9.14.22: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

9.14.22: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Producer:
Any examples used are for illustrative purposes only, and do not take into account your particular investment objectives, financial situation or needs, and may not be suitable for all investors. It is not intended to predict the performance of any specific investment and is not a solicitation or recommendation of any investment strategy.

Producer:
Welcome to your American Retirement with your hosts. Randy Sams and Kale Simpson get set for a full hour of financial information and economic news affecting your bottom line. Randy and Cale work hard each day to educate Americans like you on how to reach the financial freedom they worked so hard for by protecting and growing their hard earned money. And they can help you, too. So now let's start the show. Here are your hosts, Randy Sams and Kale Simpson.

Kale Simpson:
Hello, central Arkansas. This is your American Retirement Retirement Radio Network with Kale Simpson and my co host, Mr. Randy Sams. Thank you for joining us this Saturday. Beautiful weather out there. Appreciate you taking the time out to maybe grab a nugget or two with respect to retirement and catch up from where we left off last time. So, Randy, am I coming in loud and clear on your answer?

Randy Sams:
Yes, sir. I got you. Gayle, thank you very much. Go hogs.

Kale Simpson:
Go hogs. That's that's absolutely right. So, hey, guys, you were listening to Randy and Carl's retirement radio on 101.1 FM. The answer, if you have a question, a comment, a concern, anything that Randy or I need to know about, please give us a call. Our toll free number is 8669907664. Again, 8669907664. Or hit the link on your American retirement. Please do go on to the website. All the prior broadcasts. Other useful information. Excerpts are all loaded into the website on a weekly basis by our fantastic producer, Mr. Sam. So it's a great website to go to, to learn a little bit more about Randy, Sam's and myself, find out what we're doing, what's new in the economy, what's new in the market, what we can do, what we can do to potentially help you from a retirement standpoint or like what we were going to talk to you guys about today, which is going to be mostly focused around smart health. As a lot of you guys know, we have annual enrollment coming up on the Medicare side. So Randy Sams being the Medicare expert at our company, we'll certainly take the time and explain a lot of what you can and cannot do during the annual enrollment period and what Medicare means to you as an Arkansan, not only Arkansas. We also have clients in multiple states around us. So don't feel like if you've got a family member outside of Arkansas, I've got family that I've got to go see in Texas over the next few days. We've got plenty of clients in Texas. We've got plenty of clients all around the United States. So if you have a friend or family member that you think might benefit from some of the information that we discuss, please point them to the website or have them give us a call and we will be glad to reach out to them. Not a problem. So anyway, Randy, real quick, I want to go ahead and start the radio show today and want to go over the financial wisdom quote of the week.

Producer:
And now of wholesome financial wisdom. It's time for the Quote of the week.

Kale Simpson:
As we do every single week. But this one comes from Dave Ramsey, your second favorite person in the world. Quote is It is human nature to want it and want it now. Sounds like my my children. It is also a sign of immaturity. Being willing to delay pleasure for a greater result is a sign of maturity at your wage, as Dave Ramsey says. So I've heard about that a long time, many, many years called in my brain. It's called delayed gratification. Everybody wants it now. They want it right now and all of it. But as you discussed multiple times over the past two or three or four broadcasts, for example, going back to Social Security, Randy, I mean, my goodness, if you can delay the gratification on taking Social Security, I'm pretty sure that that income, the average income was 1588 a month, if I remember correctly, somewhere.

Randy Sams:
We're close to that. Yes, sir.

Kale Simpson:
1000 588. But if you can delay the gratification until the age of 70, I think the max Social Security income was over $4,000 per month. So there there you go, Mr. Sams. That is what delayed gratification can do to you if you do not need it now. But these are some of the things that we talk to clients about on a daily basis. We are a financial advising firm, senior markets management group, SMG Financial, Your American Retirement. We help clients on a daily basis with not only life insurance, Health Insurance, Long-Term Care, but also Retirement Strategies. We do a lot of fixed index annuities. There are three types of annuities that we focus on. Randy, we'll talk about it later in the broadcast. It's kind of like the Goldilocks thing that we went over in like week two. I do believe you've got variable annuities. That's the EKG model with your up and your down and you're up and you're down. Which by the way, guys, do you remember what happened this week in the market? Everything was rosy, right? Everything was great until inflation numbers come out in the middle of the week. And then all of a sudden, the market pukes a thousand points, more than 1000 points because of inflation, CPI numbers. All the experts were thinking it was going to be a negative one 10th of 1% reading on CPI data came in at positive 1/10 of 1%.

Kale Simpson:
The CPI, the the main headline numbers, 8.6% year over year. Right, mid eights. But all that means is the Fed is going to continue to have to put the foot on the pedal, Randy, and continue to raise interest rates. So we saw another steepening of the yield inversion, a steepening of the inverted yield curve. From a treasury standpoint, short term interest rates flew out of the gate like a horse at Oaklawn. Randy trying trying to win that trifecta for you came running out of the gates and the ten years lagging. But here's the deal. The housing data is poor, the food data is poor. All the information from a political standpoint is subpar to say to say the least. And the only thing that we've really got going for us right now, Mr. Sams, is. Gasoline. So even though it's even though it's three bucks to fill up my truck, it still hurts. And that's fine if I can spend. If I can spend $3 a gallon at the gas tank, but then turn around and go into Kroger and spend $157 to get bare essentials. Still doesn't make it any easier at my house. I don't know about yours, but would you. Would you agree with that statement, sir?

Randy Sams:
I think you're spot on. Let me ask you a question. So if you're in retirement and you've got your money in the market and like you said, you know, the market was doing really nice for, what, 7 to 8 days in a row? And I guess if you're in retirement and you're you check your account on a daily basis, you're jumping up and down, you're really happy because what had been going down is now coming back up. But then all of a sudden, you pull up the the account balance today. And it's dropped 500, 700, 800, 1000 points. What do you think that does to someone that's in retirement? You know, not not in the accumulation phase, but in the phase where they've accumulated. They are retiring. They're not adding to it, but they're starting to take out. And all of a sudden you see that 1000 point drop. What is that? How does that affect someone that's in retirement?

Kale Simpson:
It's it's a it's like a double whammy, Randi. I mean, not only does it does it affect you on on paper and in your checkbook, it affects you mentally because you don't know what to do. You've you've gone through COVID, you've gone through the pandemic. You've got you've gone way down and then back up again. But now you've got a Fed, a Federal Reserve. And here's here's the deal for all of our listeners. And I've said it once, I'll say it again. I'll say it until I'm blue in the face. People made money hand over fist during COVID. And the old saying is, you know, we had a saying, a quote a couple of weeks ago from Warren Buffett, legendary investor. But one thing that I've heard that I've heard that Warren Buffett says that a lot of other very successful people in the world say, Randi, is do not fight the Fed. That's the deal. So when money is free and everyone gets stimulus checks and they're just, you know, creating trillions of dollars out of thin air and throwing it to everyone, don't fight the Fed. That that was great. Now what's happening? Don't fight the Fed. The Fed is tightening. It's it's not easing. It is tightening. So we're going to see another 75 basis points.

Kale Simpson:
That's what 80% say. The other 20% say 100 basis points. Wow. I think it's 75. And then I think we do it again because we're going to fire all the bullets out of the gun, Randi. We're going to fire all the bullets out just to say we did. Your Europe is having a tremendously difficult time. The dollar is super strong, which hurts exports for the United States. But Europe is Europe is in bad shape and the United States is is right on their coattails. So for someone in retirement, it's funny because I heard someone say this last week, Randi, and I kind of laughed it. I laughed at what they said they said. Well, if someone's in retirement, what our firm does is we want to make sure that they're in a they're in a bunch of dividend high high dividend paying positions. Then they rattled off a few companies. So I took the luxury of just pulling up some of those companies and looked at their performance week to date. I mean, I don't care if the company pays a 7% dividend, if the company is down, you know, 9% in a week. I mean, net net. Randy, did you make any money in retirement that week?

Randy Sams:
I would say no. Yeah.

Kale Simpson:
Yeah, that's correct. I'm like, how does that person sleep at night? Like, give me a guarantee and we can go from there. So anyway, but that's that's what happened in the market this past week, Randy. And we've had a lot of people reaching out after the market dump in the middle of the week. But this is what we're going to do, guys, today we're going to talk about we're going to talk a lot about Medicare. Randy's going to come he's he's going to take the stage and he's going to give a lot of information with respect to smart health strategies. We're going to go over all that stuff on your American retirement, Cale and Randy's Retirement Radio on the Retirement Radio Network. We'll be back in just a couple of moments. Hang tight. Thank you.

Producer:
We don't need no thoughts, control.

No sarcasm in the class.

Producer:
She should be there. Miss part of today's show. Your American retirement is available wherever you listen to podcasts and online at your American Retirement dot com.

Randy Sams:
Hey, welcome back, folks, to your American Retirement with Randy Samson, my co-host, Mr. Kale Simpson. We want to thank you for joining us this Saturday afternoon on 101.1 FM. The answer for Little Rock comes to talk. Folks, give us a call. 8669907664. We'd love to talk to you. Leave us a voicemail. Tell us how well we're doing. Give us some critiques. Give us some ideas on what you might want us to. Maybe subject. We can we can talk about. Go to the website. Your American retirement will leave us the same information. We'd love to talk to you folks. I've got a I've got a giveaway I want to send to you, but I'm going to need your email address. I'm not asking that. So we're going to bombard you with a bunch of emails. But during the show, I'll just make sure you remind me you're Sam. Remind me. I've got a book. It's about four or five, six pages long. It's called Smart Money. Kind of gives you a lot of good information about annuities and why annuities and why they're considered to be safe money investments for folks that are in retirement or getting close to retirement. So just remind me and during the show and we'll make sure that you understand, go to 8669907664. Leave us a message along with your email address or go to the website, your American retirement with your email address, information request the free e-book.

Randy Sams:
So hey, folks, guess what it is. We're in September. We're getting close to what's known as the AEP or annual enrollment period. So Kale, I want to ask you a question you don't have to answer. I'm just going to ask this. Throw out to yourself and the listeners. So when you turn 65 and you're not covered by employer or group insurance, what happens? You have to go on Medicare. Correct. So that's something that I've been specializing in for a few years now, along with annuities and life insurance. But Medicare is what I enjoy talking to folks, because usually when I'm talking to folks about Medicare, they're getting close to retirement. They have a lot of questions. And that's what we're going to hopefully clear up some of those questions for you today. Folks, I'd love to talk to you. Set up an appointment. Again. Give us a call. Go to the website. We'd love to talk to you. Answer any questions you may have about Medicare Part A, Part B, Medicare Advantage, Part D, Medicare supplement. But here's what we're going to do today. We're going to spend a little time educating folks on exactly what happens when you turn 65, you get to go on Medicare. So how many Americans are currently enrolled in Medicare? Good question. More than 61 million Americans are covered right now by Medicare or health plans.

Randy Sams:
That is from the National Committee to Preserve to preserve Social Security and Medicare 2020, almost four out of ten. Medicare consumers are also enrolled in Medicare Advantage plans. That information comes from Kaiser Family Foundation 2021. 65% of respondents say they would not know which part or parts of Medicare they should enroll in 2022. Medicare Survey by Single Payer. Again, that's why you need to contact us. 8669907664 or go to your American retirement. We'll help you figure out which parts or which part of Medicare that you need to look at. For 2022, Medicare beneficiaries have access to 39 Medicare Advantage plans. That's through Kaiser Family Foundation. Again, 89% of Medicare Advantage plans offered in 2022 include prescription drug coverage, better known as Part D. That's your prescription drug coverage. Part D, 18.5% of the US population is on Medicare. That would probably be Medicare alone, part A and part B without having a medicare Advantage or Medicare supplement. All right. So that kind of give you some statistics, some data concerning Medicare. How many Americans are currently enrolled in Medicare? How many have American? The Medicare Advantage plans. And then again, how many folks really have no idea what part A, part B, part C, part D are. And that's what hopefully we'll be able to clear up for you today. Medicare Part A We're going to start with also known as hospital insurance. Covers, inpatient hospital stays, skilled nursing facility care, hospice care and some home health care.

Randy Sams:
How can you be eligible for it? What's it going to cost me, Randy? You can get part a premium free at 65 years old if. There's little asterisks. If you or your spouse paid Medicare taxes for a certain amount of time while working. You already get retirement benefits from Social Security or the Railroad Retirement Board, or you're eligible for retirement benefits but haven't filed yet. Or you or your spouse had Medicare covered government employment. So part a. Most people don't pay a part a premium because they paid Medicare taxes while working. So you don't get if you don't get premium free part A, you pay up to $499 each month. But that's based on you have to qualify for part A based on your work history. If you don't buy Part A when you first become eligible for Medicare, usually when you turn 65, you might pay a penalty. Now, that's usually when you turn 65 folks. But if you currently are still working at age 65 or 66 or 68, whatever that age may be, and you have coverage through your employer group plan, you're still okay. You won't be penalized. But when you decide to retire, or if the employer group plan coverage ends for you, then at that point in time you have a certain period of time for eligibility for guaranteed issue to go into your Medicare Part A, part B and also for Medicare supplement.

Randy Sams:
So let's look at what some of the things that the cost and what Medicare part A my coverage again it's in-hospital stay in 2022 you're going to pay if you have to go to the hospital and you have Medicare part A your deductible per benefit period. Is $1,556. $0 for the first 60 days of each benefit period. After that. So you're going to be paying that deductible $389 per day for days, 61 through 94, each benefit period. $770 per a lifetime reserve day after day, 90 of each benefit period, up to a maximum of 60 days over your lifetime. So that's what you're going to pay out of pocket for part a skilled nursing facility stay in 2022. You pay $0 for the first 20 days for each benefit period, $194.50 per day for days 21 three, 100 for each benefit period. And then all calls for each day after day 100. Now, folks, what you've got to look at is. I'd love to be able to tell you that part A or part B will pay 100% after you pay what we just went over. But that's not the case. What happens is it's usually nowadays there's a lot of 70, 30 plans out there. I look at Medicare Part A, part B as like an 8020. It could be a little bit more than that.

Randy Sams:
But if you just use that as your rule of thumb and 8020 plan. So what happens is that if you have a hospital stay, you can anticipate that after you've paid all your deductibles and the cost that we just went over for part a while, you're in the hospital, they're going to pay 80% of the eligible cost and then you're going to have to pay the other 20%. So that's how Medicare Part A is going to work. Now, let's look at Medicare Part B. Medicare Part B. Monthly premium. Medicare Part B is what it's known as medical insurance. It covers all your certain doctors services, outpatient care, medical supplies and preventative services. So that's what you're looking at with Part B kind of. I look at that as like, that's my doctor's coverage for me. Some people automatically get part B, but others have to enroll. You could be subject to a late enrollment fee if you don't sign up for Part B when you first become eligible. Unlike Part A, you will definitely pay a premium for part B. So now this is what a lot of people don't understand. The premium for Part B currently is $170.10. That's your standard or what I refer to as Base OC. It's if you are making it's based on your IRS tax returns, based on your modified adjusted gross income as reported on your IRS tax returns from two years ago.

Randy Sams:
And if it's above a certain amount, you're going to pay your standard part B premium and what they call what I call an Irma or Irma, which stands for income related monthly adjustment amount. Now, folks, I'm not going to cover every one of these again, if you want me to cover this with you, if you're about to turn 65 or you've got questions about Medicare Part A, part B, what the cost are, again, go to the website, your American Retirement dot com or give us a call at 8669907664. Be glad to return to calls or respond email, but here's what you're going to look at. So your standard rate for part B is $170.10. But depending on what your income is, Cale, the top rate that you could pay for part B, depending on what your income is, if it's if you're married and you're filing joint tax, if you make more than 750,000, again, your adjusted gross income, your part B premium could be $578.30. So when you're anywhere in between $170.10 per month, up to five, 78, 30 per month. And again, I can't tell you what that is until we do a financial analysis to kind of see what your income looks like, what your adjusted gross income looks like. But I've had several people when we've applied for the Medicare, they've gotten a little notice from Medicare that basically shows them that they have an Irma and adjusted amount that they're going to have to pay every month.

Randy Sams:
And that is based solely upon the fact what their tax returns are showing as far as their adjusted gross income is. So and also you have a part B deductible, your part B deductible right now in 2022 is $233 per year. So you've got to pay that deductible for anything else is going to kick in. So a monthly premium again. One 7010 you enroll in part B for the first time in 2022. You don't get Social Security benefits. You directly billed for your part B premiums and this is where you pay your standard premium. You have Medicare and Medicaid or Medicaid pays your premiums again. The standard premium amount for 2022 is one 7010 per month. That's what I'm currently paying myself. So what we've got Medicare Part B, that's quite an eye opener for me because when I first got, I just turned 65 this year. So folks, if you want to talk to someone who basically has done what you're about to do, if you're about to turn 65 or looking at Medicare Part A, part B, again, you can give me a call. You can go to the website, leave me a message or leave a message. We'll get back in contact with you. But it was pretty eye opening to me to realize that, you know, going from a from a group coverage over to an individual plan, Medicare supplement or the Medicare Part A and part B, even though I've been doing this for many years, until you actually go through it, it's kind of an eye opening experience to find out that, hey, you're thinking you're just going to go in and pay a part B premium.

Randy Sams:
But then all of a sudden when you come in and you actually fill out the application and they ask you all your income and they get your tax returns and they find out, then you have that, Irma. That adjustment that's added to it. You know, it can be quite eye opening. And folks, here's what most people don't make the same amount of money when you retire as you did two years ago. Would you agree with that? So what happens if, let's say you have a question and say, well, Randy, you know, I got hit with an Irma and that Irma might be $20 a month, could be $30 a month, could be $10 a month. Again, it's based on your income, but what happens if I get hit with that? Irma But actually this year and next year or two or three years down the road from now, I'm making less money than I were two years ago. Well, guess what happens then? You have to go through the appeal process, so you have to fill out documentation.

Randy Sams:
Send that in to CMS, Medicare services. And they will do. They will look at your tax returns from the past few years. And at that point in time, they'll make a decision whether or not they're going to take the aama off or they're going to leave it on. So you could be penalized for that, Irma, for the rest of the time while you're paying your premiums or based on what your income is. If it goes down and you file an appeal, you could have that taken, taken away. So that's what you got. Again, folks, annual enrollment period EP is coming up October 15th through December 7th. That's kind of why we're focusing on today's show. We're going to talk about a little bit more about the Medicare part A, part B, part D, part C. We're going to get into it as what is Medicare Advantage? What's Medicare supplement your prescription drug plan? But folks, please give us a call again, a e p is coming up. If you've got questions, if you'd like to meet and discuss and kind of do a review of what you're currently have, if your prescription drug plan is not covering what you need it to, give us a call again. Your American retirement with Randy Sams. Carole Simpson 8669907664. Give us a call 101.1 F in the answer. We'll be right back.

Producer:
I'm Matt McClure with the Retirement Radio Network. Next time you head to the pharmacy, you could be in for some sticker shock. So do you need to plan now for higher drug prices in the future? First, let's spell out the problem, and it's not necessarily a new one. Prescription drug prices have been rising faster than inflation for decades, according to AARP. To put it in perspective, the group says if gas had risen as much as prescription drugs have over time, regular unleaded would cost more than 12 bucks a gallon by now. For seniors on a fixed income, being able to afford prescription drugs is essential. Ron Mastro, Giovanni of Health View Services recently told CNBC, Whether you're.

Randy Sams:
Affluent or whether you're the average person, I'll tell you what, when you look at your.

Producer:
Social Security check, you're paying for health care. Prescription drug insurance plans provide some coverage, of course, but not all plans are created equally. And it's important that you know the details of your plan, especially what it will and won't cover. You really need to look at the coverage in those types of.

Randy Sams:
Plans to determine.

Kale Simpson:
What.

Randy Sams:
Makes the.

Producer:
Most sense for you. Lawmakers in Washington have been trying to come up with solutions on several fronts. They include things like allowing the government to negotiate drug prices, capping the cost of insulin and more. But those proposals have stalled. They were part of President Biden's build back better plan. It passed the House, but that massive piece of legislation hit a roadblock in the Senate, even though surveys show big majorities of us adults approve of those measures. It seems like everyone agrees something needs to be done to control costs, but just can't agree on exactly what that might be. In the meantime, what should you do to prepare for higher drug prices in the future? Well, putting more money in savings surely couldn't hurt, according to the experts. But that can only go so far. And what can you do now to save money at the pharmacy? Well, that is a key question to consider as inflation continues its upward climb with the retirement radio network. I'm Matt McClure. Remember, all of Randy and Gail's listeners receive a free financial consultation just for listening to the show. Visit your American retirement to learn more and schedule an appointment. Thanks for listening to your American retirement and subscribing wherever you listen to podcasts.

Randy Sams:
Hey, welcome back, everyone. You're American Retirement with Randy Sams and my co host, Mr. Kale Simpson on 101.1 FM. The Answer Where Little Rock Goes to Talk. Hey, we're going to finish up this segment. We're going to finish up talking about the Medicare folks. I haven't gone into a lot of detail. We really don't have that much time for me to cover everything there is to know about part A or part B or part C or part D or we're going to talk about Medicare Advantage. We're going to talk about prescription drug plans and a little bit about Medicare Supplement or what's better known as Medigap in this next segment. But folks, really, if you've got questions or you like for myself or Cale to review what you currently have, again, AEP annual enrollment period begins on October the 15th and runs through December the seventh. We'd love to be able to sit down and look at what you have, make a comparison to some of the other products or plans that might be available here in Arkansas. So just again, go to the American retirement website. Leave us a message, leave us a note. You'd like to talk to us and you have to contact us. We can't talk contact you because of the rules and regulations that CMS puts on contact. But if you leave me a voicemail at 8669907664, again 8669907664. Leave us a voicemail. Let us know you want us to get in contact with you, then that gives us the ability to legally contact you and have a conversation with you.

Randy Sams:
Okay, let's talk about Medicare Part D, better known as prescription drug plans, folks. It's known as drug coverage. Plans cover a wide variety of prescription drugs. So, folks, every company that you have out there, you know, we could go through, you know, who a bunch of the companies are. You're not a health care, Humana, Cigna, Blue Cross, Blue Shield, folks. There's all kinds of there's numerous local coverages here in Arkansas. There are nationwide companies that we do business with, but they all have a prescription drug plan. Some of them have different prescription drug plans, different tiers. If you do a standalone prescription drug plans, a lot of your carriers will have two or three options for you from one that covers like your basic needs to one that may be your Cadillac plan. Again, you're going to go from a basic plan that may be a lower premium to a Cadillac plan, which is a higher premium. But you may have fewer deductibles, no deductibles. You have probably more medications that are covered. But just as a side note, every prescription drug plan has to cover, at least it has to provide at least two medications from each section of what they consider of their formula. All right, formulary. So again, they cover a wide variety of prescription drugs. There are protected classes such as drugs that treat HIV AIDS that most plans cover. A plan's list of drugs is called a formulary. Those formularies are approved.

Randy Sams:
They have to be submitted by the insurance company to CMS and then they are approved. So part D plans have drug tiers. Lower tier drugs cost less than higher tier tier drugs. Some of your drugs have to be approved. So there are folks who have, let's say, transplants. Most of your medication that you have to have prescribed to you because of you've had a kidney transplant, liver transplant, heart transplant, whatever it might be, those medications are going to usually be in Tier four, Tier five. They're going to be more expensive type drugs. And a lot of times they have to have approval by your doctor or they have to be recommended by your doctor or verified by your doctor to be able to have those covered. But you've got those in your higher tiers, your lower tier drugs are going to be, you know, like blood pressure, different things of that nature. So what do you pay for in Part D? You pay a premium. You have a yearly deductible. You have co-payments and co-insurance. You have a coverage gap cost. You have extra help cost, and you have a late enrollment penalty that's permanently added to your premium. So let's talk about extra help. So, folks, extra help will kick in if you're considered an ally is low income subsidy. All right. So that depends on what your income is and you fall below a certain threshold of the poverty level. There is there's a strict dollar amount. But if you fall below that, then you can get what's known as extra help, which will help pay for your drug costs.

Randy Sams:
And it may even pay your prescription drug plan premium if you have a standalone plan. But just to give you an example, usually you've got whatever your plan is and then you can be adjusted again and has an Irma. If your income is above a certain limit, you'll pay what's known as an income related monthly adjustment amount. In addition to your plan and the additional coverage for your prescription drug plan could be as high as $77.90 plus whatever your plan premium might be. So if your plan premium was $25 a month and you made quite a bit of money, say 750,000 or above was what your joint tax return was. You could be paying an additional $77.90 plus your plan premium. Now, let's talk about the late enrollment fee. What happens, folks, is when you turn 65 or you become eligible for part A, part D, part B and part D comes into play. If you do not, it's not. I can't tell you it's mandatory. All right. No one can make you take Part D prescription drug plan. So I've run into several people out in the marketplace that when they retired or they left their job, they didn't have any health insurance. They went automatically to Medicare Part A and part B, but they did not they didn't need any medications. They were healthy. They weren't taking blood pressure, pressure medication or insulin or whatever it might be.

Randy Sams:
They did not take a prescription drug plan, Part D standalone plan. All right. And they may have waited for two years or three years. And what happens is, at the point in time, if you did not take advantage of a Part D prescription drug plan at the moment, you became eligible. First became eligible. What happens is, is you will incur a what they call a late enrollment penalty. And, folks, unfortunately, that penalty will stay with you as long as you pay those premiums unless you become eligible for extra help or you fall into that less category. But if you are above that limit or that level, that penalty that you pay will always be there. I'm going to give you an example myself. Now, some of y'all may think this is bad, but before I became started really focusing on Medicare. My mom and my dad were both on Medicare. I knew what kind of plans they had, but I was not aware of the late enrollment period. That's you know, I figured they had prescription drug plans. My dad was taking medication. But, you know, as my mom, bless her heart, she's only a she's 88 years old. I hope she's not listening because she'll be mad at me for actually giving that disclosing that information over the radio. But she's in great health. She takes one medication and that's it. But, you know, several years back, she was on no medications and she didn't understand why she should have to have a prescription drug plan.

Randy Sams:
And so what happens? The person who wrote her up a medicare program did not put her on a medicare Part D plan. And after about six years, seven years that she had that plan, she and I began to look at it. I began to become more knowledgeable and actually offer it to my clients. And we took out a plan through a local company here. And guess what happened? She got hit with the late enrollment fee. She wasn't too happy with Randy, but I kept telling her, don't shoot. The message is not something that I you know, it's not because of something I did. It's something that they implemented. I believe it was in 2000. If don't take this wrong, maybe 2006, somewhere in that range, but you are now required. Again, it's not mandatory, but you are now required when you become eligible first become eligible to enroll in a Part D plan. If you do not take advantage of that time, the period that you have gone without Part D coverage, you will pay that late penalty. And that late penalty can be it's based on how many months you've had, based on what the average premium would be. So if the average premium is $30 a month and you've been out without the coverage for, say, 60 months or five years, then there's a formula that you would use to tell you that your monthly penalty is going to be $25 a month. I'm using that as an example.

Randy Sams:
We can get more specific if you call, but that's what prescription drug plans will do. All right. Again, you pay that late enrollment penalty if you do not enroll in Part D during your initial enrollment period, that's when you first become eligible. There are 63 days where you don't have Medicare drug coverage, 63 days or more, where you don't have Medicare drug coverage or other credible prescription drug coverage. So, folks, what happens is this. Let's say that you're employed and you've been on a group health plan and you're about to lose that group health plan by you're going to retire or they're doing away with their group health plan. But they've given you a document that's what's called you've been you've had credible coverage, which is going to keep you from having to pay any late enrollment penalties for poor part B or late enrollment penalties for Part D. But let's say your coverage for your group plan ends. In the end of September. So beginning October 1st, you have 63 days to be able to enroll in a prescription drug plan. If you wait past that 63 days, then you will pay that late penalty. So that's going to get you probably a little information, maybe more than you care to to hear. But that's your prescription part D. So, folks, a lot of your Medicare Advantage, which we're about to talk about, Medicare Advantage will include a prescription drug plan with them. But if you're doing a medicare supplement plan, a medigap, you'll have to have a standalone prescription drug plan.

Randy Sams:
So. While we're looking at Medicare. Supplement plan, again, better known as Medigap versus Medicare Advantage. These types of insurance are designed to fill the gaps in part A and part B plans. You can't have both or you can't have a medicare Advantage and then turn around and have a medicare supplement plan. About 81% of beneficiaries who have Parts A and Part B supplement their coverage with Medigap Medicaid or employer sponsored plans. 48% of beneficiaries pay for Part D coverage. Most of those are your standalone plans. Medigap or Medicare Plus. Medigap is more expensive than other plans. It covers any hospital or doctor that accepts Medicare. So this is Medigap, folks. If you've got Medicare part A, part B, you can buy a standalone Medicare supplement plan known as Medigap. Those plans cover any hospital or doctor that accepts Medicare. So you're not limited to a network. There's no need for prior authorization or referral from your primary doctor. You are covered anywhere in the US, which is great for people who travel often and good for people who have specific doctors or hospitals they want to use. So folks that's going to cover Part D is going to cover Medicare supplement. We're going to take a quick break. I'll take about 5 minutes of the next segment and we'll finish up with Medicare Advantage. So again, you're listening to your American retirement with Randy Sams and Mr. Simpson on 101.1 FM. The answer. Who's going to ride that home? Three wheel.

Producer:
Social Security will get a big cost of living adjustment next year, but there could be some consequences you might not have considered. I'm Matt McClure with the Retirement Radio Network, powered by a merrill Life. A new report by the Senior Citizens League says Social Security beneficiaries could see a cost of living adjustment or COLA as high as 10.1% next year. The reason, inflation running at a 40 year high.

Mary Johnson:
This is a very, very unusual and unprecedented pattern of inflation that we're experiencing.

Producer:
Mary Johnson with the non-profit group, told WBTV that surveys show inflation has caused about half of Americans to spend their emergency savings and people are carrying more debt on their credit cards. So the highest jump in Social Security payments since 1981 would be a good thing, right? Well, Johnson says it's better than no increase, but there are some things to be aware of.

Mary Johnson:
In fact, you can get penalized if you think your tax liability is going to be 10% more next year than you're paying now. You can be penalized if you don't send in estimated payments or have more money withheld.

Producer:
She told the TV station the increase would not be enough to cover a jump in Medicare Part B premiums, which are taken directly out of Social Security checks. And she says higher incomes mean some seniors could no longer be eligible for some other government benefits.

Mary Johnson:
And then a whole 15% were made ineligible because they were their incomes increased over the income limit for food stamps or rental subsidies or programs in their area.

Producer:
So what should you do? Johnson says Prepare now. Talk to a financial adviser to help you get ready ahead of time and contact local nonprofits if you need help paying bills. So are you prepared for the unintended consequences of a larger Social Security check? That's a key question to consider as inflation impacts all our lives with the retirement radio network powered by a married life. I'm Matt McClure.

Randy Sams:
Welcome back, folks. Glad you could join us this Saturday afternoon. Your American retirement with myself, Randy Sams, my co-host, Mr. Kale Simpson. Give us a call. 8669907664. Leave us a message. Give us some good ideas. What you would like for us to talk to talk to you about. If you'd like to set an appointment to talk to myself or call about retirement planning, look at your financial investments, your financial needs, or we won't talk about Medicare again, your American retirement with Randy Sams, my co host, Mr. Simpson, 101.1 FM. The answer. Hey, folks, we're going to finish out the fourth segment. I'm going to finish up talking about Medicare and then I'm going to throw it over to Kayo because I need something to drink since I've been speaking pretty much the whole time. But folks on the Medicare Medicare supplement, again, Medicare supplement plans are are designed to come in and help assist with your medical needs, your medical and what you incur as far as cost for hospital, for doctors, for prescription drugs. So basically, again, if you remember earlier in the show, I said your Medicare Part A and part B, you can look at that as like an 8020 plan, Medicare part A, part B would cover the first 80% and then the Medicare supplement plan would come in and cover the other 20%. Now, when I state that, I'm going to put little asterisks, because when you look at a medicare supplement plan, I don't care whatever provider that may have a name.

Randy Sams:
Blue cross blue shield, unitedhealthcare, humana. Again, we go down the list. I'm not looking at the carriers. They all offer the same coverage. So folks, when you look at a medicare supplement plan, you're going to see there are several different plans. They go from a all the way to M so you've got plan A, plan K, plan A, plan M, plan M, plan in plan F, plan G. That's confusing. We don't want to cover all that. We don't have enough time to cover it on this show. But again, give us a call or go to the website, your American Retirement dot com. Leave us a message. We'd love to be able to meet with you and kind of explain the different plans, but each one of those plans, they have a premium that you're going to pay a monthly premium and they have different levels of coverage. So that's going to finish up with Medicare Supplement or your Medigap plans. Again, when you say Medicare supplement plan, you have a plan number or a plan letter like plan and plan F, plan G, and that's going to determine what premium you're going to pay, what level of coverage you're going to have. Medicare Advantage also known as Part C. So, folks, what Medicare Advantage to me, if I'll explain it the way I talk to my clients, Medicare Advantage is basically part A and part B except being administered from the government.

Randy Sams:
It's now being administered from a private insurance company. All right. So if you take a medicare Advantage plan, you will no longer need your Medicare part A, part B card. You will have a medicare Advantage card. If you have a medicare supplement plan, you will have both. You will have your original Medicare Part A, part B card. You will have your Medicare supplement card, and you will also have a prescription drug card. But Medicare Advantage, also known as Part C, you will either have no premiums or a lower premium for a than a. Medigap plan. So one of the, I guess, attractions for a medicare Advantage plan would be a lot of those plans out on the marketplace available today are zero premiums or very low premiums. And Medicare Advantage plans cover your hospital and doctors and often include prescription drug coverage and other coverage not included in Parts A and Part B, Medicare Advantage plans operates a lot of them are HMOs or health maintenance organizations and limit people who are covered by this plan to doctors and hospitals in their network. So, folks, that's one of the limiting limits that I see on Medicare Advantage. And a lot of folks that have them, they don't like the fact that they can't go to a certain doctor or a certain hospital.

Randy Sams:
But when you have a medicare Advantage plan or you're speaking to someone about Medicare Advantage, one of the things that you need to ensure may positively insure before you sign up is the doctors that you currently have. Are they in their network? And number two, any hospital that you may think about being admitted to, are they in the network? Because if you don't, if you go outside of the network, sometimes they don't cover the cost, but sometimes they will cover it. But it's going to be more out of pocket for you. So, folks, I'm done talking about Medicare. Hopefully you've learned a lot taking some good notes. But again, if you have questions, if you'd like to sit down and meet and discuss your Medicare supplement, your prescription drug plan or your Medicare Advantage plans, if you think you might want to be making changes, folks, go to the website, your American retirement. Leave us a message. Let us know you would like to sit down and talk about your Medicare planning during EAP, which begins October 15th and end December 7th, or give us a call. 8669907664. Again, 8669907664. Leave us a message and we're going to get back in contact you. Contact with you. Kale. My mouth is dry, bro. I need a drink of water. I'm going to turn it over to you and let you finish up the fourth segment.

Kale Simpson:
Got it. Thank you so much, Randy. My goodness, that's a lot of information. A lot of great information. I'm sure a lot of our listeners, I know I appreciate you taking the time and explaining kind of from a broad 30,000 foot level on on Medicare. It's not anything that I particularly focus on. But I know you do, Randy, and you do a great job for all of our clients when they have questions. So but hey, you know, for all of our listeners, you know, a couple episodes ago, we spoke about life insurance. Today, Randy gave us a lot of information regarding health insurance. I mean, guys, you know, these are these are things every client is going to have something in their life, Randy, that they need to talk about, that they need to talk to a professional about at any given time. And it's not always going to be the same. So if that's the life insurance, because you had someone in your family pass away. Unfortunately, I did this past week. People want to talk about life insurance if they're turning 65 and they need to talk to a professional about Medicare or health insurance, how that works, we're going to need to talk about that if they get that statement, randy, like we talked about and the past week, so brutal in the market, you know, they're they're losing money in their retirement nest egg and they don't want to anymore. They might want to talk to a professional about how to protect that hard earned bucket of money. So it's one of those things where we can help you guys depending on where you are in that cycle, because everybody's going to be in a different, different point in their life at any given moment.

Kale Simpson:
So don't feel like if it's the middle of annual enrollment, we won't have time to talk about life insurance or we won't have time to talk about helping you protect some of your 401. K in service distribution. Perhaps if you're not sure what an in-service distribution is, Google it or give us a call. Go to the website and put in the comments. Question about in service distribution. That's if you're if you're currently working, you're over 59 and a half years old. Most companies will allow it. Not all companies, but most companies will allow it. You can roll a portion or all of your 401. K benefits, even if you're still contributing to your 401. K, you can roll that into a fixed indexed product where you take away the downside exposure in the market. That unnecessary risk component we've talked so many times about, Randy, but you still have that upside potential. I don't know how many clients I've talked to this year about in-service distributions and why it makes so much sense when we have a -5% day, day, not week, day in the market this past week, you can't take too many of those in a row until until your retirement account goes from a 401. K Like you said a couple episodes ago, Randy, down to a201k If you're about to retire and you lose half your money, can you still retire? Probably not. So real quick, the things that we spoke about earlier, if you're thinking about various rules, I want to go over this real fast.

Kale Simpson:
I've got 60 seconds to do it, Randy, so I'm going to do it. The rule of 100 roll of 100 is easy. 100 minus your age is the maximum amount of risk that you need to be taking in your safe bucket of money, which can relate to income in retirement. So if you're 70 years old, 100 -70 is 30, 30% is the maximum. Amount of risk. Maximum amount of risk. You need to be taking 4% rule 4% rule says that's how much money you can take out of your retirement account to live off of. There was a smart guy that came up with that rule a long time ago. Now they've reduced it down to 3%. I don't like either one of those rules. We like to give our clients guarantees. Give us a call. We have a book that will that will discuss these rules in more detail. It's called Annuity 360. Go to the website, your American Retirement put annuity book Annuity 360. We'll send you a free book. We'll send you a free folder. And then the rule of 72. Guys, this is this is a tried and true rule. It's mathematics 101. And if the rule of 72 is a way to estimate how quickly, your investment will double. So if you take 72 and divide it by ten, that's 7.2. So if you're getting 10%, 7.2 years is how long it takes to double your investment. So we like to talk to clients about guarantees and if we can guarantee seven or 8% for a client on income. Randy, we're doing a pretty good job, in my opinion. Would you agree?

Randy Sams:
Yes, sir.

Kale Simpson:
Yes, sir. So, guys, listen, in October, Social Security comes out with updated COLA, its cost of living adjustments. Stay tuned for a future episode in which we will discuss. Randy will probably go into more detail than I will about Social Security, COLA, and what that means to you and your retirement income. We've talked about a lot of information today. Randy, is there anything that you want to add before we let our listeners go and enjoy the rest of their Saturday?

Randy Sams:
Okay. I'll just very quickly, folks, if you remember earlier in the show, I said if you'll go to the go to the website of American retirement or call us at 86699307664, leave us your email address and we'll send you the free e-book, Safe Money, Smart Money. But we've got to have your email address. I promise we're not going to bombard you with a bunch of junk mail. Again, Randy Sams, Mr. Kale Simpson signing off your American retirement on 101.1 FM. The Answer Where Little Rock Goes to Talk.

Producer:
Thanks for listening to your American retirement. You deserve to work with licensed financial insurance experts who can offer sound strategies for protecting and growing your hard earned money to schedule your free no obligation consultation. Visit your American retirement today that's your American retirement dot com not affiliated with the United States government. Randy Sams and Carl Simpson do not offer tax, legal or investment advice. Consult with your tax advisor or attorney regarding specific situations. Opinions expressed are subject to change without notice. These opinions are not intended as investment advice, nor do they predict future performance of any product. All information provided is believed to be from reliable sources. However, we make no representation or warranty as to the accuracy of any statement. This information is intended to be educational in nature and does not provide a guarantee or specific result. All copyrights and trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Amara Life assumes no responsibility or liability for the content of this message. The information contained herein is provided on an as is basis with no guarantees of completeness, accuracy, usefulness, timeliness, or of the results obtained from the use of this information.

Sonix is the world’s most advanced automated transcription, translation, and subtitling platform. Fast, accurate, and affordable.

Automatically convert your mp3 files to text (txt file), Microsoft Word (docx file), and SubRip Subtitle (srt file) in minutes.

Sonix has many features that you'd love including advanced search, world-class support, automated translation, powerful integrations and APIs, and easily transcribe your Zoom meetings. Try Sonix for free today.