Craig Wear, CFP, argues that tax planning must account for unpredictable future rates. Demand scenario-based projections from your advisor that model Social Security, required minimum distributions, and your spouse's situation after your death, including inheritance tax consequences.
As much as we'd like to, we can't predict what taxes will look like in the future, and building a recommendation on one set of assumptions is pretty fragile. If your CPA or advisor answer those questions clearly with real projections behind them, that's a really good sign. What happens to this plan when Social Security RMDs and my other income all start stacking together? And what does my spouse's tax picture look like the year after I die? Because those are the tax scenarios your future self may actually live in. If they were never modeled, then the biggest tax shifts in the entire plan are being totally overlooked. And the same goes for your heirs, because the tax cost doesn't always end with you. So it's also smart to ask, what happens to the taxes on this money when it's inherited? So a strong strategy should still make sense if future tax rates change, if returns are higher than expected, or if income shows up in a different order than what you planned for.
