphia college (Wade Pfau) and a Virginia-based financial adviser (Michael Kitces) have turned my thinking upside down and maybe provided me with a window to be more effective.

99% of financial advisers will tell the newly retired  to put 50% to 70% of liquid net worth into stocks of some form, tapering that exposure as the retiree ages.  That strategy has never made common sense to me, even with dollar-cost averaging entry, given the volatility in worldwide equities and risk of major loss during the first ten years of retirement.  What in the world would I do now if I had to go back and make an honest living, having taken a 35% net worth hit a few years into retirement ?

Pfau and Kitces suggest cutting equities exposure back to 20-25% at retirement to preserve the sound financial basis for your retirement decision, and to become accustomed to the household retirement budget, then gradually adding to that exposure in each of the first ten years.  The idea is to protect your capital early in retirement, avoiding major hiccups that make for sleepless nights, then use dips in the market  to slowly add exposure thereafter.    Makes more common sense to me than the standard plan pushed by the 99% of advisers mentioned above.    WHAT THE HECK !