Opinion

Dear Rusty: I have reached my full retirement age (66 plus eight months) and plan to apply for Social Security this month, but I’ve seen articles which say that when I apply, I must also take Medicare Part A. This, even though I am continuing to work and am covered by my employer’s health insurance (a high deductible plan). I contribute bi-weekly into an HSA (Heath Savings Account). I’ve read that Medicare back dates Part A coverage by six months, which suggests I would have had to stop contributing to my HSA six months ago. If this is true, will I need to pay penalties and such to the IRS? I’m not able to find anything else about this topic, and I’m wondering what you might have to say. I have my wife and two children on my employer’s HDHP. We contribute $6,000 annually to our HSA and my employer contributes $1,250 on January 1st each year. We can live without the HSA, but the taxes and IRS penalties concern me.

The Texas Lottery Commission and its former director are under scrutiny after they allegedly helped a single entity win a $95 million Lotto Texas Jackpot, the Houston Chronicle reported. Written testimony at a state legislative hearing last week from an attorney indicated an entity called Rook TX guaranteed it would win the jackpot by buying virtually every one of the nearly 26 million possible six-number combinations in the drawing, held in April 2023.

Dear Rusty: Why were the Social Security funds moved from the Social Security account to the General Fund with the government? Is it not then called a tax making it an entitlement? That then gives the government control of our retirement. Most of us feel that someone should be in charge and use the Social Security fund with investments that grow our savings.

A bill to implement school vouchers in Texas sailed through the Senate largely on party lines last week and now awaits consideration in the House, the Austin American-Statesman reported. House Speaker Dustin Burrows, R-Lubbock, said he believes there are enough votes in that chamber to pass the legislation, which was defeated a half-dozen times in 2023 by a coalition of Democratic and rural Republican members.

Tears of millions of Americans have scarcely dried since the tragic mid-air collision of a passenger airliner with a military helicopter on January 29 in the icy waters of the Potomac River in Washington, DC.

My aged Uncle Mort admitted the other day that he feels like it’s time for him to re-enter the stock market, and this time, “brimming with confidence.” He swore off trying to out-guess the market in the late 1990s. Mort said he lumped all of his investments into “sweet chariot stocks.” I’d never heard of such, but his next sentence clarified: “When I bought ‘em, they swung low,” he cackled….

Dear Rusty: If a financially well-off individual had multiple ex-spouses, could it happen that the multiple ex-spouses could each be collecting Social Security based on their own financial situation as compared to their rich ex-spouses? Thus, multiple payouts by SS? Just curious, because there are probably many people in this situation as a result of the ever-increasing number of people involved in multiple marriages that each lasted more than ten years.

Relax. This is NOT going to be another one of those “promise pieces” about helpful resolutions that might elevate life for me in 2025.

Legislative budget writers are proposing nearly $5 billion to increase teacher pay and $1 billion to implement a school voucher program in the next biennium, the Austin American-Statesman reported. The voucher program, also referred to as school choice, would provide public money for private schooling, a key priority for Gov.