Friday, February 28, 2020

Short Takes: Illiquid Investments, Deferring OAS, and more

My most recent post argued that all of us have shortcuts in our decision making that can lead us astray and make us look irrational at times:

Behavioural Biases are in All of Us

Here are some short takes and some weekend reading:

Tom Bradley at Steadyhand explains what investors should know before diving into illiquid investments.

Boomer and Echo explains when you should or should not defer taking OAS to age 70. It’s important not to get too caught up in guessing how long you’ll live. The important thing is having a decent income in case you live long. This tends to make deferring OAS to age 70 look like a good idea for those with the savings to pay their own way through their latter 60s.

David Robson explains how the gambler’s fallacy finds its way into decisions unrelated to gambling. I suspect that the real life examples have more complex things going on, but it’s clear that there are biases at play. The problem is that most people think these biases are things that other people have, but not themselves. Thanks to reader Gene for pointing me to this article.

The Blunt Bean Counter explains some subtle points related to the complex Tax on Split Income (TOSI) rules.

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