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      09-25-2021, 09:08 AM   #17
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Quote:
Originally Posted by zx10guy View Post
With the current economic situation, it has caused me to start thinking a little differently. Especially around taxes. I see all of this intertwined with each other as much of the inflation we're seeing is being affected by monetary policy. Which in turn will affect taxes as you can't keep dumping/printing money without eventually paying the piper. While I made some decent financial decisions, the two things I regret not doing more of was putting more money into non qualified investments and funding my Roth. I was fixing the non qualified situation as I had a substantial amount put away but the divorce screwed that up. The Roth situation I couldn't fix at all. By the time I realized I should have funded my Roth more, I make too much to qualify. I know about doing a Roth conversion but the up front tax bill would just kill me.

So right now, I'm looking to fund my non qualified account as best I can and looking to now start focusing on paying off my houses. My target is to control what my fixed yearly expenses will be in retirement so I can position which tax bracket I would fall under. Not having to pay into a mortgage will go a long ways towards getting myself into a lower tax bracket as I wouldn't have to draw out as much out of my accounts as taxable income.
Good points, especially about taxes. I’d forgotten that tax brackets are not indexed to inflation, meaning as inflation pushes up wages or Social Security income, it also pushes you into a higher tax bracket. So inflation helps government in two ways: deflates the value of the debt, and increases tax revenue.

Curious why you want to pay off houses if you have fixed rate mortgages. Understand completely if they are variable rate (those rates will rise, driving payments up).
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