Category: Professionals
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The Tax Mistakes Aesthetic Practitioners Make When Their Income Takes Off
Aesthetics is one of the few corners of healthcare where a clinician’s income can climb faster than almost anyone predicted. The result is a predictable set of expensive mistakes. Here are the ones we see most often, and what to do about them.
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The High-Earner’s Roth Problem: Backdoor and Mega-Backdoor Strategies for Physicians
Roth accounts are among the most valuable tools in a long-term financial plan. Money grows tax-free, qualified withdrawals are tax-free, and unlike traditional retirement accounts, Roth IRAs are not subject to required minimum distributions during the owner’s lifetime. For a physician who expects to be in a high tax bracket for decades and well into…
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The End of SAVE: What Doctors and Dentists With Six-Figure Student Debt Must Do Before the RAP Transition
SAVE has ended and the new RAP plan launches July 2026. What doctors and dentists with large student loans should decide before their options narrow.
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The Loan-Out Decision: When Actors, Writers, and Directors Should Incorporate
In entertainment, a quiet piece of tax structure can make a meaningful difference in what a working professional keeps. It is the loan-out company, an entity through which actors, writers, directors, and other creatives provide their services. Instead of being hired directly by a studio, network, or production, the talent is employed by their own…
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Liquidity Before the IPO: Navigating Tender Offers and Secondary Sales
Staying private longer has become the norm for successful technology companies, and that creates a particular problem for employees. You may hold equity worth a great deal on paper, while your salary is ordinary and your net worth is locked inside shares you cannot easily sell. The classic answer, wait for the IPO, can be…
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Before the Lockup Expires: A Pre-IPO Planning Checklist for Equity-Rich Employees
An initial public offering is the moment years of equity compensation finally become real wealth. It is also a moment that rewards preparation and punishes improvisation. The employees who come through an IPO in the best financial shape are almost never the ones who started planning when the bell rang. They are the ones who…
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No 401(k), No Problem: Retirement Planning for Self-Employed Creatives
Most retirement advice assumes a particular setup: a steady salary, an employer, and a workplace 401(k) with a match. Self-employed creatives have none of that. There is no employer to sponsor a plan, no automatic payroll deferral, and no match to capture. Combined with income that arrives unevenly, this leads many writers, artists, musicians, and…
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Your First Attending Paycheck: A Financial Playbook for the Residency-to-Practice Transition
The jump from resident or fellow to attending is one of the most dramatic income changes in any profession. After years of training on a modest stipend, a new physician’s income can triple, quadruple, or more, almost overnight. It is a moment of real opportunity, and also one of real risk. The decisions made in…
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Deferred Comp and the California Exit: What Senior Tech Leaders Should Know Before Leaving the State
For senior technology executives, a large share of compensation often arrives in forms other than salary: nonqualified deferred compensation, restricted stock units, options, and other long-dated pay. For those same executives living in California, every dollar of that compensation is exposed to the highest state income tax rate in the country, currently 13.3% at the…
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Too Much of a Good Thing: Managing a Concentrated Position in Your Employer’s Stock
For many successful technology professionals, the same equity that built their wealth eventually becomes their biggest financial risk. Years of stock grants, option exercises, and a rising share price can leave a large share of net worth tied up in a single company. The position that made you wealthy is now the position that could…