Editorial standards
How the content here gets made.
Plain rules, applied to every page: figures traced to primary sources, arithmetic recomputed before publish, dated reviews, errors fixed when found, and a hard line between education and advice. Here they are in full.
Reviewed Jul 2026
Where the numbers come from
Wherever an official figure exists, we cite the primary source: IRS revenue procedures and publications for tax figures, Social Security Administration fact sheets for benefits and cost-of-living adjustments, CMS fact sheets for Medicare premiums and deductibles. Citations sit inline — next to the figures they support — and link to the document itself, so you can check us without leaving the paragraph. Where we reference research or reporting, it is named and linked as a secondary source.
The arithmetic is recomputed
Before a page is published, the arithmetic in its worked examples is recomputed from the source figures rather than copied from someone else’s summary. If an article says a couple would pay about $2,300 more in Medicare premiums, that number was rebuilt from the underlying premium tables before it went live. When our result differs from a figure circulating elsewhere, we show our math and cite the inputs.
Dated, reviewed, refreshed
Every article shows its publish date. Pages and tools built on year-specific figures reflect the year stated on the page, and a “Reviewed” date — like the Reviewed Jul 2026 chip above — records when the page’s figures were last checked against their sources. When the IRS, the Social Security Administration, and CMS publish the following year’s numbers each fall, the site’s figures are refreshed and the review dates updated.
Corrections
We fix errors when we find them — and when you do. A correction goes on the page as soon as the error is confirmed, and the page’s reviewed date is updated. If you spot something that looks wrong, tell us through thefinancialsciences.com or in a conversation; we would rather know.
Education, not advice
Everything on this site is educational. Articles and tools explain how the rules work; they don’t know your situation, and they never recommend that you convert, claim, withdraw, or buy anything in particular. Personalized advice requires a review of your full circumstances and begins only if you choose to engage the firm. The full statement of that boundary is in our disclosures.
Never sponsored
Nothing on this site is sponsored, paid for, or placed by a third party. There are no ads, no affiliate links, and no paid mentions — no company can pay to appear here, and none has. The complete picture of how the firm behind this site earns its revenue is on How we make money.
Sources we rely on
- IRSInternal Revenue Service — annual revenue procedures (for 2026 figures, Rev. Proc. 2025-32) and publications, including 590-B (IRA distributions), 915 (Social Security taxation), and 969 (HSAs).
- SSASocial Security Administration — annual COLA fact sheets and published benefit guidance at ssa.gov.
- CMSCenters for Medicare & Medicaid Services — annual premium and deductible fact sheets, plus program rules at medicare.gov.
- ResearchRetirement research — where articles discuss withdrawal rates, we draw on Morningstar’s annual safe-withdrawal-rate research and William Bengen’s original work on the “4% rule,” cited and linked in the articles themselves.
- PressFinancial press — outlets that compile published figures are sometimes cited as named, linked secondary references alongside the material they summarize.
More on how this site works How we make money Who runs this
The Financial Sciences Company, LLC is an investment adviser registered with the State of Texas. Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training. Our Form ADV is available at adviserinfo.sec.gov.