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Ty Bullard, MD, associate professor in the UNC Department of Anesthesiology, created a program on personal finance for medical residents at the UNC Medical Center. “Our residents now have a place they feel they can get unbiased, non-conflicted information,” he told the Times.


“When the pandemic was declared in March and the U.S. stock market plunged, Dr. Bryan T. Whitlow was surprisingly sanguine about his retirement investments. Unlike many Americans, he didn’t radically cut his spending, didn’t check his balances constantly and didn’t yank money from the market.

‘I have not even looked at my I.R.A. since this happened,’ said Dr. Whitlow, a fellow in pain medicine at the University of Kentucky.

But that kind of detachment didn’t happen by accident. Dr. Whitlow, 29, had talked with his father — and with a colleague who has become something of a financial mentor to him. They reassured him that he had little cause for concern about his retirement investments losing value in the short term. (An emergency savings fund helped, too.)

At a time when companies are devoting significant attention to helping their employees plan for retirement, some workers are turning to their peers and colleagues for more personal guidance. Seeing the choices made by a friend or co-worker can help demystify investment options and offer an example to follow amid turbulent markets and a contracting economy.

Dr. Whitlow was benefiting from a project that his instructor, Dr. Ty L. Bullard, had begun at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine to encourage residents to start thinking about and planning for retirement early in their careers. Each year, Dr. Bullard schedules lectures and quarterly panel discussions for doctors to share some of their financial decisions, divulge mistakes and discuss investing.”

Read the rest of the story at the New York Times.