HerMoney with Jean Chatzky

You've heard of FIRE, Financial Independence, Retire Early. And maybe your first reaction is: those people are a little extreme. But what if you stripped away the extreme version? What if early retirement just meant leaving the workforce in your late 50s, or stepping back a few years before 65… on your own terms?

That's exactly what we're digging into in this special mailbag episode with the co-hosts of the Catching Up To FI podcast.

Together, Bill and Jackie answer your real questions, including:

How do you plan for health insurance before Medicare kicks in?

How much cash do you really need on hand when you retire early?

I've been financially independent for three months. How do I reallocate my portfolio now that I'm in drawdown mode?

How do you plan for FIRE when you're also caring for an aging parent?

📩 Send your questions to mailbag@hermoney.com
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When's the last time you looked at your portfolio and felt genuinely confident it could weather a bad year? For most of us, the answer is some version of "I'm diversified — stocks for growth, bonds for safety — so I should be fine." But in 2022, stocks and bonds both posted double-digit losses at the same time, and the "safe" part of the plan turned out not to be so safe after all.

That gut-check sent researchers looking for a third option, one that doesn't make you choose between growth and protection, but blends the two. This episode, sponsored by LIMRA, digs into that research with Dr. Wade Pfau, a fellow with LIMRA's Retirement Income Institute and a leading voice in retirement research, and Brad Pistole, President and CEO of the Ozarks Retirement Group and host of Safe Money Radio.

We cover:

Why 2022 was the wake-up call that made people question the classic stock/bond mix

What "protection" actually means as its own asset class, and how fixed index annuities fit in

The tax advantages that can help protected assets outperform bonds on an after-tax basis

Why there's no universal "right" ratio for stocks vs. protected income, and how to find your own number

Ready to take the next step? Get up to speed on annuity solutions that can help you build a more secure retirement by using this guide from LIMRA.
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You know that feeling when you should ask for the raise, have the hard money conversation with your partner, or push back on a bad deal… and you just don't?

On today’s episode, Jean Chatzky sits down with Jia Jiang, the guy behind the viral "100 Days of Rejection" experiment, and author of the new book, Easy Discipline: An Unconventional Way to Achieve Ambitious Things.

Jia argues that lasting discipline comes from making hard things feel genuinely enjoyable, a lesson he learned firsthand while navigating undiagnosed ADHD.

In this episode, Jean and Jia cover:

Whether rejection therapy is actually a healthy way to build resilience

What it means to love the process instead of just chasing the result

The four principles of Easy Discipline — Enjoyment, Artistry, Systems, and Yourself — and how to apply them to your financial life

Jean’s new book, The Forever Paycheck, is now available for pre-order.
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What if the secret to never worrying about money again isn't earning more or spending less?

Jesse Mecham, founder of the beloved budgeting app YNAB (You Need A Budget) and author of the new book Never Worry About Money Again By Answering One Question, is joins us to dig into why so many of us carry a constant low-grade hum of money anxiety — even when the numbers are fine — and how asking three simple words, "What's it for?", can change everything.

Then, Lacy Garcia, founder and CEO of Willow, joins Jean to discuss Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage by Belle Burden, the book that has taken over book clubs, group chats, and DMs everywhere this year.

Willow is also hosting a follow-up webinar, Empowering Her Finances, August 25th at 12 ET: Register Here! You can find Lacy and the team at Willow at hermoney.com/findaadvisor.
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$100,000 used to mean you'd made it. Today, in some cities, it barely covers groceries — and there's a real reason that gap feels so wide. This week, Jean sits down with Mark Hamrick, Chief Economic Analyst and writer of The Hamrick Brief, to unpack why the official numbers so often miss how people actually feel about their money.

Mark recently built his own economic measure, HAPI (the Hamrick American Prosperity Index), designed to answer one question: are people actually getting ahead, or just running in place? Plus, Mark shares the one economic "skill" he believes matters most in this moment of nonstop change — and how to build it, even if it doesn't come naturally.

In this episode, you'll learn:

What HAPI measures, and why Mark built it as the mirror image of the Misery Index

Why real wage growth — not just unemployment — is the number that actually predicts how "ahead" people feel

The real odds of a recession in the next 12 months, according to economists

Want to make sure you never run out of money, no matter what’s happening in the economy? Pre-order Jean's new book, The Forever Paycheck.
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