![Weekend Reading 150x150 Final](https://www.kitces.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Weekend-Reading_150x150_Final-150x150.png)
Enjoy the current installment of "weekend reading for financial planners" – this week's edition kicks off with the industry buzz that there's some new retirement legislation winding its way through Congress, known as the SECURE Act, that is showing promising signs of passing later this year, and would make a number of notable changes to retirement accounts, from eliminating the age limit on IRA contributions, pushing back Required Minimum Distributions from age 70 1/2 to age 72, and curtailing stretch IRAs as a revenue-raiser to "pay" for the other changes.
There were also a number of regulatory news headlines this week, including the death (at least for now) of Maryland's proposed fiduciary rule, a new simple one-page Fee Disclosure form under consideration in Massachusetts (even as debate continues over the SEC's proposed four-page Form CRS disclosure), a discussion of whether the recent fiduciary momentum at the state level means that it may actually be a better way to enact improved regulation of advisors (if only to eventually force federal regulators to then create a uniform national law), and a fascinating (and painful) look at how the rise of forgivable-loan recruiting bonuses amongst broker-dealers may be causing consumer harm (and a rising number of broker bankruptcies).
From there, we have a number of articles around practice management, including: what advisory firms should focus on if they're struggling with growth; how to better measure a firm's AUM and revenue over time to ensure the firm will know if/when it has a growth problem; how advisory firms are shifting from revenue-based compensation to team-based and firm-based compensation to promote a more team-oriented growth environment; and what owner-advisors should be thinking about to increase the valuation of the business if there's a plan to sell the firm in the coming decade.
We wrap up with three interesting articles, all around the theme of repetition and breaking the boredom routine: the first looks at how adopting deliberately repetitive habits is a key to helping us change our behaviors for the better (and to simply make it easier to do what we know we need to do, without being forced to spend so much time and energy thinking about it!); the second looks at how we as human beings tend to bond by sharing our stories... except when our stories get too repetitive that no one wants to hear them, though ironically acknowledging the repetitiveness of our stories can actually still build trust after all; and the last explores how to relieve the boredom that often comes with routines, not by ending the routine behavior itself but simply by recognizing the benefits of choosing to deliberately break the routine (or as the saying goes, "everything in moderation... including moderation!").
Enjoy the "light" reading!