What I'm Reading Today:

• How to Minimize Long-Term-Care Premiums By Kimberly Lankford, Contributing Editor, Kiplinger's Personal Finance "You'll have the most flexibility if you buy a policy with benefits that are "short and fat" rather than "long and lean."
• Taxes go up on cigarettes, hard liquor & wine. Is chocolate next?????? New Jersey Passes Budget Fueled by $1 Billion in Tax Increases By David Chen of The New York Times. "Those who make more than $250,000 a year will no longer be able to deduct their property taxes, at least for one year. Those making between $150,000 and $250,000, meanwhile, can deduct only a maximum of $5,000."

What I'm Reading Today:

• TaxProf Blog informs us that The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 amended the rules for 529 accounts to allow us to use the assets in 2009 or 2010 to buy an iPhone or a laptop for the student -- and possibly more. The language is broad -- covering the "beneficiary and the beneficiary's family." As a result, it appears to cover not only a college student's laptop but also the family's home computer and related equipment, software, and Internet access.
• John Hussman writes in his Weekly Market Comment Long-Horizon Risk Aversion Creates Headwinds. Despite any short-term optimism, investors are harboring a persistent sort of risk aversion about the long-term. This may seem like a small point, but it is actually a fairly powerful consideration here.
• More than 75 million people, a quarter of the U.S. population, are between the ages of 50 and 75. Demographers call this life stage “neither young nor old”; HGSE Professor Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot calls it a new developmental period. In her new book, The Third Chapter: Passion, Risk and Adventure in the 25 years after 50, Lawrence-Lightfoot challenges assumptions about aging and offers fresh perspectives on the dynamic learning that can occur during this period of life.