Summary: This week Doug Andrew discussed the following: Upcoming Free Webinar Attend our free 90-minute webinar live over the Internet Tuesday, March 19th at 11:00 a.m. pacific (12:00 p.m. mountain, 1:00 p.m. central, 2:00 p.m. eastern), and again at 6:30 p.m. pacific (7:30 mountain, 8:30 central, 9:30 eastern). The topic is "True Asset and Wealth Optimization." You'll learn how to choose the right investments for liquidity, safety, rate of return and tax benefits. Click Here to Register Now All attendees will receive $997 worth of valuable gifts, including a customized LASER Retirement Brief, The Success Formula audio program, and access to The Secrets to a Tax-Free Retirement event.. Putting Our National Debt In Perspective Imagine that you just got married and that right after making the commitment your marriage partner told you that he or she was $165,000 dollars in debt. Furthermore, if your partner informed you that with their annual income of just $25,000, every single penny of what they take in is allocated to paying just the interest on that debt as well as mandatory payments on their car, etc. Suppose they also told you that they had cut their spending by $380 and were planning on going to the bank to have their debt limit raised from $165,000 to $200,000. How would you be feeling right about now? Would you be a bit unsettled with that amount of debt? There’s a wonderful video circulating around the Internet that very cleverly demonstrates some of the thinking behind America’s mounting debt problem. It’s worth 3 minutes of your time to watch it. The thought of $165,000 in debt landing squarely on our shoulders helps illustrate some very important facts about our national debt and how it potentially affects all of us. With the national debt sitting at $16.5 trillion, every single taxpayer would owe $165,000 as their prorated share of the national debt. Just 7 years ago, each taxpayer’s share of the national debt was just $90,000 each. So who do you suppose is going to bear the ultimate responsibility for paying it all back? The unpleasant answer is that it will be passed along to our children and grandchildren. The federal government spends about a trillion dollars a year more than amount they take in from tax revenues. That’s money that must be borrowed and added to the national debt year after year. Ongoing partisan wrangling between the Democrats and Republicans isn’t likely to produce a solution anytime soon. And that leaves the rest of us with a responsibility to do what we must to protect ourselves from the likely consequences of this continuing federal spending problem. Two Hard Facts To Be Faced The former comptroller for the General Accountability Office David Walker has gone on the record stating that in order to dig ourselves out of this hole, we’ll have to double taxes and cut benefits. This means that you not only need to make your retirement nest egg immune from higher taxes but it also means that we cannot rely on the government to take care of us in our golden years. The writing on the wall points to taxes going up. It also indicates that inflation will be rising as well. And as the debt continues to pile up, there will be continuing economic uncertainty and market volatility. Hiding our heads in the sand and pretending this oncoming triple whammy won’t affect us is not an option. Protecting your nest egg will require learning and enacting the right strategies to enjoy liquid assets safely earning predictable rates of return for the rest of your life. This means that you can’t simply leave your money sitting in a savings account at a bank or credit union earning a paltry 1 or 2% interest rate. It means that your money should be strategically rolled over from a tax-deferred savings account like an IRA or 401(k) into a tax-free vehicle where it is completely and legally immune from tax hikes. From that day forward your money will accumulate tax-free,
