The Ortho Money Show
Money, business, and life strategies for orthopedic surgeons who want to build wealth beyond the operating room
Ep #132: Closing the Contribution Gap: The Payroll Math, the Super Catch-Up, and the Cash Balance Lever
What percentage of your paycheck is actually going into your 401(k) right now, this pay period, not what you elected back in January? If you'd have to go check, you're not alone.
In this episode, Jared breaks down a new wrinkle in this year's contribution limits: surgeons turning 60 through 63 get a super catch-up of $11,250 that replaces, rather than stacks with, the standard $8,000 catch-up, bringing the total to $35,750. He walks through the payroll math on a stale January election (a flat per-paycheck number that has to triple or more once only a handful of checks remain before December 31), and why waiting until November to change it is often already too late once payroll processing lag is factored in.
Then he covers the bigger lever most of this conversation misses entirely: the cash balance plan, which runs on the actuary's funding schedule rather than a payroll election, and can dwarf the 401(k) catch-up figures for a surgeon in her late 50s or 60s.
Ep #124: Why I Recommend A Financial Second Opinion, And What To Look For
You've ordered hundreds of second opinions in your career. Have you ever gotten one on your financial plan?
In Episode 3, Jared makes the case for a financial second opinion. Financial services are built in silos: your CPA handles compliance, your advisor handles investments, your attorney handles the estate plan. Each does their piece well. Nobody's looking at how the pieces interact, and that's where the money leaks.
Jared walks through the four areas a real second opinion should cover (entity structure, retirement plan design, tax strategy, and investment allocation), and works through a scenario where an $850,000 surgeon's second-opinion review surfaces a cash balance plan opportunity, a SEP restructuring, and uncoordinated tax-loss harvesting worth $50,000 to $80,000 in year one, and over $400,000 across a decade.
Then he gives you three questions to ask before you sit down with anyone offering a "second opinion": what's their motive, will the findings be specific, and will they respect your existing team.