Historically speaking, a flattening yield curve that turns into an inverted yield curve has been a pretty good predictor of recessions. Under normal circumstances, with an economy humming along the way ours has, long-term rates will be significantly higher than short-term ones, creating an upward sloping curve. The main idea here is that bond investors demand higher yields in the longer term to account for the risk of inflation, which would eat away at their returns the same way it eats away at your purchasing power.

Many Americans are playing roulette with their retirement as they don’t have enough saved for emergencies.

Let's fantasize a bit. Let's talk about lottery-winnings-type money. If you had $10 million to retire on, how long would it last? Why bother going through this exercise? Well, it's kind of fun, for one thing. And who knows, it might even actually apply to some people reading this.

Many of us know by now that the Social Security fund will not be able to pay out full benefits within 15 years. But there is news today that for the first time since 1982, the cost of the Social Security program will be greater than its inflows. This means that Social Security will need to use part of its $3 trillion fund in order to pay out benefits.

So what makes for an actually useful retirement planner? Let's start with your actual, live investment account data, updated regularly. A free calculator is at best a snapshot in time, whereas a program like ours will keep track of your investment accounts' performance and holdings over longer periods. If your mutual funds and ETFs change up their portfolio holdings, their anticipated performance (based on the asset classes they hold) will be automatically handled in WealthTrace.