Jonathan Clements's Blog, page 2
November 26, 2025
Thanksgiving: The Keeping Story
And now… the rest of the story.
Good day. It is a very good day.
It was November, 1621. Ninety Wampanoag warriors and their chief, Massasoit, sat down with fifty-one Pilgrims for a three-day feast of deer, wild turkey, and corn the Indians had taught them to grow.
The history books call it “The First Thanksgiving.”
And it was… glorious.
Laughter, gun salutes, archery contests, and tables groaning with food.
What the paintings don’t show is that half the Pilgrims who had arrived the year before were already dead. Starvation had taken them.
And the ones still alive? They were one bad harvest away from joining them.
Why were they starving in a land overflowing with game and fish and fertile soil?
Because of an idea. A very modern idea.
Communal property.
When the Pilgrims stepped off the Mayflower, their contract with the investors back in London required everything they produced (every bushel of corn, every fish, every board they sawed) to go into a common store. Each family got an equal share, no matter how much, or how little, they worked.
Governor William Bradford wrote later that the system was “found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much employment.”
The young men asked, “Why should I bust my back all day when the lazy guy next door gets the same ration?”
The women said, “I’m not hauling water and hoeing corn so someone else’s kids can eat it.”
Even the teenage boys refused to work.
Bradford said the result was plain: “much hunger and nakedness.”
So in the spring of 1623, after two winters of famine, Bradford did something radical.
He broke the contract.
He gave every family their own plot of land.
Plant what you want. Keep what you grow. Trade the surplus if you wish.
In other words, he introduced private property and profit motive to the New World.
Bradford recorded what happened next with astonishment:
“This had very good success. It made all hands very industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been. The women now went willingly into the field, and took their little ones with them to set corn, which before they would claim weakness and inability… There was no more talk of stealing from the common store, for there was no common store.”
The harvest of 1623 was so abundant they didn’t just feast; they traded the surplus with the Indians for beaver pelts and other goods.
The colony never starved again.
Ladies and gentlemen, the Pilgrims did not discover turkey and pumpkin pie in 1621.
They discovered something far more important in 1623:
When people own the fruit of their labor, they work.
When they don’t, they don’t.
That single change (from collectivism to private ownership) turned a failing socialist experiment into the foundation of the richest, most generous nation on earth.
So when you sit down to Thanksgiving dinner this year, and the table is piled high with more food than any Pilgrim ever dreamed of…
Remember that the turkey on your platter and the freedom in your heart have the same ancestor:
A quiet decision made four hundred years ago to let people keep what they earn.
That… is the rest of the story.
Good day.
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November 25, 2025
What’s Really on My Mind These Days
My retirement has been wonderful so far. Honestly, sometimes I have to stop and remind myself how lucky I am. Rachel and I have our health and enjoy each other's company, which is not always true when a couple retires. However, there are four things that concern me as I reach my mid-70s.
Feeling lonely. I tried calling Mark, my old high school friend, a couple of weeks ago, and I haven’t heard from him. I tried again and got a message that his mailbox was full. I texted him asking him to call me when he had time.
This isn’t like him. I’m beginning to think there’s something wrong. He has health issues, and when you’re my age, you think the worst.
I can’t keep track of all the people who were a part of my life who have passed away since I retired. Some of them I was extremely close to and will be terribly missed.
I never thought that when I retired, I would be more concerned about running out of friends than running out of money.
If I ever lost Rachel, and I keep losing friends, I think I’d need to move into a retirement community just to have more people around me. The silence would be too much.
Stock market bubble? Lately, it feels like the economy has been built for people like me — retirees who already own their homes and have money in the stock market. I never expected our net worth would jump this much these past couple of years.
The rise in real estate prices and the AI-fueled market boom have nudged Rachel and me into spending more freely. We eat out more than we used to — not fancy places. We even booked business-class seats on our last trip, something I never imagined I’d do. And lately, I’ve been walking around the house noticing little projects and thinking: Why not? Let’s fix that.
But underneath all that comfort is a knot in my stomach. If this AI boom fizzles, the wealth effect that’s padded our lives could disappear just as quickly. Every time I read that Nvidia now makes up around 8% of the S&P 500 and the “Magnificent Seven” accounts for about 35% of the index, I feel a twinge of the same uneasiness I had during the dot-com era. I keep asking myself: Are we all betting too much on too few companies?
These few companies are spending billions of dollars on AI. The question on many investors’ minds is whether they will make enough money off AI to recoup their investments and turn a profit.
Still, I’m not changing my portfolio. Maybe it’s trust that things will settle. The market has risen so much that I’d probably be fine even if it slid. And unlike the dot-com days, these companies at least make real money.
Even so, something about this AI rush feels fragile. Like we’re all enjoying the party while quietly wondering when the music will stop.
The Economy for Others. What worries me even more is that this strong economy doesn’t seem to be helping everyone. It’s so hard for younger people to buy their first home — the median first-time buyer is 40 now. Airlines are struggling more with filling economy seats than business class ones. And one out of eight people in this country depends on SNAP just to buy food.
I’ve also been reading about how tough the job market is for recent college grads, partly because AI is reshaping entry-level work. I sometimes wonder whether my son-in-law will ever feel like he’s on the same financial footing we had at his age. He’s got a good job, but the economy doesn’t seem geared toward helping the younger generation or those who are struggling.
All of this leaves me in a strange place emotionally. On one hand, I know I’ve benefited from this market boom — more than I probably deserve. On the other hand, I’m not blind to the fact that this same economy feels like a completely different world for people who aren’t retired homeowners with investments. I can enjoy the comfort it’s given Rachel and me, but I can’t ignore the uncomfortable thought that the system seems to be lifting some of us up while quietly letting others slip behind.
Will I get the health care I need when I need it? One thing I never expected to worry about in my 70s is whether I’ll be able to see a doctor when I need one. My urologist — the same one who has always returned my calls and squeezed me in when something felt off — is switching to a concierge practice. He says he wanted to offer “more personalized care.” Then he handed me a brochure with fees ranging from $1,200 a year for the basic level to $12,000 for the premier package. None of it’s covered by Medicare. These fees do not include the additional services listed in his contract agreement that go beyond what Medicare pays.
I sat there thinking: I just need a doctor who will see me when it matters. Even he admitted the new setup might not be a good fit for me and suggested I find another urologist. When I walked out of his office, I felt like losing another person I had depended on.
Now, I’m concerned that I won’t be able to find another doctor who will be there for me when I need care. It already takes seven months to see my geriatric doctor. My dermatologist is booked months out, too. Everyone keeps saying that older adults will need more medical care, but the system feels like it’s shrinking right when I’m finally entering the phase of life when I need it most.
I try not to dwell on it, but sometimes I imagine waking up one morning and seeing blood in my urine again and not knowing who to call. It’s an unsettling feeling — the kind that lingers and makes you realize how much you took for granted when you were younger.
Although I have these concerns, I’m thankful every day for Rachel, for the life we’ve built, and for the good fortune we’ve had. But retirement isn’t the carefree stretch of leisure I once imagined. It’s a period of adjustment — to loss, to uncertainty, to an economy and a health-care system that feel less predictable than ever.
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Bearing Witness: Retirement From the Wrong Side of the Divide
I bumped into a guy I played with as a kid. He's six foot six and built like a linebacker, but he looks old and worn out now—forty years in a hot tarmac crew hasn't been kind. He asked me what I was doing these days. I never told him I was retired. I vaguely talked about juggling lots of commitments and left it at that. I wasn't lying. I have sporting commitments, and I juggle social and travel schedules with more affluent people.
I'm sometimes uncomfortable telling certain people I'm retired. My social circle is very diverse from a socio-economic point of view—that's a combination of randomness and a callback to my family history, growing up in a deprived public housing scheme. The ties that bind are still there; I'm friends with some pretty dodgy but interesting characters.
These characters don't mix with my more affluent friends, and I don't make any effort to bring the different circles together. I genuinely think it would be the equivalent of throwing water on a cooking oil fire—an incendiary and explosive combination. It wouldn't end well. A dinner party or restaurant gathering would be an alien concept. A lot of pints, pool, and a few games of darts along with very, very strongly worded banter is the perfect night, preferably without your wife. It might sound stereotypical, but it's reality. I still join the craic and show my face a few times a year. It's very different but refreshing.
This social disconnect between worlds is very real and, to my mind, very concerning for society as a whole. Straddling this divide at such a personal level has rammed home the ever-widening financial gap that, although always there, has definitely been accelerating over the last five years or so. My friend Nigel is a 62-year-old self-employed builder. Things are tight. The fuel injectors on his van packed in, and he's scrambling to get another truck on the road. No van, no work, no money. That's the grim reality.
The discomfort around saying I'm retired isn't about modesty—it's about the sheer unfairness of it. I know too many people, good people, who've worked themselves into the ground and still can't see a way out. They're not lazy or feckless; they're just trapped in a system that's rigged against them from the start. Low wages, insecure work, rent that eats half their income before they've bought a jug of milk. Retirement isn't even on their radar as a realistic prospect—it's a fantasy for other people, the ones who got lucky or started with advantages they never had.
What really gets me is watching mates from back home still grafting in their sixties, bodies breaking down, knowing they'll probably work until they physically can't anymore. There's no pot of gold waiting, no pension worth mentioning, just the grim arithmetic of benefits that don't cover the bills. Meanwhile, I'm out—done, finished, free to do what I like. The randomness of it seems wrong. We started from similar places, same schemes, same schools, but a few breaks here, a different choice there, and our trajectories diverged completely. They're still in the struggle; I'm not. It doesn't feel like something I earned through superior virtue. Not everyone can own the means of production.
And here's what really worries me: this isn't getting better, it's getting worse. The gap between those who can retire with dignity and those who'll work until they drop has widened dramatically in the last few years. Pensions have been gutted, housing costs have exploded, and the precarious nature of work means people can't build anything stable anymore. When I'm around people still stuck in that grind, saying "I'm retired" feels less like sharing news and more like rubbing salt in a wound. I don't know how to fix it. I've got a unique vantage point. I think the least I can do is bear witness to the inequality before I slink back to my middle-class retirement lifestyle. It's not much, but it's all I have. The simple fact is: sometimes hard work and superior effort is met only with superior exhaustion.
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You worked a lifetime, you achieved your goals, you have it all-the next day it hardly matters
We are all among the most fortunate retirees. It costs a minimum of $26,000 a year just in taxes and HOA fees to live where we do.
One of us has a pension, one fellow ran his own businesses, went bankrupt once, but started another business many years ago sold it last year. The other man worked for a large company but saved diligently to enable them to move into our community.
All of us have two homes, one has three. We play golf twice a week and drive nice foreign cars. We have grandchildren to enjoy and the money to spend on them.
As we were talking about our good fortune, one of the women said she was embarrassed to say they planned for retirement so they didn’t need Social Security to live on.
We agreed we pretty much live in a bubble, but appreciate what we have. Sounds pretty good - perhaps what many people strive for in life and retirement. We couldn’t have done better if we used spreadsheets. 😁 However, I acknowledge that one friend explained how he tracks their spending-the couple that doesn’t need their Social Security.
But as Paul Harvey always noted “now for the rest of the story.”
The three couples, one in their 70s two in their 80s, have something else in common. They are all battling cancer. One person just had life-changing surgery that will end his golfing. Two of the ladies are under active treatment, the third in remission.
All the nice things, stuff we have accumulated, the lifestyle, all the planning, have faded in significance. None of us are going to Florida this winter as usual, rather we will be at weekly infusion center and doctors visits. Even with good Medicare coverage ancillary costs are rising, but because we are so fortunate, we can handle it.
Don’t misunderstand me. We remain grateful for every tangible thing we are privileged to have and especially the really important things in life, our families who are all close by.
But there is a lesson here too. No matter how diligent we may be, how careful and considered our planning, life includes something’s you just can’t control…but you can try to accept and manage during the rest of the journey.
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November 24, 2025
Your 2026 Social Security Benefit amount
Today, 11/24/2025, I logged into mysocialsecurity.gov account. On the Benefit Verification Letter tab I found my December 2025 benefit amount that will be paid in January 2026. There was currently no indication of my 2026 SS benefit on the main SSA splash page. The gross amount for 2026 was equal to my 2025 gross amount plus the announced 2.8% COLA as rounded down to the whole dollar. My 2026 Medicare Part B premium deduction was the standard $202.90 per month as previously publicly announced.
I expect there are others that are gathering available 2026 information that may find such final information useful in their planning. I had previously established both ID.me and login.gov security identifications so I do not know if the previously user ID and password are still functional for logging on.
Best wishes for a joyful Thanksgiving.
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When is it worth your time to unfreeze your credit score?
Like everyone, I’m frequently asked at the checkout of drugstores and retail outlets if I have a credit card linked to the store and, if not, why don’t I quickly apply then and there to get a discount or cash bonus when my application is approved? I was recently tempted by $50 offered at the local chain drugstore, but then I thought about the time and energy to unfreeze my credit score and declined the $50 offer (but I continued to think about it for a short while 😊). However, when I got a notice last week that my backup credit card, currently with a $0 balance, is increasing its annual fee from $99 to $249, I decided it was worth my time and energy to apply for a $0 or low fee card. After all, this is just for my convenience and peace of mind if the one I use all the time needs to be replaced. Quick research found a no-fee card with the same bank. Though I haven’t yet followed through with the application process or the unfreezing, I have learned that everything can be done either online or on the phone and takes well under 10 minutes per scoring company. I think it will be worth my time to follow through later, but I’m interested in your opinions before doing so. Thanks.
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Fantasy Retirement Billable Hours
Driving home from the airport yesterday morning after dropping off a friend, an amusing thought crossed my mind: what if I actually calculated my billable hours for the past week? Since retiring, I've noticed that friends and family have come to see me as their go-to problem solver whenever something needs doing. The assumption seems to be that old Mark just sits around doing nothing while everyone else is busy being productive.
Let me walk you through my week. I took a friend's daughter to the hospital for her 20-week pregnancy scan and spent the appointment in the waiting room entertaining her two-year-old. I collected another friend's car and drove it across town to get its mandatory annual safety inspection. And as I mentioned, there was that airport run yesterday morning.
But let's really examine my billable hours. On Friday afternoon, I ran a two-hour pickleball clinic for 16 seniors who wanted to learn the sport. I taught them the rules, covered playing tactics, organized practice games between participants, and walked them through proper court safety and age-appropriate warm-up routines. That's got to be worth a few billable hours, surely.
Now, I'll give myself a free pass on the three days I spent ferrying my grandkids to and from school. Billing for that would be pushing things a bit far.
By my rough calculation, that's at least $400 to $500 worth of services I've provided for free this week. It just goes to show how much society benefits from the goodwill of us retired folks who are supposedly standing around doing nothing all week.
I wonder what job title I should give myself? needs to be something fancy to justify my wages: Community Logistics & Wellness Coordinator sounds about right, I'm feeling very important now, I might get myself some new business cards printed up.
Just saying 😉
Billing Period:,"November 17 – November 23, 2025"
Billed To:,"The Community (Friends, Family, and Society at Large)"
Consultant:,Mark
Title:,Community Logistics & Wellness Coordinator
Services Provided This Week
Monday
Hospital Caregiving & Support: Providing childcare/entertainment during friend's daughter's 20-week scan (Waiting Room Attendant / Child Supervisor)
1.5 hours @ $50/hour = $75.00
Wednesday
Automotive Fleet Management: Collecting, driving, and coordinating mandatory annual safety inspection (Logistics & Transport Specialist)
1 hour @ $65/hour = $65.00
Friday
Professional Athletic Instruction: Developing and delivering two-hour Pickleball Clinic (Certified Wellness & Sports Instructor)
2 hours @ $100/hour = $200.00
Saturday
Executive Travel Coordination: Early morning airport drop-off (Dedicated Chauffeur/Logistics Specialist, including premium for early hour service)
1.5 hours @ $75/hour = $112.50
Complimentary Services
Pro Bono Publico Deduction: Family Transport Services (Grandkids school runs x 3 days) = $0.00
Total Hours Billed: 6 hours
Total Amount Due: $452.50
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November 23, 2025
What would you do if you couldn’t drive?
A more realistic title would be “when”, not “if”. It doesn't take much, especially if you're over 65: a broken bone, a joint replacement, failing eyesight, a stroke or heart attack, dementia. If you have a partner, and rely on the partner for transport, the same problems apply.
My mother, born in 1906, spent over 90 years living in England without ever learning to drive. There are a few cities in the US where that's possible – New York, Chicago, San Francisco, for instance – but in most of the country you need a car. There was a grocery store “near” the house I lived in before moving to a Continuing Care Retirement Community, but it would have been a three mile round trip to the other side of a major four lane road. No-one wants to do that, pushing a shopping cart and a cooler, during a North Carolina summer, with temps and humidity consistently in the nineties. Nothing else I might need was even that close.
Consider two of my friends. One, let's call her C, is my next-door neighbor at the CCRC. After she had joint-replacement surgery she came back to the Skilled Nursing facility, and then to her apartment. Meals were delivered, and her on-site physical therapist took her down for treatments in a wheelchair. The CCRC also provides transport to off-site medical appointments.
Then there is my friend M, still aging in place. When she had joint-replacement surgery she constructed a massive spreadsheet to track all of the people coming to look after her, provide physical therapy, and take her to appointments. That's a lot of effort, with plenty of opportunity for things to go wrong.
Which would you rather be?
(BTW, M is moving to a facility with Independent and Assisted Living in January.)
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Is the value of your home an important part of retirement plans?
We know the equity in a home can be important and is part of net worth. It can be used to purchase with cash when downsizing. It can be sold and the cash used for living expenses - tax-free income up to a point. It can be used as income via a reverse mortgage. It seems a growing number of seniors are using home equity to pay an entrance fee to a CCRC. Or it may be part of inheritance.
But those strategies require the ability to sell. Prices keep rising, but we are also told it is becoming very difficult for younger families to afford today’s prices. In some areas, required down payments are 5% or less just to make a house available to purchase.
When we sold our family home in 2018, it took longer than anticipated and the price was $70,000 less than needed to cover the cost of our condo. Doing so today may well be more difficult.
The good news is the selling price for our condo today has increased about 60% and they sell quickly in our 55+ plus community. But will that continue?
So, the question becomes, how important is home equity as part of your retirement planning and what creative ways are you (planning to) using it?
Do you have concerns that changes in the real estate market may upend your plans?
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Don’t Let Mr Market Bully You: A Gentle Reminder of Your Built-In Protection
Now we've all had a little reminder over the last few weeks of what it feels like when Mr Market smacks us in the face with a loss, I think it's an excellent time for everyone to assess how they truly feel about their losses. Are you indifferent? Maybe it's made you slightly stressed, a bit edgy about the future? Or are you constantly checking your account and wishing you had done something before the losses piled up?
Considering your current frame of mind, what do you honestly think your feelings would be if we had a sudden further market drop of 30 percent? If you have an average 60:40 portfolio, that's going to show up as a massive 18% drop in your wealth. If that really concerns you or possibly makes you feel queasy, it might be a good indication you need to think about derisking some of your equity holdings into short bonds or cash and cash equivalents like treasury bills.
But before you pull the trigger, might it be prudent to think through your situation? Especially if you're in retirement and drawing from your portfolio for everyday living. Take the 60:40 portfolio as an example. You probably have at least 10 years of spending needs already pretty well insulated from our hypothetical 30% equity drop, sitting safely in your bond and cash allocation.
Although it's simple finance 101, during a big downturn this fact gets overlooked in the panic of the moment. By switching where you draw living expenses from—prioritizing your bond and cash allocation—you're not selling distressed assets from your equity holdings. You're letting them recover while your portfolio does exactly what it was designed to do: protect you.
Ultimately, these thoughts serve as a crucial reminder that risk management is not a knee-jerk reaction, but a calm, calculated process. While the feeling of being smacked in the face by the market is a powerful prompt for reflection, the most prudent response is always a pause. Before you radically derisk out of fear, take the time to evaluate your emotional tolerance and your portfolio's practical ability to weather the storm.
If you have a bond and cash buffer protecting your immediate needs, you're already insulated. By prioritizing calm thinking over panic selling, you avoid turning a temporary market dip—be it 6 months or 6 years—into a permanent loss, ensuring your long-term financial strategy remains intact and aligned with your personal goals.
Always remember: equity losses are nothing more than numbers on a screen until you sell and crystallize them in the real world. Don't let Mr Market bully you into making that mistake. Use your bonds and cash as designed, stay the course, and let time do the heavy lifting.
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