Table of Contents

Financial Advice for Astronomy Graduate Students

“Someone's sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.” – Warren Buffett

Preamble

This is a general repository for financial advice for astronomy graduate students of the “I wish I had known that when I was a first year” variety. The glossary is a good place to start if you don't know your Dow Jones from your Standard and Poor's; if you know why index funds are such a good idea then you can probably just skip it. The other four major links were designed to be read in order. Finally, at the bottom of this page there are links to more information and bottom-line advice. Some of the stuff here, like the glossary, is totally general financial stuff. Some of the stuff is Berkeley-grad-student specific, identified by a Cal icon (cal.jpg) so you can avoid it or skip right to it, depending on why you're here.

Finances

This section contains general advice about bank accounts, credit cards, and student loans cal.jpg.

Investing

This section shows how to safely become a millionaire on the stock market. Really.

Retirement

This section tells you what all that DCP “safe-harbor” stuff cal.jpg is all about (i.e. why Fidelity keeps sending you mail), IRAs, 401(a)s, Roths, and more.

Taxes

This section is about what to do with your 1098-T form, fellowships cal.jpg and those education credits. This section could use some work by folks who understand this stuff.

Glossary

You may want to skim this glossary of terms used above if you're not sure, for instance, exactly what a mutual fund is.

Saving for College

This section describes a great way to save for college for a child, or to help out with college for a neice or nephew. Makes a great wedding or baby-shower gift!

Learn more

Bottom line advice

Right now:

Longer term: