Financial planners are sort of like money doctors – but what if your planner actually was a physician? That’s the unique biography of my guest on the podcast this week – Dr. Carolyn McClanahan.
Carolyn is a physician turned financial planner. She became interested in planning when her husband inherited some money – and wanted to make some career moves that would require him to accept a lower income. The couple set out to find some financial planning help, but they were dissatisfied by what they found.
One thing led to another, and these days Dr. McClanahan runs her own financial planning practice in Florida, called Life Planning Partners. She also has emerged as a leader in the planning profession, in part because of her unusual blend of professional expertise. Carolyn speaks and writes regularly at conferences and writes for Forbes and Financial Planning Magazine. You can find her quoted regularly in the Washington Post, New York Times, CNBC, and NPR; I have turned to her for insights in plenty of stories I’ve written in recent years. Dr. McClanahan brings a fresh, provocative perspective to a range of topics where health and financial issues intersect – everything from chronic illness to end of life, long term care, health care reform, and health care costs.
I asked Carolyn to tell the story of her unusual journey from practicing medicine to providing financial advice. We also talked about how the financial planning field has changed over the past two decades, how she thinks about health – and health care expenses – in the context of retirement plans, and how to select Medicare plans. Finally, I asked Dr. McClanahan for her thoughts on health care reform and proposals for Medicare for All.
Listen to my conversation with Carolyn McClanahan here. You also can find it on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher.
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