These are resources, organizations, and individuals that I—or a trusted colleague— personally recommend. This list is not meant to be exhaustive.

Of Interest to Consumers and Financial Advisors

Benefits Calculator for Social Security
If you have enough Social Security credits to qualify for benefits, and you’d like to see what’s available to you, you will find a Retirement Estimator calculator at www.ssa.gov/planners/calculators.htm. According to information on the site, you can use this for “a retirement estimate based on current law and real time access to your earnings record.” It will “provide an estimate of your retirement benefits comparable to the estimate you receive on your Social Security Statement each year, and let you create additional ‘what if ’ retirement scenarios based on current law.”

Books by Other Authors

Dychtwald, Ken, PhD.
Age Power: How the 21st Century Will
Be Ruled by the New Old. Los Angeles, CA: Jeremy Tarcher, 2000.
(This book has been lauded as a “wake-up call to debt-laden baby boomers heading toward poverty-stricken old age, to senior citizens, and to society as a whole. Dychtwald, the author of the best selling Age-Wave, has written many other excellent books that may also be of interest. I can’t recommend his work highly enough. For more information about him, visit http://www.dychtwald.com/.)

Greene, Kelly and Ruffenach, Glenn.
The Wall Street Journal. Complete Retirement Guidebook: How to Plan It, Live It and Enjoy
It. New York: Three Rivers Press, 2007.

Salsbury, Gregory, PhD.
But What If I Live? The American Retirement Income Crisis.
Erlanger, KY: National Underwriter Company, 2006.
(Dr. Salsbury deserves kudos for such a cogent analysis of this issue. It has spurred many media reports on the subject.)

Financial Education for Consumers, Companies, and Advisors

I highly recommend “The Allianz: Women, Money & Power Study” and the tools that were created based on this research. With the help of Ken Dychtwald, Ph.D., president of Age Wave, The Allianz Life Insurance Company of North America set out to quantify the attitudes and behaviors of women and men toward money, finance, and investing. “The Allianz Women, Money, and Power Study”, which used Harris Interactive for its survey, examined women in a variety of stages of life and took into consideration varying family dynamics. For women, it’s an enlightening tool that examines what best describes their particular “financial” behavior type: Are you a Financial Dreamer, Financial Avoider, Financial Initiator, Financial Collaborator, or Financial Analyzer? Knowing this can help you and your financial advisor to better understand your decisions and personal approach to planning for your financial future. For more information about “The Allianz Women, Money, and Power Study”, please visit, www.allianzlife.com. Financial advisors, this is also an excellent tool for you. If you understand the five female financial personalities, you can become the ideal financial professional for women, retain their business, and expand yours with financially empowered women.

The Heartland Institute of Financial Education (HIFE), a 501© (3) non-profit organization, believes that financial well-being is fundamental to the foundation of a successful society. Its mission is to provide quality financial education courses in the workplace or community settings in cities across the nation. Its courses are taught by CFE Certified Financial Educators®, and are endorsed by a consortium of colleges and universities. No solicitation is allowed by instructors, so the courses are offered in a pressure-free, optimal learning environment. HIFE is approved to offer CE credits to HR professionals. The curriculum includes retirement strategies for investing, retirement planning pitfalls, retirement liability issues and retirement distributions among other relevant topics. Go to www.heartlandfinancialeducation.org for more information, or contact Alan Gappinger, CFP®, CFEd®, chairman and founder of HIFE, toll free at
(888) 895-1479.

If Your Insurance Company Fails or Is on the Verge
Contact the National Organization of Life & Health Insurance Guaranty Associations (NOLHGA) at 703-481-5206. NOLHGA is a voluntary association made up of the life and health insurance guaranty associations of all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. Since its creation in 1983, NOLHGA has assisted its member guaranty associations in guaranteeing more than $21.2 billion in coverage benefits for policyholders and annuitants of insolvent companies. In that time, the associations have provided protection for more than two million policyholders and worked on more than 100 multistate insolvencies. NOLGHA is located at 13873 Park Center Road, Suite 329, Herndon, VA 20171 (E-mail: info@nolhga.com; web site: http://www.nolhga.com. For information on how to contact the health and life guaranty association in your state: go to: http://www.nolhga.com/contact/main.cfm.

Of Interest to Financial Planners and Advisors

For Editorial Support
I have relied on Deborah Grandinetti for editorial support—for magazine and journal article editing, and book development and editing—for over a decade. If you are planning to write a book, need help editing professional or consumer articles for publication, or want to create materials your clients can understand, I can’t recommend her services highly enough. She has been a senior editor for a national magazine and a book acquisitions editor for an international trade book publishing company, so she understands what is required to make a magazine article or book publishable and saleable. You can reach her via e-mail at debgrand@comcast.net or on her cell phone at 215-514-1637.

A Professional Publicist
Lots of us have a book we’d like to write, but we might lack the time or enthusiasm for the writing process. If so, I help people write their books and book proposals. I also help with almost any kind of publicity. I have a strong background as a writer/editor/PR-media
relation professional, and I have a strong journalism background along with direct publishing experience. So, when your ready to tackle the world of major publishers and New York literary agents, I’ve been there, done that. I can help you with my experience as an award-winning writer and with a background including Money Magazine, Life Magazine, Rocky Mountain News, Denver Post, Fortune Magazine, USA Today, NewsWeek, Atlanta Constitution AND my own successful PR firm. But more about that later, what about you? Do you want to write a book, or book proposal, or launch a publicity campaign? If you do, just shoot me an email or give me a call anytime at 303.692.9774 or smarsh11@msn.com. I’m a longtime friend of Dick Duff and my name is Steve Marsh.

For Current Insurance and Financial News
Ranked #1 by Google, InsuranceNewsNet.com (INN) provides 24/7 access to insurance and financial news that matters to advisors and their clients. As a leading content provider, INN uploads more than 150 articles per day on the topics of life insurance, annuities, health insurance, long-term care, disability, and property/casualty. From current legislative headlines, to the most compelling retirement research, INN helps insurance professionals and consumers bridge the gap between knowledge and action. In further support of the educational needs of insurance producers, INN distributes InsuranceNewsNet Magazine to well over 50,000 independent agents every month, nationwide. The magazine provides a broad mix of news and sales support articles, including Capitol Hill headlines, sales and marketing ideas, expert insights on running a successful business, interviews with top industry executives, and unique access to the most current marketing research available. For more information, visit www.insurancenewsnet.com.

For Professional Education and Certification Programs:
The Great Life Program from Dr. Linda Ballou can strengthen your transaction and relationship skills in all areas of sales and marketing, and broaden your sales and marketing horizons like top producers. This program is designed to help financial advisors confidently provide educational sessions around four pertinent topics for members of affinity groups, such as credit unions, associations, clubs, churches, charities, hospitals, and schools. The program explains how to align yourself with these groups and walks you through all of the material you would use—such as PowerPoint presentations and presentation material for one-on-one discussions— to present the topics to members of the group. Dr. Linda Ballou is the creator of the material. She uses it in her own business to generate leads. You can visit her at her website at www.greatlifeeducationalacademy.com. This educational service will help you expand your client base, retain your employees, and provide better—and more—financial services that are mutually advantageous to you and your clients.

Software to Make Numbers Crunching a Breeze
My good friend, Stephan R. Leimberg, CEO of Leimberg and LeClair, Inc., a Bryn Mawr, PA estate and financial planning software company, has created some terrific, time-saving software. Two products I recommend are his NumberCruncher software, described as the ultimate “instant answers” solution for estate, business, and financial planners, and his Financial Analyzer II software, which puts 75 easy-to-use calculations at your fingertips. WebCPA had this to say about both:

NumberCruncher and Financial Analyzer are two more excellent examples of that adage that good things come in small packages. They are simple but effective Windows applications that should have strong appeal for accounting firms engaged in basic analysis and planning. These applications... provide an economical and easy-to-use method of handling the widest possible range of basic analytical tasks. They are highly representative of software developed by professionals for their peers in their simplicity, attention to task and precise results.

Just as pertinent for readers of this book is Steve’s Retirement Plan Analyzer 2007.04, which is designed to evaluate pension and profit-sharing distribution strategies. This tool computes an almost unlimited number of alternatives under methods such as discretionary or attained age. It factors in minimum distribution rules and is updated for the latest tax changes. For more information about other great products from Steve, go to: http://www.leimberg.com/.

A Website Designer/Graphic Designer/Illustrator
For those who need a new website or a redesign of a current website, Kathy Walker can create a professional, custom designed website for you. She can also provide branding services that include logo design, email newsletters, brochures, ads, book covers, book illustrations and more. She brings to the table more than 25 years of experience in both advertising agencies and design studios. Her experience has included a broad range of industries. You can send her an email or call her at 303.932.2400 or kwalker@counterpointdesign.com. Samples of her work can be viewed at www.counterpointdesign.com. Kathy Walker designed and built this website for Dick Duff’s new book, Retirement Breakthrough.