The Power Of Zero Show

There is a little-known part of the IRS tax code that allows you to access your 401(k) or 403(b) prior to 59 and a half without penalty. Traditionally, the penalty is 10%, but the Rule of 55 gives you access without paying a penalty, but it comes with certain requirements. If you leave your job in the calendar year you turn 55 or older for any reason and your employer has stipulated that you have the ability to tap into your plan, you can do so without penalty. Some plans may require you to withdraw your entire balance as one lump sum, which would most certainly be a bad deal. To maximize the Rule of 55, there are a number of roll-over strategies you can use. For example, if you have an old 401(k) or IRA, you can roll those balances into your employer’s plans, and then when you separate you will have unfettered access to the total amount between age 55 and 59 and a half. If you have specific circumstances or know that you’ll have heavy cash flow needs between those ages, this is a solid, penalty-free option. You have to get all the shifting done before you leave your employer. You won’t be able to roll over a balance after you are no longer employed. There are some caveats. You can only withdraw funds from your most recent employer, and you can’t make penalty-free withdrawals from your IRA. The Rule of 55 is very specific and only applies to narrow circumstances. People are retiring at younger and younger ages, and if that’s the case for you in that period between age 55 and 59 and a half, the Rule of 55 is a great option. You will want to apply Power of Zero principles during those years because if you don’t you may bump into a higher tax bracket than you expect or accidentally suffer a 10% penalty. Another reason you may want to take money out of your 401(k) using the Rule of 55 is to take advantage of historically low taxes. You can use the money to fund your lifestyle as well as your Roth IRAs and LIRPs.  A 72T is another viable option for some people, but it comes with artificially low limits that may be an obstacle. The 72T works for a lot of people, it just doesn’t work for everybody, particularly those that want to retire early.

The Joe Biden legislature is currently dead in the water. Congress people are looking for ways to pay for the package, but even if they could there may not be a package to pay for. Every Senator wields considerable power and a couple in particular have been vocal opponents of the proposed bill. Joe Manchin and Krysten Sinema have voiced concerns about the package and the price tag. Other members of the Democrat party have lambasted Joe Manchin on social media and on the floor, and he has not taken the criticism lightly. He’s gone from proposing a $1.5 trillion dollar limit to $0, and Krysten Sinema has made it clear that she’s not interested in any sort of tax increases at all. Congress has now turned its attention to a different sort of tax. They’ve proposed a wealth tax, also described as taxing the unrealized capital gains on the liquid assets of anybody who has $1 billion or more in assets or anyone reporting more than $100 million in income for three consecutive years. This would affect only the 700 richest people in the country, and will generate $200 billion in revenue over the next decade. The reasoning is that raising the tax rate isn’t going to directly affect the highest earners because so much of their net worth is tied up in the value of their stock ownership.  Democrats are not calling this a wealth tax because it’s not being levied against the entire net wealth of a wealthy person. Elizabeth Warren proposed a wealth tax in her presidential run and it is considered to have sunk her campaign. Jeff Bezos doesn’t liquidate his stock to fund his lifestyle. He borrows money and uses his stock holdings as collateral. This allows him to fund his lifestyle while still maintaining a controlling interest in Amazon. Democrats have asked Krysten Sinema to weigh in on the proposal, but she’s not likely to vote for it since she’s opposed to similar measures already being proposed. This would leave the Democrats below the threshold of a simple majority. Critics of the plan say that it will force billionaires out of the stock market and into more opaque markets like art and real estate. The real issue is that, even if passed, this tax only raises $200 billion in revenue. Even if the Democrats managed to pass the bill, there is still no clear plan to pay for it. The real question with this package hanging from a thread is what will happen to individual tax rates? Joe Biden’s proposed tax increases are tied to the bill so right now we have a choice.  We can either assume the tax rates will expire in 2026 and this bill will not pass. The trouble with this is compressing the amount of shifting you need to do over five years and possibly bumping into a higher tax bracket along the way, only to realize after the fact that you had nine years all along. The reverse is also troublesome. You don’t want to plan for nine years when you only have five and end up in the scenario where you didn’t shift as much as you need to. Joe Biden wants to increase tax rates on the rich, but the only way for him to really accomplish that is by allowing the Trump tax cuts to expire in 2026.  The more time that passes that Joe Biden fails to push through this legislation, the less likely that anything is going to be adopted. Few Congress people want to have their name tied to a controversial piece of legislation leading up to midterms because that’s the kind of thing that will get you voted out of office.   Mentioned in this Episode: With corporate tax off table, U.S. Democrats turn to billionaires to fund spending bill - reuters.com/world/us/with-corporate-tax-off-table-us-democrats-turn-billionaires-fund-spending-bill-2021-10-25/ Secretary Yellen: How new billionaire tax would work [video] - edition.cnn.com/videos/politics/2021/10/24/yellen-on-billionaire-tax.cnn

David gets variations of one question pretty frequently whenever he gives one of his presentations, whether that’s in front of financial advisors or members of the general public. At the end of the workshop, there are five takeaways. The first is that tax rates are likely to be dramatically higher in the future than they are today. Mathematically speaking, we are past the point of no return. The second is that the only way to truly insulate yourself from the impact of higher taxes is to get to the zero percent tax bracket. The third is that it is nearly impossible to get to the zero percent tax bracket with only one stream of income. This is where most people stumble. Invariably at the end of the presentation, someone will come up and ask what the other streams of tax-free income are despite having just gone over six different streams during the presentation. People tend to fixate on the LIRP and forget about the rest. The LIRP is great, but it has a narrow focus and doesn’t do enough to generate a stream of tax-free income on its own. Typically, David recommends diversifying your tax-free streams of income because each one is unique and accomplishes different parts of the strategy. Getting to the zero percent tax bracket is like fitting pieces of a puzzle together. Only when you fit them all together does the zero percent tax bracket come into play for you. The first stream is the Roth IRA. If you’re younger than 50, you can contribute $6000. If you’re older than 50, you can contribute $7000. The thing that makes the Roth IRA unique besides being tax-free is that when you put money in, you can take money out right away. It’s the only tax-free stream of income with that feature. The Roth 401(k) is unique because it’s part of a company plan and they will often have inducements that go with it. The Secure Retirement Act 2.0 that is working its way through Congress will also allow you to direct that match to your tax-free bucket. This company match is free money and that’s something you should always take advantage of. The Roth conversion is unique because it can be the workhorse for your retirement planning. It allows you to convert as much as you want to tax-free because there are no limits at the moment. If you have a lot of money in your IRA ($10 million+), it probably makes sense to convert all of that money before tax rates go up next year. Required Minimum Distributions are interesting in that they come from your tax-deferred bucket. The idea is that the balance in your IRA is low enough that your RMDs at age 72 are equal to your standard deduction and don’t cause Social Security taxation. RMDs are the only strategy where you get a deduction on the front end, the money grows tax-deferred, and you can take it out tax-free, also known as the holy grail of financial planning. The LIRP has a lot of things going for it, but one thing that really stands out is the death benefit. Should you die prematurely, your heirs get a death benefit. With the right LIRP, you can also receive that death benefit in advance of your death for the purpose of paying for long-term care. This avoids the heartburn of paying for something you hope you never use. Social Security is the final stream of tax-free income. As long as your provisional income is below certain thresholds, it’s tax-free and functions a lot like an annuity. It can help you mitigate longevity risk, inflation, and sequence of return risk. The longer you live, the better it gets. The Power of Zero approach is built around having multiple streams of tax-free income. This is also how you know whether an advisor is following the true Power of Zero plan. Each stream of tax-free income is unique in its own right and contributes something to your retirement plan that none of the others can do. 

It looks like Joe Biden’s landmark legislation is running into some challenges in Congress. Joe Manchin, one of the most powerful men in Congress right now, has pushed back on the $3.5 trillion bill and counter-offered with a more narrow $1.5 trillion plan. Progressive Democrats in the house are saying that it’s too small to make their priorities a reality. Both sides of the aisle are pulling in opposite directions and don’t seem to be able to come to a compromise. Joe Biden is making tax reform a major aspect of the Human Infrastructure plan. The increase of tax rates on those making more than $400,000 per year are the means for paying for part of the plan. If the bill fails to pass, the current tax law expires in 2026. If it does pass, the Trump tax cuts will still be in effect for another 8 years. The time difference could be the determining factor in shifting your money to tax-free without bumping into a higher tax bracket. Joe Biden is on the clock. If he can’t get this bill passed relatively soon, he’s going to convey the impression that his party is in disarray and they aren’t going into the midterm elections in a unified way. Typically, the party in power needs to get their priorities done in the first two years. The stalemate in Congress runs the risk of pushing the legislation so far out into the future that nothing happens. The bill will end up somewhere between the two extremes. There are other Senators and Congress people saying that the $3.5 trillion is too small while others are saying $1.5 trillion is the maximum. Nancy Pelosi has recently abandoned the effort to tie the Infrastructure bill and Human Infrastructure bill together. The longer this bill takes to pass or fail, the more likely failure becomes as congresspeople won’t want their name attached to it. This means that every day that goes by where this bill doesn’t pass, the likelihood is that the current tax rates are going to expire in 2026.     Mentioned in this Episode: A top House progressive says $1.5 trillion is not enough to pass social spending plan - npr.org/2021/10/03/1042862107/a-top-house-progressive-says-1-5-trillion-is-not-enough-to-pass-social-spending-?t=1633978400218&t=1634060208587

The increase on taxes on the rich with the Human Infrastructure plan is rumored to cost the average American nothing, but that’s not quite the full story. The long-term implications of the cost of the plan say differently. Fiscal insanity has been a bi-partisan venture, and it has been for at least the last 20 years. Debt goes up under Republican administrations just as much as Democrats. Under Donald Trump’s administration, the debt rose by an average of $2 trillion per year. Historically, the debt rose by $1 trillion driven primarily by Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid as Baby Boomers begin to retire. Broken down, this means that there is an extra $23,500 in federal debt for every person in the country. Only two other presidents have come close to spending as much, George W. Bush and Abraham Lincoln, both of whom oversaw extraordinary circumstances during their presidencies. One of the things that drove up the debt was the Covid-19 crisis, but the debt had already soared to grave levels prior to the pandemic. Trump cut taxes but didn’t do anything to cut spending, and this caused debt to soar to unprecedented levels. The national debt is now at the point where it’s higher than it was at the conclusion of World War 2. The difference is that we could demobilize after WW2 but we can’t avoid the primary expenses looming over the nation now. A common myth that many people believe is that we can grow our way out of the national debt. The debt is growing at an extraordinary rate and there is no way for revenue to grow in comparison. The tariffs Trump introduced were believed to help eliminate the budget deficit and pay down the national debt, but that was not the case. The Trump tax cuts were primary drivers of increasing the debt, when combined with a lack of cuts to spending. The tariffs also had a minimal impact on the debt once it had been allocated. The fiscal gap and the national debt are so large that the idea of taxing the rich pales in comparison. Taxing the rich, even at 100% levels, it’s only enough to pay the interest on the debt and fund a couple of programs for a few weeks. There are huge fiscal unsustainabilities in the scope of the federal government’s budget. By early 2019, Trump was telling the American public that the national debt was a grave threat to economic and societal prosperity. Other officials began sounding the alarm as well. Historically, we have racked up debt but with good excuses for doing so. This time we accumulated debt when the stock market was booming. When every other country was getting their house in order, we continue to pile debt onto the national credit card. We are currently at 130% debt-to-GDP and for most economists, alarm bells are going off. The reason why now is different from WW2 when we had similar levels of debt is we are now funding social programs that are slated to grow dramatically in the near future. The real issue is the cost of the interest on the debt. Most of the debt has been financed in the short term and will have to be refinanced. If interest rates go up in the interim, the cost of that interest is going to skyrocket and consume the federal budget. Low-interest rates are manageable now, but if and when that changes in time, the risk becomes greater. Blame can be laid on both sides of the aisle, but if you’re a Republican you need to acknowledge that the Trump administration accumulated a record amount of debt in a short time period. If you’re a Democrat, you need to insist your representatives show some leadership regarding the fiscal future of the country. Social programs like Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are driving the debt and unless something is changed the problem will only escalate. This will only increase the likelihood and magnitude of higher tax rates in the future.   Mentioned in this Episode: Donald Trump Built a National Debt So Big (Even Before the Pandemic) That It’ll Weigh Down the Economy for Years - https://www.propublica.org/article/national-debt-trump

Dr. Larry Kotlikoff is the foremost expert in the world on fiscal gap accounting and has done a great job transforming how we should be thinking about a nation’s debt. Dr. Kotlikoff recently stated during an interview that most retirement planning is wrong.  According to Dr. Kotlikoff, the basic problem with financial planning is that the goal of our life is not to accumulate wealth so that people can charge us fees on our assets. It’s about having the best lifestyle we can, given our resources, so we don’t end up on the street if the market crashes or we live to be 100 years old. You don’t necessarily need to pay someone to manage your assets, but it can be worthwhile to have someone help you stick to your objectives. Most people without a financial advisor participate in emotionally driven investing, which is why the average investor’s returns suffer. Saving for retirement is a requirement in consumption smoothing, but there is an optimal amount to save. Once you know what you have, you know what you can spend. Part of the job of a good financial planner is helping you reverse engineer what you need to create the lifestyle you want in retirement. This is where the Power of Zero paradigm deviates from mainstream financial planning. You have to get the tax part of the equation right. It’s not enough to know what you should be saving, because if you execute that plan in your tax-deferred bucket and watch as tax rates rise over time, you’ll find that your financial plan only delivers about half what your lifestyle needs. You need to contribute the right amount of money into the right kinds of accounts. Dr. Kotlikoff feels the stock market is overvalued and dependent on the Federal Reserve’s support to maintain its levels. Market timing is tricky at the best of times. Statistically, it’s nearly impossible to do. Over the course of a given year, that 80% of the rise in the market occurred on 6-8 days and you have to predict exactly which days those are going to be.  If you can guarantee your lifestyle expenses with your Social Security, pension, and/or a guaranteed lifetime income annuity, you can take much more risk in the market.  A good rule of thumb if you need to dip into your assets during a down year is to take money out of your LIRP instead of your stock market portfolio. Dr. Kotlikoff recommends that you push off taking Social Security for as long as you can to mitigate longevity risk. The key here is predicting how long you are going to live. The worst thing that can happen to you is push it off until age 70, and then die at age 71. The best way to predict how long you are going to live is to go through the LIRP underwriting process. When an underwriter accepts you, they are basically betting that you are going to live a long, healthy life, and you can use that to push Social Security off as long as possible. Is paying off your mortgage early smart? The question we should be asking is whether we “should take money that could be invested in the stock market or pay off a mortgage early?” When you look at the arbitrage between the market and your mortgage, the math doesn’t add up. Converting money to an IRA has to be done over a period of time to avoid paying more taxes than necessary. We are in a rising tax rate environment, so it makes sense to take advantage of today’s historically low tax rates, but it has to be done systematically. You shouldn’t be drawing Social Security during your conversion period because it will cause Social Security taxation and lock you into a lower amount. There are secrets to all stages of the life cycle. When you’re young, stay home to save on housing costs and don’t borrow for college if there is a reasonable likelihood you might drop out. Invest more in stocks as you age in retirement, especially if you have your lifestyle needs guaranteed already. Mentioned in this Episode: Medicine’s Golden Age Is Dawning. 10 Stocks to Play the Latest Innovations. - barrons.com/articles/medicine-healthcare-stocks-roundtable-51632527474

Most of the changes of the two infrastructure bills working their way through Congress right now will mainly affect high-income earners, but the details may change as time goes on. There are seven major takeaways from the recent house tax bill. The first is that personal income tax rates are going up, but only for roughly 2% of households that make more than $400,000 per year. Joe Biden campaigned on not raising taxes on the middle class, and the current form of the bill seems to reflect that. Takeaway #2 is that capital gains rates are going up, but not as much as Biden originally proposed, which is primarily going to affect high-income earners. This is a retroactive bill which if it comes into effect retroactively to the date of Sept 13. If you sold anything after that date you will be affected by the higher capital gains tax rate. Takeaway #3 is that the bill brings back the marriage penalty. This bill will become somewhat punitive for married people when compared to single people. Takeaway #4 is that the Roth conversion is going away for the wealthy. Whether the Roth conversion is applied to the limit is a question right now, but if that’s the case it will be a major roadblock for any Power of Zero planning. The effective date of this provision is December 31, 2031. It’s speculated that by delaying the start date it will create a buy-now mentality. The IRA and the Roth conversion are two of the only things in the world that Americans like and the government likes. The government gets revenue today, and Americans get to insulate themselves against the impact of higher tax rates down the road. Takeaway #5 is that the backdoor Roth conversion is going away.  Takeaway #6 is that there will no longer be any IRA or Roth contributions for the rich, basically anyone making more than $400,000 or anyone with more than $10 million in retirement accounts. The intent is to prevent extremely wealthy people from taking advantage of the tax code, but the end result is generally pretty minimal. Takeaway #7 will have a particularly large impact on people with large amounts of money in their Roth IRA. This is largely inspired by Peter Thiel who recently revealed that he had over $5 billion in his Roth IRA. People in the higher income bracket and who have over $10 million in their Roth IRA would be required to distribute 50% of the excess of $10 million. If your balance exceeds $20 million, you would have to distribute 100% of the excess over the $20 million mark.  As it’s written right now, if you’re a married couple that earns under the $450,000 per year income amount, the rule won’t apply to you. Earn one dollar more though and you will have a massive RMD coming your way.   Mentioned in this Episode: Jeff Levine, Twitter: @CPAPlanner

Whether you like to talk about politics or not, the things that are happening in Congress right now will affect your retirement. All the unmitigated spending during the Covid pandemic is catching up with the US. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin revealed further measures to avoid breaching the federal government’s borrowing limit and also announced they would be suspending reinvestments for a number of retirement funds. Debt negotiations have always been a game of chicken between the Democrats and the Republicans, but there’s more at stake right now. The Treasury uses emergency maneuvers to conserve cash so the government can keep making payments on its obligations. Once those measures run out, the Treasury could begin to miss payments which could trigger a default on US debt. A default on the debt in the US has never happened before, and if it did happen it would likely precipitate a global depression. There are only two things the federal government is Constitutionally required to pay: Civil War pensions, and interest on the national debt. Similar instances have happened in the past, like in 2011 when Standard and Poor stripped the US of its AAA rating for the first time. If we default on our debt, it could trigger a sovereign debt crisis, which will likely result in the costs of servicing the national debt to go up dramatically. The debt ceiling has been raised 98 times in the past, but it’s possible for this time around to go differently. It’s possible that the tipping point will occur mid-September and we could be seeing the consequences of this as early as October.  We refinance the national debt every two years, so when interest rates go up it gets even more expensive to service the debt, and that can result is taxes being raised even earlier than we thought. The national debt is projected to increase by $3 trillion by the end of 2021.  All of this is a backdrop to the Democrats trying to pass a $1 trillion infrastructure bill and a $3 trillion human infrastructure bill through Congress. The Democrats want the debt ceiling increase to be a bipartisan effort, but the Republicans are positioning themselves as opposing the increased spending and forcing the Democrats to own the bill. It seems like no one saw this spending initiative coming face-to-face with the fiscal constraints of the repercussions of unmitigated spending by both parties over time. Mitt Romney said that the Democrats would be wise to raise the debt limit in reconciliation and own the decision. Joe Biden’s tax increase initiative is part of the drama. If this debt crisis implodes, he may not get anything that he wants and the Trump tax cuts may simply expire in 2026.   Mentioned in this Episode: Janet Yellen to Enact Steps to Avoid Breaching Debt Ceiling - wsj.com/articles/janet-yellen-announces-measures-to-avoid-breaching-debt-ceiling-11627936540 McConnell vows no GOP help with debt limit hike - politico.com/news/2021/08/05/mcconnell-gop-debt-limit-502593

If Joe Biden can’t get his tax legislation through before midterm elections, it’s unlikely he will be able to pass it at all. The situation in Afghanistan has lost Biden approval points in polls across the nation and since the midterm elections usually involve the sitting administration losing either the Senate, the House, or both, there may be no opportunity for him to push it through later. The Senate, which is currently controlled by the Democrats, has proposed a $1 trillion infrastructure, which has bi-partisan support, and a $3.5 trillion human infrastructure bill, which has been opposed completely by the Republicans and doesn’t have universal support from the Democrats. The Democrats have imposed a September 30 deadline to vote on both bills at the same time. Joe Manchin wrote an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal showing substantial misgivings for the human infrastructure bill. This gambit of Joe Manchin not only threatens the human infrastructure bill, but also Joe Biden’s presidency. Joe hints at the implications of both borrowing more money and printing more money in the article. Joe Manchin has been echoing many of the sentiments from David Walker, Larry Kotlikoff, and Maia McGuinness. Joe Manchin warns about spending too much money when things are going well and what happens then when we have a real crisis on our hands and the coffers are empty. Manchin recommends that Congress should pause on the budget reconciliation legislation to give everyone more clarity on the situation with the pandemic and inflation. You should not push through legislation unless you have a full understanding of the implications of that legislation. If you can’t get your constituency to agree to raising the taxes needed, you shouldn’t be layering on additional unprecedented debt. According to David Walker, the death of Social Security and Medicare accelerated by three years due to the impact of COVID-19 spending. Joe Manchin has a pattern of putting up a lot of fight during the legislative process, but then almost always falls into line when it’s time to vote. Given how well the economy is humming along, there is no clear and present danger to the country and this spending bill sets a very bad precedent. The biggest issue our country is facing is our own fiscal irresponsibility. The decision to vote for the two bills in tandem means that if there is any pause, then that is going to contribute to the perception of dysfunction and chaos, which is something voters do not like to see. The danger of the pause is it could set off a cycle of failure. Delay creates the impression of chaos, making Biden and Congress less popular, in turn reducing the popularity of any bills they pass, and making Congress less likely to support them. Joe Biden’s tax proposal is part and parcel of the $3.5 trillion human infrastructure bill. If he can’t pass the bill, he doesn’t get the tax increases needed to pay for it. The next two weeks will be instrumental in determining what happens to tax law in America over the next eight years.   Mentioned in this Episode: Why I Won’t Support Spending Another $3.5 Trillion - wsj.com/articles/manchin-pelosi-biden-3-5-trillion-reconciliation-government-spending-debt-deficit-inflation-11630605657 Joe Manchin Has Put Biden’s Presidency in Mortal Danger - nymag.com/intelligencer/amp/2021/09/joe-manchin-pause-biden-presidency-failed-danger-congress-democrats.html

In August 2016, the University of Michigan began a trend by offering their football coach a split-dollar life insurance arrangement as an alternative to deferred compensation. Other football coaches in different schools have similar arrangements. The overarching principles of these kinds of plans can apply to you as well without having to be rich or famous to take advantage of the benefits. This is a program where the employer agrees to loan dollars to an employee, generally over a period of 7 years, that are invested in a cash accumulation life insurance policy. Unlike traditional life insurance policies where you want the highest death benefit at the lowest premium, these plans are the opposite. The plan is attempting to mimic the best aspects of the Roth IRA without any of the limitations, and there are a number of limitations of a Roth IRA that would make them unattractive to people like Jim Harbaugh. At some point, the loan will be repaid, but in the meantime policy cash flow in excess of the balance can be accessed tax-free to supplement cash flow in retirement. It’s a win/win arrangement for both parties. For the employer, they incentivize the coach to stick around and for the employee, they get to take advantage of a tax-free accumulation tool that otherwise wouldn’t be available to them. As good as the arrangement is, it can be improved upon. Interest-free is not cost-free. Every year Jim Harbaugh has to pay tax on imputed income. Since the money is broken out over 7 years, the interest rate ebbs and flows, and the cost to him is variable. Jim Harbaugh won’t know the full extent of his imputed income until the final seventh installment has been made. If they were to do this deal again, it would make more sense to make the loan all upfront and lock in the interest rate. The key to this approach is having an accumulation tool that’s going to grow the money to the point where it far exceeds what the repayment of the loan has to be. Without that tool, you won’t have the ability to grow. Rumour has it that the arrangement with Jim Harbaugh involved a whole life policy, but when they compared that to an indexed universal life policy it could have been even better. This kind of arrangement has two key components: the money has to grow safely and productively (net of fees 5% to 7%), and you need to look at how you get the money out. With whole life policies, we know they can have a net cost of borrowing. The problem comes when there is an arbitrage between the rate on your collateral account and the loan rate. One of the most important provisions in the life insurance retirement plan contract is the loan provision because if you give them 30 years to make up their mind, it’s not always going to be in your favor. At its core, the purpose of the program is to promote the long-term retention of the employee in a tax-efficient manner. It works best when the employee is able to receive the maximum benefit possible from the dollars provided in exchange for expressing a long-term commitment. All of this reinforces the virtues of the life insurance retirement plan. Wealthy coaches have used this type of arrangement because they have attributes you can’t find in any other type of retirement plan. There is no income limitation or contribution limits, and you can take the money out tax-free and potentially cost-free, and it comes with a death benefit.   Mentioned in this Episode: Why College Coaches Are Being Paid With Split-Dollar Life Insurance - fa-mag.com/news/why-college-coaches-are-being-paid-with-split-dollar-life-insurance-56010.html?section=