Of course I meant no state income taxes!

I do consulting on health and insurance issues, and work on Medicare issues quite a bit for CMS, Congress, DoD, etc., and there is some apparent misunderstanding above about this program even among those who I think may be getting it.

You are not required to get or pay premiums for Medicare insurance in the US. If you don't want it, fine, you can reject it. I think that would be very foolish but you can do so. The Part A (mainly hospitalization, but also some coverage for SNF, HHA annd hospice care) benefit is free for most people who are US citizens (assuming you are actually eligible through SSA). YOu are not automatically enrolled unless you are already receiving SS benefits at age 65; if you aren't, you must sign up.

The Part B benefit (for physicians, etc.) does have premiums and is voluntary. Again, you are automatically enrolled if you are getting SS benefits at 65, otherwise you must sign up for it. However, the instructions that come with the card tell you how to decline Part B if you are automatically enrolled due to prior SS receipts, if you don't want it. For actuarial reasons, there are some penalties in increasing premium rates if you choose not to buy it at age 65 and want to enroll at age 80, only when your expenses are very high or you don't have other insurance any more.

In any case, there are reasons for that schedule and the automatic enrollment in some cases, but if you don't want Part B, you can decline it when you are automatically enrolled and do not have to pay Part B Premiums or be enrolled in it. You are not charged for Part A usually, although some people are if they didn't contribute the right amounts to Medicare taxes during their working lives. If one doesn't qualify for free Part A because of not paying appropriate taxes through SS, one can usually buy into it and pay a premium for Part A benefits, but that is not mandatory, either, it is voluntary.

As for Medicare not providing free travel insurance, I agree, it would be nice if it did. But there isn't enough money in the budget for it and I wouldn't bet on that happening in the near future (or any time) given the dismal state of the current budget, deficits, receipts and spending allocations. I don't actually think that's a top priority because people who can afford to travel are more able to afford to buy their own travel insurance. There are many other items I would put of higher priority myself in terms of funding human resources programs in the budget.

SO, you are not required to pay premiums for this or have Part B, but you are required to contribute to it during your working life as part of your taxes, as you are required to pay taxes for many other federal functions.

So Degas, if you don't want Medicare, feel free to decline it.

Our friends in Europe travel and most of our friends in the US say they will travel when they retire. But I'm not sure they'll ever get around to it.

I say travel now - whatever your age!

You can travel on almost any budget whether you're camping at State Parks or going to an Elderhost program abroad. Many of these who say they can't afford to travel mean that they can't afford to travel in the style to which they would like to be accustomed!

Interesting question, and one DH and I ponder. I'm close to retirement age, he's already passed that date -- but because he has his own business, he'll retire when he wants to. Right now, as long as the work comes in and health is good, he loves what he does. (I work for a big corporation, and love it less and less!) :-(

We're traveling now, as much as time and budget allow. Once our children were done with college and weddings, we made a list of the places we wanted to see before we got too decrepit for adventures -- now we are enjoying working our way down the list. I can see that there will probably be an point at which all the packing, scheduling, traveling, schlepping etc. that I enjoy now will be less and less fun, and more of a physical challenge. My Mum, bless her, came to visit us from England every year until she was into her 80's (we live in CT). She loved to do it, but I could see it was getting harder for her to manage physically.

I hope once we retire and are not tied to work schedules that we will have time to go farther and stay longer, and are healthy enough to enjoy it. But I suspect that we will all reach a point where we decide it's not worth the upheaval, and home becomes more important. Which is why we plan to stay where we live now, with mortgage paid!

Interesting point Rex makes, but that assumes only major catastrophic illness, I think. There are many ailments where good health care and treatment can improve your life tremendously -- joint replacement, for example. Not everything that comes to us is a do or die decision, which makes the decisions much more complicated.

I heard Andrew Weill say his ideal was to live healthy as long as possible, and go fast once that was not possible. But that's not what happens to many of us or our loved ones.

Christina, I am glad you took the time to explain that Medicare is not mandatory. I just read this thread today and I was going to post..but you did a much better job of explaining than I would have. Best regards.

Just one more thought. I would strongly encourage anyone that is able to to travel whenever they can way before they retire.

I have known so many people that put off travelling until they retired and then sadly were not able to or only took a trip or two and then were not able to in the future.

About 30 years ago, my friend's retirned parents, sold their home, which they owned outright, and moved in with their daughter in a rear cottage on her property. They paid her a reasonalbe monthly rent. They had always traveled and this was the main purpose of doing this.

They bought an RV for U.S. travel and took several extended trips to European and other countries each year.

About three years later, they got a divorce (after over 40 years of marriage), he remarried, and for as long as they were able, they both continued to travel extensively, with the aid of the house money, investments, Social Secuity, Pensions etc..

I don't know why it took him 40 years to divorce her .... I made the mistake of traveling with her ONCE .... or as my mother reminded me as we were boarding the plane for a 6 week trip to France ....'I can't understand why you are going with May, you never liked her when you were a child". Wise words mom, but waaaaay to late.

Nina

Thanks for the info guy18. I can see why that legislation came about (people on fixed incomes being driven out of their homes by increasing taxes), but it does put people in a bad position when they do want to move.

Whoops .. my friend's parents were retired - not retirned. And mom told me way TOO late.

Fordor's please get a spell check, although that won't help with typos.

Nina

Or just an edit feature Nina66, that way you can fix your mistakes when you spot them!

I just retired a year ago, at age 55. . Before I retired, I worried about how much we would need in retirement. So we maxed out our 401(k) accounts, spent money with care, but did not deny ourselves things that we value, saved outside retirement accounts, and paid off all debts and the mortgage. If we had not been somewhat frugal for a while, I would have never retired so young. So while some of our friends are enjoying their highly leveraged mini-mansions and their Sub Zero refrigerators, they are still in the rat race and I am not. They appear envious. There is a lot to be said for liquidity.

When doing research prior to retirement, I came upon the following links that may prove helpful in determining costs of living elsewhere:

http://www.taxfoundation.org/research/topic/9.html

http://www.retirementliving.com/RLtaxes.

htmlhttp://www.bestplaces.net/city/

Some states have no income tax, but they have personal property taxes, or huge sales taxes on everything including food. Some states have deals freezing property taxes, or giving preferences to retired people. Some states still tax estates. Some tax your investment portfolio. Unless your state has a way to make money (such as from gampling in Nevada, or from oil in Alaska,) the government will need to pay for its essential services (roads, fire, police, garbage, schools) by some means.

Shorebrau,

What's a Sub Zero refrigerator?

I too have wondered about the term sub-zero refrigerator. I understand it is somehow "high end", but if it is sub-zero, wouldn't it be a freezer?

Sub-Zero is a corporation which manufactures high end appliances, here in high tax Wisconsin. Almost everyone who builds a custom high-end home will install a Sub-Zero brand built in refrigerator. I'm sure you can Google their web site.

Sub-Zero is a brand name; it is part of Wolf. One of the major reasons that they are popular is that the refrigerator has the compressor at the top, instead of at the back and therefore can be positioned flush with kitchen cabinets thus contributing to a more streamlined, built-in look.

You can travel inexpensively in retirement without foregoing the creature comforts like good quality beds, WC, closets, cable or satellite Tvs with international channels, intervet connection, cellular phones, prime view of the sea or mountains.
In a discussion on what a Europe travel costs I described the lifestyle and costs of my fall-winter-spring living in southern Spain, while also making monthly trips to other parts of Europe and Africa on a budget of about 1500 euro per month for a SINGLE person: it costs less per person for a couple. Now, I initially, after early retirement did not keep any permanent abode: my European flat was furnished, but after two years of vagabond living I started missing my cats and having a place to call home: with my own furniture etc. So I leased (and probably will buy - the owner wants $40 k, which the locals tell me is too much) a very nice cabin (around 1000 sf) in the cloud forest in one of the Latin American countries, with a mini-finca (= a small farm: fruits and organic veggies), which costs me next to nothing in maintenance, because my native housekeeper/gardener couple not only make sure there be no squatters and break-ins and that my cats will be well cared for in my long absence, they also grows the organic poduce and fuits and sell them, (ok, I got the organic certification and developed a well paying market myself by niche targeting) and use part of the proceeds to pay their salaries and part to pay lease and utilities on the cabin.
So, when the heat and prices in Spain become high in early summer,I get there for a cool, rainy summer in the jungle, and live very well - though pretty quiet - on less than $500 a month - with excursions, of course, to Mayan ruins, volcanos, snorkeling and scuba diving, etc. Living well is not a question of money, but of a bit of inventiveness - and not being bound to stereotypes of what constitutes a comfortable living.

Anciana, what a wonderful description of what can be done if you are willing to shuffle away from the expected norms. Congratulations on creating your own fabulous lifestyle.

http://www.retireearlyhomepage.com/restud1.html

This is a good site which gives a lot of data about retirement and how much money is needed.

This mentions about the amount (in percentage)of the savings that can be withdrawn. On most web sites about this plan, you can only take about 4% of your savings before you end up broke later.

Basically, if a person has a million zulus or whatever currency you're holding. This means you can only withdraw about 40,000 zulus per year.

From the various sites, these will substain 30 years before you go broke.

In my opinion, $1,000,000.00 in assets, it's not too much. You hope to develop a like to Alpho.

Blackduff

..."Some states have no income tax, but they have personal property taxes, or huge sales taxes on everything including food. Some states have deals freezing property taxes, or giving preferences to retired people."....

Well, here in Texas we have no state income tax on anything, no personal property tax where I live, but we have an 8.25% sales tax but not on food or meds. It helps pay for the light rail around Dallas. Most Texans get a homestead allowance on their main residence, the amount depending on where you live but around 20% off your assessed value. Many communities also will freeze your city and school taxes when you apply for your "old age" exemption at age 65. And we get a lot of house for the money here. Our 3200 sq. ft. custom home would sell for about $400,000. We pay about $5000 in property taxes. So many people come to Texas from more expensive states and can't believe how much home they can buy here.

Blackduff I am assuming you mean a million in assets other than real estate, right? Per person, not for a couple?