Could a Trust Fit Your Estate Plan?

MARK RIEPE: I'm Mark Riepe. I head up the Schwab Center for Financial Research, and this is Financial Decoder, an original podcast from Charles Schwab. It's a show about financial decision-making and the cognitive and emotional biases that can cloud our judgment.

We're tackling a topic that strikes fear into many an investor's heart: trusts.

It's not that trusts are inherently scary, but they can be intimidating. There's a lot to consider. Different kinds of trusts serve different purposes, and that means you've got to figure out what kind of trust you need. In addition to that, like any legal document, it's important to understand your rights and obligations. The end result is a process that could be, if you're not careful, cognitively taxing. Trusts, like many financial processes, also have an emotional component to them as well. 

In the case of a trust, you're forced to consider potentially unpleasant things like your own mortality. We recently came across a paper entitled "Terror Management Theory: Understanding Existential Anxiety."[1] The upshot is that if we dwell on the fact of our passing for too long, the death anxiety, as it's known, would overwhelm us. But I think we all know that, deep down, avoiding reality is rarely a good plan. It's far better to confront that reality and make the most of it. And for some, a trust is a great tool to have in our financial toolkit.

To help us aggregate the world of trusts, we've got a returning guest. Austin Jarvis puts the trust in trust education. He's our trust, estate planning, and tax expert here at the Schwab Center for Financial Research. Austin analyzes and provides insights on complex estate gifts and trust planning, advanced charitable strategies, business succession, and executive compensation.

Austin Jarvis, welcome to the show.

AUSTIN JARVIS: Happy to be here, Mark.

MARK: So Austin, maybe let's start at the beginning here. Is there a simple test for whether someone should even be thinking about a trust? What sort of problems are trusts typically aiming to solve?

AUSTIN: So I really hate to start out the interview like this and sound like a lawyer, but it really depends on each person's goals and circumstances. Like if you live in a state that has a slow and costly probate process, a revocable trust as a will substitute may be what's right for you, because then you get to basically have an alternative through going through your state's probate process. But there are many more types of trust than just a typical revocable trust that many people are familiar with.

Trusts can be used to hold assets for beneficiaries that can't manage their own affairs. Maybe someone in your family that you want to give money to has gambling problems, or creditors have sued them, or they just can't manage a large inheritance or a large gift. Trusts are set up all the time to manage those types of circumstances. And if you're a high-net-worth person, trusts are often used for charitable-planning purposes, estate tax mitigation, especially for states that have state estate taxes. 

And then for the ultra-rich, we have trusts that are really efficient for tax-focused generational wealth transfer. So the long and short of it is trusts can be used for the average person just looking for a way to avoid the probate process, give themselves a little bit more flexibility and control over transferring of assets at their death, or it can be used for a multitude of other purposes, depending on what your goals and circumstances are.

MARK: The word "trust," it's a simple word. We use it all the time. When people hear that word in this context, what should they be picturing? Is it an account? Is it a kind of a legal construct? Is it a set of instructions? What is it exactly?

AUSTIN: So I like to think of a trust as a box. And so for like a revocable trust, it's a box that's open that you can put assets into, take them out of, control them. Basically, during your life, it flows in and out. You have full control. But at your death, or incapacity for a revocable trust, then the box closes, and those set of instructions you basically slap on top so that the next trustee takes over.

Now for an irrevocable trust, which basically just means that it can't be changed without significant effort after you've established it, the box typically starts off closed with a set of instructions that the trustee has to follow.

MARK: Lot of different trusts that are out there, Austin. What are the main categories or use cases that people should be thinking about?

AUSTIN: If you don't have to worry about federal estate taxes, which in 2026 is $15 million per person or $30 million for a married couple, I want you to know about three trusts. The first is the standard revocable trust as a will substitute. This has a lot of power, which I'm sure we're going to get into later. The second is a standard irrevocable trust used to manage a gift or bequest for your beneficiaries. So again, if you have someone that can't manage their financial affairs. They've got some gambling or maybe drug addiction problems, something like that. 

The third, and this is near and dear to me, is a special needs trust. And these are used to give resources to beneficiaries above and beyond what government assistance programs can provide them without also disqualifying them from those needs-based assistance programs. Because if you give someone at your death an outright bequest, that money can disqualify them from receiving those government benefits because of their disability. These trusts are specifically structured to make sure that that doesn't happen.

MARK: Let's go back, Austin, to the revocable living trust, because that's the one you said is the most basic, and it kind of suits the majority of people's needs. Could you elaborate a little bit on that? What makes them so broadly useful?

AUSTIN: In my opinion, revocable trusts are so powerful because they can help in both cases of incapacity and death. And estate planning to me is just about planning for those two things. Incapacity, when you can't make decisions on your own, and death, once you've gone to the great beyond. So let's start off with you're incapacitated for whatever reason. Say you get into a car wreck and you're in a coma.

Well, if you've moved all of your assets into a revocable trust, or let's say the majority of your assets, because there's some assets that can't be put into a trust. I'll make that clarification here. Whoever you've named as your successor trustee would be able to immediately step in and manage those assets for you. If you did not have this, then you'd be relying on a durable financial power of attorney, which you should have as a part of this. It's not a substitute, but it's a great compliment to say, hey, I've got a revocable trust that my successor trustee can manage. And also I've got a financial power of attorney that they can do all the other things that are outside of the trust. 

Revocable trusts are also powerful because they can help streamline the process after death by avoiding probate and keeping the transfers of what you're giving to your beneficiaries from public record.

MARK: Where do revocable living trusts fall short? Or maybe a way of asking that a little bit differently, what are some of the more unique situations that could prompt someone to consider a different type of structure?

AUSTIN: So one of the things I want to point out from the outset is there's a misconception out there that if you have a revocable trust, you don't need a will. Because even I said, "will substitute." That's not true. Most of the time you're going to need a pour-over will that just basically says anything that's inside of your estate that wasn't a part of your revocable trust, once it's done through the probate process, it gets poured into your revocable trust. So that's all that really means.

It's fairly common, so don't worry about it. A will is also a place where you can name a guardian for minor children. So that's the only place that you can do that. So that's another reason why you should always have a will. Even if you say, "I want to use a revocable trust as my primary," a will is the only place where you can name a guardian for your minor children.

But one of the most common things that I that I see and that most estate planners see in practice is people not funding their revocable trust once it's set up. You've gone through the time and expense of creating it, but a trust that doesn't have assets has legally not come into existence. So these are the things for revocable trusts that I would say, hey, you need to know about. But if you have more specific goals than simply using a trust as a way of transferring your assets at death, you should talk with an estate-planning attorney about different trusts that may suit your needs. 

Examples might be trusts for beneficiaries with special needs, as we mentioned before. The trusts for people who can't manage large inheritances, trusts that can help fulfill charitable desires while also giving you some tax benefits, whether that be on the income tax side or on the transfer tax side. There's lots of different trust structures to meet specific goals. And I do mean specific goals. We've got trusts out there that help you transfer residences in the most tax efficient manner possible. There's lots of different things. If you've got a spouse who isn't a U.S. citizen, and you need to worry about estate taxes, there's a trust specifically out there for that situation. So if you've got specific goals, and you say, "Hey, I don't know where to go or what type of trust might fit, talk with an estate planning attorney and see if there's a structure out there that fits for you.

MARK: Yeah, I think that's really good advice because as you just mentioned with all those examples, everybody's situation is a little bit different. And that kind of leads me to my next question, which is, given that, what are some of the key variables that people should be thinking about as to whether in this situation a trust is, yeah, it's a good idea, but it's sort of like an optional thing to do versus something where you and the people you've worked with, it's really something you would strongly recommend somebody doing.

AUSTIN: So the first thing that I ask someone is what state do they reside in? Because as an estate planner, we kind of know intuitively what states have a streamlined probate process that is both cost effective and timely. And then the others that cost and take a lot of time to go through. So in that circumstance, a revocable trust might be the way to go to save time and expense. Because some probate administrations can take well over a year and cost significant amount of money. And it's normally tied to the value of your estate.

So if you have significant assets, and you live in a state that has a costly probate process, I would look at a revocable trust as a possible solution to that. Number two, are you subject to federal or state estate taxes? If so, trusts can help minimize the taxes you pay. Now this is completely legal. It's just structuring it in a way so that it flows in the most tax-efficient manner. That's a little beyond the scope of what we're talking about, but I do want to let people know that if you do think, "Hey, I live in a state that has state estate taxes" or "I have more than $15 million as an individual, $30 million as a couple," that trust structures can help minimize those estate taxes so that your beneficiaries can receive more of your estate. 

And then finally, do you have people that you want to give to, whether during your life or at your death, that have any type of special circumstances or needs? Have your kids or grandkids ever been sued? Have you ever sent any of them to rehab? That's a conversation that I have had with clients. I see here that we paid a rehab facility for one of your grandkids. Are we sure we want to leave them an outright bequest? Do we want to put a little bit of guardrails on that? Are there people out there who can manage that amount of money on their own? You can go from a middle-class life, and then you have a rich relative that passes millions of dollars on. Are they able to handle that amount of money, or should they get the guidance of a professional trustee that also includes some investment management services? So a trust manages and protects that inheritance if you need it to, if you say this person can't handle that. 

And then finally, for people with disabled beneficiaries, a special needs trust is absolutely necessary if you know that this person qualifies for governmental benefits, they're going to be on it, and you do not want to disqualify them from those benefits. I would say that in that circumstance, a trust almost becomes mandatory in those situations.

MARK: Austin, I want to go back to this point you were talking about earlier about the differences between a will and a revocable trust. In terms of kind of what happens to your assets and who's in charge, draw a distinction between those two in those situations.

AUSTIN: So first, with a trust, you have a trustee, whereas with the will, you have an executor. They can be two different people; they can be the same person. But on the trust side, once the successor trustee's notified of a death, and that's been verified, the trustee then begins following the instructions of the trust. They gather and inventory the assets. They'll then follow the terms of the document to the letter, which typically either states to gather the assets and then distribute them to the beneficiaries and close up, terminate the trust.

Or it creates new subtrusts underneath there for the beneficiaries that the trust continues on and manages, in which then the trustee would then manage those assets for the benefit of those beneficiaries. Or there can be a combination thereof. It does not have to be one or the other. It can be a combination. You can give some money outright; you can withhold some. That is the great power of trusts is the flexibility. There's not one set document that you have to just pull off the shelf.

You can tailor it to your specific needs. And that's the one thing I would like everybody to know. Trusts are as flexible as you need them to be. Now they have to follow some legal requirements, but after those legal requirements, really the world is open to you and how you'd like to structure that.

MARK: So Austin, that's great. A lot of great information there. But I my guess is wherever there's a trust, there's going to be a trustee. So what role does the trustee play in making all this work?

AUSTIN: So the trustee is the person that you appoint to carry out the instructions provided in the document. They should be someone who's professional that has the expertise because they do carry with them a legal fiduciary duty to follow the terms, to not self-deal, to make sure that the instructions are carried out appropriately. Trust documents give immense power to the trustee and discretion. So the person you choose to serve as trustee is one of the most important decisions you're going to make when you're putting all the terms and provisions together. And this is why, when you sit down with an estate planner, you go through, do you want to have an individual? Do you have someone that you trust? Do they have the experience? Do you think that they'd know what to do? Or would you maybe want to go to, you know, something like a corporate trustee, which I think we'll talk about a bit later. A corporate trustee in my opinion can either serve as sole trustee, make all the decisions, because this is all they do. They're an entity. They've got trust officers who they manage a trust accordingly.

Or what's most common nowadays is to say, "I want an individual who knows the beneficiaries, who knows the family, they know all the interpersonal relationships," but you also have the experience of a corporate trustee and you name them as co-trustees. That way you get the best of both worlds because what you don't want is a corporate trustee not understanding some of the nuances, whereas an individual trustee who does can explain that, and they can come to a decision together. 

But that doesn't mean that the individual trustee is going to sway a corporate trustee. If the document is explicit about something, they have to follow it. So this is one of the biggest decisions that I think someone can make when they're putting their trust together. And I would caution to make sure that you get someone who's experienced that knows what they're doing, because if you don't and they make mistakes, a trustee can be sued if they screw up.

MARK: So how do you go about choosing, for example, a corporate trustee? I mean, as you mentioned, it's a huge decision, and it's really important to get it right. So walk me through kind of a process that you would go through to make sure you're making the best choice you can make in that situation.

AUSTIN: Corporate trustees, first and foremost, they're normally chosen when you need a trustee that has longevity, expertise, and impartiality. Because they're a corporate entity, theoretically they can last forever. So trusts with a very long time horizon could be well served by naming corporate trustee for continuity of administration. However, this is something that you have to be cognizant of is corporate trustees do come with fees that should be closely examined.

It is not uncommon to see some of these larger irrevocable trusts with fees in excess of 1% of the assets under management. Now that does basically have a full laundry list of services underneath it, such as trust administration, investment management, filing the taxes, everything under the sun that you could possibly need, but that could, that 1%, while it's not a whole lot, in a down market, you could be basically saying I'm taking 1% in a down market. 

But the peace of mind that you get knowing that it's being professionally done, that's something. So when you're looking to hire someone, I would say go look at their fee schedule. Because the other thing to keep in mind is if you don't have traditional assets, if you've got farmland, if you've got real estate, if you've got life insurance policies, there can be basically different fees attached to those administration services. I know life insurance policies, sometimes they just charge a flat fee of, hey, if this is just a life insurance trust, then we're going to charge $2,500, whatever it may be. And there might be different fees associated with real estate. So look at that. Then from there, I would just say look at the ratings. A lot of people would just tell you, you can't really look. But if a trust company has been in existence for a long time, and they've got good ratings, it's enough to have a conversation about. But I will say, don't just look at one and then sign the paperwork. Make sure that you go to different trust companies.

Some of the larger ones are fantastic, but if you want someone who's a little bit more local, go down the street. Many of the financial institutions that are local have trust services that they might offer. So what's important to you? Do you want the big name that's been there forever? It's polished. That might be right for you. But you also might want to be able to say, hey, I need to go speak with the trust officer. They're going to be down the street. What's important to you?

MARK: Austin, you mentioned earlier that the trustee has a legal obligation to the beneficiary of the trust. And I think that's a really important point for people to pay attention to. So does that mean the trustee no longer is working for you, sort of the person who created the trust in the first place?

AUSTIN: So let's divide this into two different areas. The first is revocable trusts. With that, the person who sets up the trust, so you are typically the trustee and have all the power to do with the trust assets as you please, because you've got the power to revoke. So at any point in time, you could just say trust doesn't exist, all the assets flow back to me. With irrevocable trusts, however, once the trust is established and funded, a trustee is basically owing a fiduciary duty to follow the terms of the document for the benefit of the beneficiaries.

Even if at that point the grantor of who created that trust comes in and says, "I don't want to do that anymore." Too late. The document controls. So yes, the trustee is going to have to follow the document. There are ways to go about modifying an irrevocable trust. It takes effort. There's different ways depending on state statute. I don't want to say that you can't do anything, but it's difficult and it's costly to change an irrevocable trust.

So yes, a trustee for most irrevocable trusts, they owe a duty of care to the beneficiaries to make sure that they're following the terms of the document as written, even if the grantor says that's not what I want to do anymore.

MARK: Yeah, I think the way you describe that is really good because there are these ongoing responsibilities with the trust as well as the costs that you mentioned, not just the setup but any of the maintenance to the trust over time. So how should people think about that in their decision-making process?

AUSTIN: So again, let's keep it divided between revocable trust, irrevocable trust. For revocable trusts, because you're a trustee, really the expenses you're going to have is the initial setup and changing the title of your assets over to the trust. Your estate-planning attorney is going to help you with that. Great news is that most estate-planning attorneys work on a per-document fee or a bundled fee. So say you go in and get the full estate-planning package, your will, your revocable trust, powers of attorney, healthcare directives, all of it. Normally that's one set price. 

Now, some prestigious law firms might do it a bit differently, but that's the typical practice that is most common to see. So when you're doing this, typically for like a revocable trust, you're only looking at those initial setup fees. And then if there's any fees associated with changing title to property that you want the trust to own. 

For irrevocable trusts, however, you still have the legal upfront fees. Typically, you're not the trustee. There's rules around that, so you're going to have to have trustees' fees. Irrevocable trusts also are going to have taxes that they're going to owe. Now, depending on how it's structured, there's grantor, non-grantor trusts. We're really not going to get into that. But let's just say that no matter what, you're going to basically either have to take the information from the trust, what it generated, and flow it out to the grantor, if it's a grantor trust, or the trust itself is going to have to pay income taxes on what it generated as its own entity. 

Now, one caveat here is that taxes for irrevocable trusts that are non-grantor. Trusts have compressed tax brackets, which means that they reach the highest level of income, basically at around, I think it's $16,000. So if the trust is significant, if it has a million dollars in assets, you're probably reaching that fairly fast. So there is some benefit for grantor trusts, but again, your estate-planning attorney will help you decide which kind of trust is right for you. 

And then the other thing to consider is a lot of people use trusts for non-traditional assets, art, collectibles, even some businesses are put inside trusts. Those might take specialty asset managers in order to make sure that everything works correctly. And that might be additional fees that the trust might incur.

MARK: So you mentioned taxes there. So why don't we shift gears here a little. I've got a number of different tax-related questions that pertain to trusts. So maybe let's start really basic here. At a high level, when do trust decisions start to have real tax implications? And maybe we'll start with the revocable living trust as the most common type.

AUSTIN: So this one's easy, and I'm glad that it is because for revocable trusts, it really doesn't have any impact on your income taxes because anything that the trust has in terms of taxes flows immediately to your personal 1040. It's as if you owned those assets yourself. So from an income-tax-planning perspective, nothing really changes. The IRS looks at that vehicle and says, "That's just you." So that's how I look at it. And that's one of the best things is that even by creating this trust, nothing about filing your taxes really changes.

MARK: So what about some of the other structures then? When do they start having tax consequences or special filing requirements, for example?

AUSTIN: For other type of trusts, so let's say you funded it during your life for the benefit of someone else. So those situations … like say, hey, I've got that person who I want to give money to, but I want to make sure that I protect that gift from maybe creditor problems or something like that. You're going to have to file a gift tax return if it exceeds your annual exclusion, which is, in 2026, is $19,000 per person.

A married couple can give up to $38,000. But if you do what's called gift splitting, if you both use that, you would have to file a gift tax return. Now, filing a gift tax return is not the same as actually owing gift taxes. I want to make that absolutely clear. You're just letting the IRS know, "Hey, I'm utilizing my annual exclusion and possibly utilizing some of my lifetime exemption from the estate tax" if you're above that amount. So anything that you give above that annual exclusion reduces your lifetime exemption. So that's a little bit less than you're going to have to use when you eventually pass away. 

Many people who set up trusts during their life fund them with significant amounts. So if that's going to be you, you're going to need to know about that and file the 709. For those of you who live in states with state-level transfer taxes, that's also another consideration. So if you're doing this, make sure that you speak with either your CPA, who's probably knowledgeable, or an estate-planning attorney when you're making these kinds of gifts.

MARK: Are there any situations where the trust itself actually becomes a taxpayer and needs to in effect file its own returns?

AUSTIN: Yeah. So irrevocable trusts that are considered non-grantor trusts, so it's its own taxpaying entity, they actually have to pay income taxes as a taxpaying entity. The issue here is that again, as I mentioned, the trusts are subject to extremely compacted income tax brackets, with anything over $16,000 hitting the highest tax rate of 37%. So when you're thinking about setting up a specialized irrevocable trust that is considered a non-grantor trust, just know that the trust itself will file a tax return and pay taxes on its income with those compressed tax rates. So you might just be wary of knowing that. But there are certain situations in which paying a little bit more in tax might be worth it in specialized circumstances.

MARK: Couple more questions, Austin, then I'll let you go here. First one, what are the most common mistakes people make once they've set up the trust? What are they, under real-world conditions, what tends to go wrong?

AUSTIN: This one's fairly easy, not funding the trust. Many people go through the entire process of setting up a trust and then spending the legal fees. And then they just don't follow the final step by actually funding the trust with the assets they want to control. Again, a trust without assets never comes into an existence legally. So we see that a lot when people come in and say, "I have a trust." And I say, "OK, what does it own?" "Oh, we've never gotten around to changing the account titles or changing the property." So if you have a trust, and you have not done this, this is your sign to go back and finish that last step. 

I will also say, for like a revocable living trust, that some people don't consider the flexibility that's afforded to them. They don't think about what could change, future births, divorce, things that happen every day in life. They just look at their life in a static picture and never anticipate what could change and put those circumstances into the document.

There's lots of ways that you can tell a standard revocable trust, "If this, then that." That's what I'd like to also say is that revocable trusts are customizable. They're flexible. Revocable trusts that are really good are normally very long because they take into consideration almost every conceivable circumstance in order to make sure that, if something happens, there's a provision for it so that what you want to happen does actually happen.

MARK: All right, last question, Austin. And I think I'm going to turn this into a two-parter. Let's say somebody's listening to this and they're thinking maybe there's something to this trust thing. Maybe I need one, but I'm not really sure. So first part of the question is what's the next step they should take? What's the next decision they should be thinking about? And the second part is, I'm guessing you're going to use the words "estate-planning attorney" at some point in your answer to the first part. And so for that person who's thinking about that, what do they need to do in preparation for that meeting so they get as much out of it as they need to? 

AUSTIN: Well, you hit the nail on the head on that one. If you think you need a trust but you aren't sure, make an appointment with a qualified estate-planning attorney. If you don't know where to go, start with Google, look at ratings. But one of my best suggestions is if you live near a large metropolitan area, look at the estate-planning council that's in your area. Give them a call and say, "Can you give me some references for some estate-planning attorneys in your area that are close to my hometown who work with clients like me?" And you can describe yourself.

When you go to that estate-planning attorney, they might say to you, "You don't need a trust. Your estate is very simple." But you're already there. "Let's go ahead and get you a good will, your powers of attorney, your healthcare directives." They might even help you on something like a letter of instruction that's just kind of a "Hey, here's where you can find my important documents," things that you need to know, that type of thing. But no matter what, I am going to say, go ahead, contact the attorney. 

Again, some of these attorneys charge just flat rates for their estate-planning packages. Some might do hourly, but be up front. Ask them those questions about what they charge. And if you think even those rates are way too high for me, there are online will preparation companies. A lot of them will meet your needs if you don't have something sophisticated, and they're much less expensive. I will say that some of them don't give you the customization and the flexibility if you went to an actual estate-planning attorney. But if you don't have anything, they're going to be better than having done nothing at all. 

As to your second question, in preparing for the meeting, I will say take inventory of everything that you own, all of your liabilities, any special circumstances for you and your family. Think about your goals. What would you want to happen if you became incapacitated? Who's going to make your financial decisions? Who's going to make your medical decisions? Then communicate those goals to your family. 

Say, "Here's the people who I want to make these decisions. Here's what I want to have happen if I can't make my own medical decisions." Because if they don't know, they're going to be using their best judgment. But if they have never heard you talk about this, they're going to use what they think you'd want, but not what you actually want. So that's why these documents are important because you're putting in paper your wishes in writing. This is what I want to have happen to me in these circumstances. 

And at death, your trust says, "Here's how I want things to flow." And you can even put in these documents the reason why. I know it's very common for jewelry that's been heirloom, jewelry that's been passed down the family to say, "I'm giving this to so and so because this has always been passed down to the firstborn female in the family." And that's why, just so that you can alleviate any type of family disgruntlement over why inheritances are going to certain people, you can put in these stories so that people understand. 

But as my final closing word, I will say that these decisions can become personal. When death or incapacity occurs, it is a trying time for your family and loved ones. That's why it's so important to have these documents so that there's no guessing about what you would want to happen, whether it's making financial or medical decisions, or whether it's who's getting what from your estate. Having it in writings basically sets in stone this is what you actually wanted. You took the time and effort to put it into writing. And that's what you wanted. 

So if you don't have an estate plan, please go out and get one from a qualified estate-planning attorney or even go online. Because if you don't have an estate plan, the state that you reside in has one for you and that's called the intestacy statutes. And believe me, most everyone does not want that to control because I don't think that the legislatures in your state were thinking of your specific circumstances when they wrote the statutes to control for anyone who didn't have a will in place.

MARK: Well, that's a good place to end it. Austin Jarvis is a director of estate, trust, and high-net-worth tax planning research for the Schwab Center for Financial Research. Austin, thanks for joining us today.

AUSTIN: Thank you for having me, Mark.

MARK: That's another episode in the books. If you've been thinking about establishing a trust, I hope this clarified some things for you. And if trusts weren't on your radar, and now you think you might need one, that's good too. There are many articles on trusts at schwab.com/learn. We'll link to those in the show notes. And if you'd like to hear more from me, in the meantime, you can follow me on my LinkedIn page or at X @MarkRiepe. That's M-A-R-K-R-I-E-P-E. As always, we'd appreciate it if you give us a rating or review on Apple Podcasts, or comment on the show if you listen to it on Spotify. Or tell a friend or a few friends about us. We always like new listeners, so if you know someone who might like the show, please tell them about it and how they can follow us for free in their favorite podcasting app. 

For important disclosures, see the show notes and schwab.com/FinancialDecoder.
 

[1] "Terror Management Theory: Exploring the Psychology of Existential Anxiety," NeuroLaunch.com, September 14, 2024, https://neurolaunch.com/terror-management-theory-psychology-definition/