What the experts say

Virtual retirement; ARMs revival; Kidney for college

Virtual retirement

Researchers may have finally found a cure for Americans’ tendency to save too little for retirement, said Jason Zweig in The Wall Street Journal. By showing young subjects a computer-​generated image of what they might look like in retirement, research teams at Stanford and other universities are succeeding in “turning impulsive spenders into patient savers.” In one study, young people who met their “elderly avatars” planned to save twice as much as their peers. This high-tech approach could one day be widely available through employer 401(k) plans or investment firms. Until then, there are other tricks you might use to make retirement more tangible—such as putting exact dates on your savings goals, using photos to create a “vivid” picture of retirement, and signing up for “auto-escalation” plans that each year increase the paycheck contributions that you make to your retirement savings.

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