PrefaceI've been offering people financial advice for over 20 years; first as alawyer and a banker, then as an author, teacher, broadcaster, columnist,and private consultant. For the first 15 or so of those years, nothingchanged very noticeably. Interest rates fluctuated only very slightly; newinvestment opportunities were rare, and usually aimed at high-incomeinvestors; the flow of rules and regulations tended to be molasses-like. But in recent years things have been changing with breathtaking rapid-ity. Interest rates have gyrated like a roller coaster out of control. Newinvestment opportunities for the public at large have been coming at uslike an artillery barrage: Money Market funds ... cash management ac-counts ... NOW accounts and Super NOW accounts ... IRAs ... vari-able rate certificates.., single premium annuities.., zero coupon bonds... and more. New tax laws, new credit legislation, new investment reg-ulations have been pouring out of Washington like a waterfall. New concepts that affect us all regularly pop up in both news headlinesand casual conversations: "creative financing"... "T-bill rates"... "tax-deferred retirement plans" ... and so on. Confusion reigns supreme. I hear it and try to resolve it, regularly. Everyweek for over five years I have spent three hours on KABC radio in LosAngeles answering questions from the public at large. The audience,estimated at over 200,000 people, reaffirms my conviction that peoplehave become very much aware of the need for financial planning andthat they are extremely anxious to obtain the tools needed to allow themto do their own planning. This book and the instructional materials that accompany it, student study guide and instructor's manual, are intendedto be such tools. Many major changes have been incorporated in this book, which is a revision of the original 1978 edition. In addition to reorganization and updating of much of the material, there are some important new concepts added. These include the Consumer Beware narratives and the Personal Action Checklists at the end of each chapter. The former are intended to alert you to specific problems you might confront in handling particulartransactions related to the material in the chapter. The latter are intended as guidelines to assist you in planning or implementing your own financial decisions.