Maria Bruno and Joel Dickson: 'Building a Better Retirement'

Our guests for the latest installment of "The Long View," Maria Bruno and Joel Dickson, are both veterans of investment behemoth Vanguard.

Bruno is the head of U.S. wealth planning research at Vanguard, leading a team responsible for conducting research and analysis on a wide range of retirement, wealth planning, and portfolio construction topics. She also contributes to the oversight of the investment philosophy, methodology, and wealth management strategies supporting Vanguard's advisory products and services. Bruno is a Certified Financial Planner, and she's a fount of wisdom on many subjects, but especially retirement planning.

Dickson has worn many hats at Vanguard during his long career there. In his current position as Vanguard's global head of advice methodology, he oversees all investment methodology development for Vanguard's advice programs whose end consumers are individual investors.

The transcript for this podcast can be found here.

Background Information

• Maria Bruno bio
• Joel Dickson bio
• "The Planner and the Geek" podcast series
• Vanguard Research and Commentary Archive

How Retirement Savers Can Play Catch-Up
"It's the 'how much?' But then also how do you actually direct those savings?" (1:30-2:56)

"It's such an idiosyncratic or individual sort of consideration from a planning standpoint; there are plenty of people that have little wealth but high income." Whether traditional tax-deferred accounts are automatically better than Roth for people playing catch-up on retirement savings. (2:57-5:53)

"It's a little bit simpler when you're younger and accumulating." How basic savings and investing habits, combined with plan defaults, make the accumulation period much simpler than decumulation. (5:54-8:24)

'Off-Label Uses': Ways Supersavers Can Maximize Their Investments Aftertax
401(k): What it is and how heavy savers can take advantage of it. (10:41-12:55)

• After-Tax 401(k), Bogleheads Wiki entry
• "Should You Make Aftertax Contributions to Your 401(k)?" Morningstar.com article
• "Aftertax 401(k) vs. Taxable Account? Evaluating Options for High-Income Savers," Morningstar.com article
• "Heavy Savers, Meet the Mega-Backdoor Roth," Morningstar.com article

Backdoor Roth IRA: How it works, who should consider, and potential pitfalls to be aware of. (12:56-16:34)

• "IRA Insights: The Benefits of a Backdoor Roth," Vanguard research
• "Backdoor IRAs: What You Need to Know," Morningstar.com article

"There's more and more focus on minimizing income taxes during one's life than there is about avoiding estate taxes." Using a 529 as an additional tax-advantaged savings vehicle. (16:35-21:26)

• Navigating College Savings episode from The Planner and The Geek podcast

Decumulation
"How do I meet my goals today but then also make sure that I'm protecting myself down the road?" Why setting spending rates can be so tricky. (21:27-24:26)

• "Determining Withdrawal Rates Using Historical Data," research paper by William Bengen
• William Bengen bio
• "How to Put a Dynamic Retirement Spending Strategy in Place," Vanguard research
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