VOA慢速英语2011--Retirement Savings Rule 1: Reduce Investment Risk as the Day Nears

Economics Report - Retirement¹ Savings² Rule 1: Reduce Investment Risk as the Day Nears

 

This is the VOA Special English Economics Report.

Today, retirement can mean different things. For many Americans, it means the end of the money-earning part of their life and the beginning of a period of enjoyment³. But retirement calls for planning and savings.

In many countries, employers may offer some kind of retirement savings plan. The plan could be linked to the company’s stock or to a managed investment service. Almost any financial planner will say workers should use these plans to save money easily: often directly from their wages. But an employer plan should not be your only way to save for retirement.

Pete D’Arruda heads his own financial planning company and gives retirement advice on radio shows and television. He tells people to save whenever possible. But he says as retirement nears, you must take fewer financial risks.

PETER D’ARRUDA: “There’s three stages of life there when we look at it. There’s the part where you’re earning money. And when you’re earning money, if you have a salary, it makes it easier to take risk because you know that if you lose the money you can go back and earn some more.”

Robert Rivers of Ravena, New York, is among the baby boomers now starting to retire.

By risks, Pete D’Arruda means investing in stocks and other financial instruments that can lose value quickly. He says people should move money away from riskier⁴ investments as they age even if there is a possibility of a higher rate of return. Instead, investors⁵ nearing retirement should seek more secure investments for their savings.

PETER D’ARRUDA: “But then we get to the transition phase when we’re within five years or so of retirement. I call it the financial red zone because now is the time when you need to protect what you have, you need to start transitioning away from the risk of Wall Street and into safe places that guarantee lifetime income.”

Pete D’Arruda has a simple way of deciding how much of your retirement savings should be at risk. He says, take your age and put a percentage after it. That is the percentage of your retirement savings that should be fully⁶ protected from losing value. So, for a sixty-five-year-old, the rule works like this:

PETER D’ARRUDA: “Sixty-five percent of the money must be in a place that can’t lose it. The reason why is when you’re in retirement it’s impossible to get the money back that you lost because you don’t have a salary coming in, so time is no longer on your side.”

The investment services company Charles Schwab prepares studies about Americans’ retirement planning. The company’s Retirement Pulse Survey looks at how people of all ages prepare for the big event.

One recent survey found that forty-four percent of baby boomers feel secure in their readiness for retirement. Baby boomers are the generation of Americans born in the years immediately after World War Two. The first baby boomers are now reaching sixty-five, currently the full retirement age in the United States.

And that's the VOA Special English Economics Report. I'm Mario Ritter.

1 retirement   

n.退休，退职

参考例句：

• She wanted to enjoy her retirement without being beset by financial worries.她想享受退休生活而不必为金钱担忧。
• I have to put everything away for my retirement.我必须把一切都积蓄起来以便退休后用。

2 savings   

n.存款，储蓄

参考例句：

• I can't afford the vacation,for it would eat up my savings.我度不起假，那样会把我的积蓄用光的。
• By this time he had used up all his savings.到这时，他的存款已全部用完。

3 enjoyment   

n.乐趣；享有；享用

参考例句：

• Your company adds to the enjoyment of our visit. 有您的陪同，我们这次访问更加愉快了。
• After each joke the old man cackled his enjoyment.每逢讲完一个笑话，这老人就呵呵笑着表示他的高兴。

4 riskier   

冒险的，危险的( risky的比较级 )

参考例句：

• Now they are starting to demand higher returns on riskier assets. 而今他们开始在风险更高的资产上要求更高的回报。
• The problem with that: RIM's business is getting riskier every quarter. 不过问题也随之而来：RIM面临的业务风险正逐季增大。

5 investors   

n.投资者，出资者( investor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a con man who bilked investors out of millions of dollars 诈取投资者几百万元的骗子
• a cash bonanza for investors 投资者的赚钱机会

6 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。