Any Bonds Today?
Marjorie Kondrack | Mar 30, 2025
You can learn a lot about history by studying it but to truly understand it, you had to have lived through it. This holds true for the popularity of financial instruments as well. This is a companion piece to Jonathan Clements’s recent post, “Seeking Uncertainty,” in reference to Savings Bonds. Savings Bond mania was in full swing during World War II. They were introduced by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1935, before I was born. But I can remember, even at 5 years old, the tremendous push and popularity for buying savings bonds. Artists made colorful, eye catching posters encouraging Americans to save 10% of their wages to “buy their share of freedom”. Movie stars went on bond rally tours to induce their purchase. The movies had shorts exhorting patrons to buy “freedom”, liberty” and “war bonds”, as they were sometimes called, with a reminder that patrons could even buy them at the movie theatre. Savings Bonds made you feel patriotic. You were helping the war effort. In 1941, Gene Autry, a popular singing cowboy actor made a recording of catchy upbeat song entitled, “Any Bonds Today”. Bing Crosby and others recorded it too. Irving Berlin wrote the words and music. A repetitive phrase from the bouncy song is still remembered—“scrape up the most you can, here comes the freedom man, asking you to buy your share of freedom today” Through June, 1970, You could get a savings stamp book from the post office where you could buy 10, 25, or 50 cent stamps you pasted in the book until you had $18.75–enough stamps to purchase a bond worth $25.00 face value. If you’re thinking 75 times 25 cents you are right. The popularity of savings bonds continued after the war, well into the introduction of “I”…
Read more » There Always
Marjorie Kondrack | Sep 25, 2023
DON'T BE TOO IMPRESSED with the magnificent chandelier hanging from the ceiling or the tastefully furnished lobby. A nursing home is a nursing home. It’s not the best answer, but sometimes it’s the only answer. Mom grew very frail when she entered her 90s. She’d already been diagnosed with late onset Alzheimer’s. At age 91, she fell and broke her right hip and shoulder. At 93, she broke her left hip and, at 95, she fractured her pelvis. Surgery was out of the question for the pelvis. Her bones were now porous and brittle. From that point on, she was wheelchair bound. Mom was taken to the hospital, and then transferred to its rehabilitation and residential skilled nursing-care facility. She was placed in the Alzheimer’s wing. [caption id="attachment_1540194" align="alignright" width="225"] The author with her mother, then age 97.[/caption] I was spared having to formally admit her. I don’t think I could have. But as providence would have it, the timing of her admittance was beneficial—because shortly after she required major surgery on her liver. This came to light because I noticed she was becoming jaundiced, and I immediately reported her condition to the head nurse. Fearful because of her age, I asked the doctor if surgery was a necessity. He replied that she would die in terrible pain without it. That settled the question. But the doctor also told me if there were complications with the surgery, he wasn’t going to do anything “heroic.” Somehow, at 95, she survived and lived another three years, but with worsening dementia and more medical problems. A nursing home patient needs a strong advocate—something that’s imperative for those who aren’t able to speak for themselves. The care of your loved one depends on the health care workers, who are often understaffed. Problems can be…
Read more » Hearing Voices
Marjorie Kondrack | Jan 28, 2023
READING ABOUT FINANCE can be a little dry at times, so I occasionally turn to TV for relief, relaxation and a little entertainment. What am I drawn to? More than anything, it hinges on a person’s voice. For instance, I like listening to Neil Cavuto on Fox Business Network. His interviews with business leaders are usually interesting and his demeanor holds my attention. He comes across as earnest. My parents were transplanted New Englanders, so I never had a heavy Brooklyn accent, but just a hint of one, thanks to being raised there. I worked hard to lose it, but it still slips out when I’m tired. I guess you can take the girl out of Brooklyn but not Brooklyn out of the girl. I’m always glad when I tell people where I’m from and they say, “You don’t sound like you’re from Brooklyn,” as if I were expected to say “dees” for “these,” “dem” for “them,” and “doze” for “those.” I still remember the late Marty Zweig, a regular panelist on Wall Street Week with Louis Rukeyser. He was an erudite investment advisor and financial analyst, and contributed many articles to Barron’s. He had a certain charm and an interesting personality, and hid his persona behind a humble, “regular Joe,” almost woebegone demeanor. I recall him saying he liked rock and roll, had a jukebox and enjoyed salsa dancing. He had a wry, dry sense of humor. I find a pleasant, well-modulated and cultured voice can be so much more interesting and pleasant to listen to than someone who yaps away. It allows the listener to better take in the message that’s being conveyed. I once worked with someone whose voice can only be described as mellifluous. When he spoke, I was almost transfixed. It was like listening to…
Read more » Bagging It
Marjorie Kondrack | Aug 18, 2023
IT'S BEEN A YEAR since New Jersey banned all plastic bags from grocery stores, and yet I’m still wandering into our local store without my reusable bags. You would think I’d have gotten the memo by now. I used to keep the bags in the trunk of my car—but out of sight, out of mind. As a visual reminder, I now keep them inside my car on the passenger side. But they might as well still be in the trunk. Maybe I should hang them around my neck. While walking through the parking lot during my last food shopping venture, I saw another shopper heading in the direction of the store, bogged down with bags, which reminded me that I’d forgotten mine—again. I’m on line at the checkout when I notice the shopper ahead of me has a neatly folded, organized pile of reusable bags. They’re uniform in size, color and pattern, with the logo on the bag matching the store we’re shopping at. Meanwhile, I have a motley wad of bags in various sizes, shapes, colors and patterns—some with a psychedelic melange—and almost all of which were freebies from various sources. I have bags with logos from three different supermarkets in my area. I feel a little sheepish when I hand over some of the bags at checkout in the Wegmans food store, while trying to hide my bag with the Aldi store logo emblazoned on it. One of my bags announces, “Surely Not Everybody was Kung Fu Fighting,” which would leave you completely lost unless you’re old enough to remember the song. I also have a bag with a New York attitude that reads, “You Got a Problem With That?” And from the Sopranos: “Fughgeddaboudit.” My logic is that, if others think I’m a thug, it might keep…
Read more » Playing Possum
Marjorie Kondrack | Nov 20, 2023
ZERO-WASTE LIVING. Kondo cleaning. FIRE, or financial independence-retire early. Whatever your feelings are about these three movements, frugality is at their core, with the focus on minimizing possessions and living simply. To these, you might want to add another, “possum living,” which has been hailed as a manifesto for living cheaply. Possum Living is the title of a book written in 1978 by a free-thinking, resourceful young woman who went by the pen name Dolly Freed. The book’s subtitle: How to Live Well Without a Job and (Almost) No Money. Possum living is about dropping out of the rat race to live simply, growing food in your garden, living off the land and sometimes earning a little money from odd jobs. The author also offers a host of creative ideas for leading a laid-back lifestyle without a steady income. Freed talks about her love of growing tomatoes, her father’s love of fishing, and the chickens and rabbits they kept. Ultimately, the book is about living life on your own terms and saving money. Decades later, there’s been renewed interest in the book and it’s been brought back into print. It was re-released in 2019, with an update from the author. I had always wondered what had happened to Freed, and was pleasantly surprised to learn that she went to college, became a NASA aerospace engineer, married, had two children and now has a big garden. And she doesn’t make moonshine anymore. A frugal lifestyle can be fulfilling. In fact, it can make you happier than living large. Spending excessively has serious consequences. Today, the cost of carrying a credit-card balance is at its highest level in 40 years. Making $90,000 a year but spending $100,000? You may never be able to retire. One of the richest people in America is a paragon of…
Read more » Don’t Go Breaking My Heart
Marjorie Kondrack | May 8, 2025
Love and heartbreak are human experiences. Heartbreak is not restricted to the end of a relationship. It can be unrequited love, the death of a loved one, divorce, unmet expectations we have of another. Or other severe emotional conditions. Harvard Medical School recently published an article about a phenomenon known as Broken Heart Syndrome. It is a real condition known as Stress Cardiomyopathy or Takotsubo syndrome, and can be deadly. But most people recover quickly without any long lasting effects. Although it mimics a heart attack, the key difference is that in broken heart syndrome there are typically no blockages in the coronary arteries While dying from a broken heart sounds like something that happens only in romance novels, it can grab the headlines. In 2016, actress Debbie Reynolds unexpectedly died four days after the passing of her daughter, actress Carrie Fisher. Headlines blared, “Can Someone Die of A Broken Heart?” Broken heart syndrome isn’t what the media has painted it to be, but it can be fatal for about 1% of people who experience it. Previously it was thought that it affected mainly women over the age of 50, but a recent study by the New England Journal of Medicine indicates a marked increase in the percentage of men affected as well. Researchers attribute this to the likelihood of, at some point beyond mid-life, the response to stress can weaken or stun the heart. An ultrasound (echocardiogram) of the heart can show how well the heart is contracting and whether the heart has taken on what has been officially termed as the Takotsubo shape. Your heart suddenly changes shape and weakens. While older women are the most likely to develop broken heart syndrome they also have the best chances of recovery. Men and younger people are less likely…
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Tax Efficiency
ArticleBogdan Sheremeta | Apr 4, 2026
TAX EFFICIENT FUND placement is an often underrated topic. The goal of the tax efficient fund placement is to minimize taxes within your investments, and select the right account for those investments.
But how much does that actually matter?
Vanguard’s research finds that a thoughtful asset location strategy can add significantly more value than an equal location strategy. The value added typically ranges from 5 to 30 basis points of after-tax return, depending on circumstances (e.g., income, portfolio size).
Investors generally have access to different account types, including:
If you are an employee that may not have access to a retirement plan, you could perhaps consider a Solo 401(k) if you have "side hustle" business income.
Generally, if your investments are all in tax-deferred or tax-free accounts, fund placement will not make a huge difference for you. That is because these accounts already come with tax efficiency.
If that's your case, two things become important though:
1. Consideration between pre-tax, like Traditional 401(k) or after-tax account, like Roth 401(k). Put simply, this decision generally comes down to your marginal tax rate now versus marginal tax rate in the future (which isn't something easy to predict due to the ever-changing tax landscape).
2. Account allocation. It becomes equally important where exactly you are investing. Roth accounts grow tax-free and qualified withdrawals are tax-free. You likely don't want to hinder that growth by choosing conservative assets (like fixed income, Money Market Funds, and so on).
Tax-efficient fund placement becomes extremely important when you also have a taxable brokerage account, along with tax-advantaged accounts. Many funds pay dividends and distribute capital gains if placed in your taxable brokerage account. At the end of the year, you receive a 1099 with that income and must pay taxes on the dividends and certain distributions.
One thing to call out from history is that you generally shouldn't hold Target Date Retirement mutual funds (or any "proprietary" funds) in your brokerage account. This is because unexpected redemptions could cause a huge tax bill.
You may remember a Vanguard 2021 fiasco where Vanguard opened an institutional TDF to more investors (lowered the minimum investment from $100M to $5M), which caused smaller retirement plans to sell out of individual funds and move into the institutional fund. This triggered massive unexpected capital gains for anyone invested in the individual funds if held in a brokerage account.
All of those unnecessary taxes could've been avoided by:
Let me give you a simple example:
Let’s say you are in a 22% federal tax bracket and a 5% state tax bracket, and you have some money invested in a dividend fund like Schwab US Dividend Equity ETF (SCHD). SCHD dividends are generally qualified, which means that the dividends get preferential treatment at a 15% federal tax rate for this investor.
The dividend yield is 3.43%. Considering the tax rates, the tax drag is (15% + 5%) * 3.43% = 0.686%.
To put this in perspective, a $10,000 investment will yield ~$343 in annual dividends. The tax impact on that investment will be $60.86.
Of course, if that money was in a Roth IRA, you would pay $0 in taxes on dividend distributions. Alternatively, this is something you may need to decide whether a dividend-focused investing strategy is the right one for you. For example, a Total US Stock Market ETF could have almost 3x less tax drag, and potentially more growth.
As someone in their 20s (who is subject to the Net Investment Income Tax) my focus is 100% on a growth investment strategy, rather than income generation. For someone in their 60s, that strategy could be different (even though selling shares for capital gains is better from a tax timing point of view).
A few more important points:
REIT stocks/ETFs are the least tax-efficient asset class to hold in a brokerage account because their distributions aren’t qualified, so you pay more tax (even though it may qualify for a 199A deduction).
Stocks that don’t pay dividends are the most tax-efficient to hold within your taxable account (Adobe, Amazon, Netflix, and others). However, holding individual stocks may not be the best strategy from an investment and diversification standpoint.
A big benefit of a taxable account is that the money is always easily accessible (liquidity), and you can control your withdrawal timing. While there are strategies that allow you to withdraw from retirement accounts before age 59 (like Rule of 55, 72(t) SoSEPP, Roth conversions), a brokerage account is more flexible. Therefore, analyzing the contributions and investments that go into this account is crucial.
How do you maximize tax efficiency? Let us know in the comments!
Bogdan Sheremeta is a licensed CPA based in Illinois with experience at Deloitte and a Fortune 200 multinational.
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