In the year 2000, HBO advertised Ellen DeGeneres’ latest comedy special with a Botticelli reference. Perched inside a clam shell and surrounded by figures from the original painting, DeGeneres created her own “Birth of Venus” for the promotional print poster — subbing out nudity for a more signature white pantsuit. (Both HBO and CNN share the parent company Warner Bros. Discovery). Three years later, for a magazine advertisement, the now-defunct British car brand Scion decided to reproduce Damien Hirst’s controversial sculpture “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living” (1991) by suspending their XII model in a tank of seafoam green formaldehyde. In the same decade, there was a surprisingly artistic print artwork for the sixth season of the popular 2005 CBS TV show “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation”. In the ad, cast members gaze through the window of a neon-lit diner lifted straight out of American painter Edward Hopper’s seminal painting “Nighthawks” (1942). Each of the campaigns may appear to have little in common, but they reveal an unmistakable truth about the advertising industry: before digital marketing became the norm, overtaking print in terms of revenue and budget allocation, there was arguably more room for complex, creative and daring image-making. Jim Heimann, graphic designer, historian and the editor of the forthcoming book “All-American Ads of the 2000s” — available in the UK from April 14 and in the US a month later — is worried these might be the last of their kind. “Print is slowly disappearing. That’s a problem,” he said. ‘The material isn’t there anymore’ Like a skilled archaeologist, Heimann has spent his life hunting down and preserving American cultural relics, such as cocktail napkins collected while researching the country’s penchant for drive-in restaurants to travel brochures from the early 20th century. A fixture at Sunday flea markets for the last 50 years, Heimann finds they are a good location to scour for magazines — often the first thing to go following a home clearout, he said. He normally turns to eBay to source specific ads, despite the added cost, and takes care to cherry pick from across pop culture, selecting the most artfully designed campaigns for top movies, popular games and even beloved cereal brands, among others. With each decision, he’s thinking: “What would I want to revisit 20 years from now?” In 2000, Heimann was commissioned by Taschen to create a series of books that mapped the visual fluctuations of the advertising industry. He started with the 1950s, a post-war period often referred to as the golden age of capitalism in the US, sourcing John Wayne-fronted Camel ads, glossy Cadillac double-page spreads and kitschy lingerie illustrations. Then he went back to the ‘30s, the ‘40s and jumped forward to the ‘60s, following each decade until the last tome cataloging the Wild West of the ‘90s hit the shelves in 2022. This edition on the aughts, however, will likely conclude the collection. “We had a discussion about doing 2010 to 2020,” Heimann told CNN in a video call. “But the material just isn’t there anymore.” Chronicling the earlier part of the decade has proved difficult. As the book’s foreword by Steven Heller, former senior art director of the New York Times, reads: “Advertising did not change when the Times Square ball fell at the stroke of midnight on January 1, 2000, but the industry began its creative decline in the 2000s” — a period when digital advertising was starting to creep in. When Google launched its AdWords platform in 2000, small businesses could eschew forking out for expensive visual campaigns and instead promote themselves on Google’s search results page with text-based adverts. By 2001, television had surpassed newspapers in terms of ad revenue for the first time in the US. These developments mark “the end of a century of advertising,” said Heimann. Societal shifts For Heimann, ads offer insight into the values and aspirations as well as political and economic environments of a generation. On compiling them in the book, he explained: “We always have a staple of 10 categories, but we expand them according to the decades. For instance, in the 1940s we had to expand war-related ads. They were really predominant, all these companies that were no longer producing automobiles or tires were doing everything for the war effort.” In the aughts, many of the ads were focused on technology. “The tech world just blew up,” Heimann said. “Everything fell into that (category) consistently.” It was the 10-year-period that saw the invention of the first ever iPhone, the iMac, the iBook, the MacBook, the iPad, the iPod, iPod Nano and iPod Mini — and that’s just Apple. Heimann also found old Motorola, Blackberry, Sony and Nokia ads, along with a slew of brands that are no longer in existence. Amid a shift in societal attitudes towards sexuality and sexual freedom, the concept of “sex sells” became a common marketing strategy in the ‘70s — so much so that it would be difficult to tell the difference between a Dolce & Gabbana campaign and an ad for Durex, said Heimann. Sexual marketing imagery continues to be prevalent, despite advertising’s changing tides (see Jeremy Allen White’s racy Calvin Klein underwear campaign in 2024, which Heimann sought to collect but failed to find a print copy, even after searching through 15 men’s magazines at his local newsstand). In a Gucci ad from 2002, a topless male model is photographed side-on, undoing the monogrammed belt of his ‘G’ embroidered jeans — the leather strap in-hand creating a “sophomoric suggestion of an enhanced male appendage,” wrote Heller in the book. A Tom Ford menswear shoot Heimann preserved from 2008 shows an entirely naked female model grabbing the crotch of a suited man. “Females are always exploited,” he pointed out. “But to the extent of how they exploit women just becomes (implausible).” At least the French brand Sisley somewhat evened the score, with an advert of a nude man saddled up and being ridden by a fully clothed woman. Still, to Heimann, this level of sexualization is “toned down” compared to the material he has collected from the ‘80s and ‘90s. “Now, we’ve got this new era of hyper masculinity,” Heimann said, referring to Trump’s hypermasculine campaign messaging that called for a return of gender roles, as well as the rise of “manosphere” influencers such as Andrew Tate and Joe Rogan, who push male-supremacist viewpoints and call for the subservience of women on platforms such as YouTube. “Where’s that going to take us?” he questioned. The future of ads Between the leaps in AI technology and the new US administration, Heimann has questions not only on what adverts in the future might look like, but also who might be making them in the first place. It’s unlikely advertisers will want to spend on an agency to deliver a campaign when they can create them using AI for a fraction of the price. A recent study conducted by the University of Oxford suggests that AI-generated advertising images performed more effectively than human-made ones, as long as the images used do not look like artificial intelligence. “Where will that creative world go?” Heimann mused. “It’ll have to play out, but it doesn’t bode well.” A fixation on cutting costs might only become greater in light of President Donald Trump’s anti-European initiatives and the recently announced 25% tariffs on imported cars among other products. “How do you sell a car that’s 25% more (expensive) than another car?” Heimann asked. “Who’s going to buy a Subaru (or) a Volvo (if they) charge 25% more than an American car?” For Heimann, advertisements of the last two decades have been selling a steady version of the American Dream. “In the ‘90s and the early 2000s, advertising still has that same cadence to it. The population looks the same, the automobiles look the same,” he said. Now, Heimann thinks that as America continues to evolve, more monumental changes will come in the years ahead. “I’ve been asked the question, ‘Did 9/11 affect advertising and how people perceived it?’ I think there was a little bump (in the road)… But I think what’s happening currently is going to be much more impactful,” he said.

Last weekend, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent went on television and said people who wanted to retire right now were not paying attention to the stock market. On the NBC program “Meet the Press,” referring to those who have “put away for years in their savings account,” he said the following: “I think they don’t look at the day-to-day fluctuations of what’s happening.” Is that true? I asked readers of our Your Money newsletter who were on the cusp of retirement whether they were watching the markets and, if so, why? About 400 people replied. More than 90 percent of them said they were looking. They gave me an earful. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT *** “I have Parkinson’s disease and am unable to work in any capacity. Naturally, I closely watch how the market performs on a daily basis.” — Nancy London, Plain City, Ohio “I don’t concern myself with normal market fluctuations, but what’s going on right now is anything but normal. So, yes, I am looking.” — Edward M. Kenny, Brooklyn, N.Y. “They have no idea how ordinary people live.” — Barbara Costanzo, Milwaukee “Of course, I am watching. I am disheartened that he and President Trump seem to be treating my hard-earned savings in such a cavalier manner.” — Cleo LaRue, League City, Texas The word “cavalier” was the adjective that came up most in emails from readers, and Ms. Costanzo’s sentiment — that people in the Trump administration were out of touch — was common. President Trump is not the first person to appoint someone like Mr. Bessent — a former hedge fund manager who is worth hundreds of millions of dollars — to run the Treasury Department. When Bill Clinton was president, he put Robert E. Rubin, a former Goldman Sachs banker, in charge. But when you’re someone like that doing work like this, it behooves you to have some empathy — or at least sympathy — for the struggles of others. “Secretary Bessent is highly engaged in financial literacy and encourages all Americans to invest for the long term,” according to a Treasury spokesperson. He has spoken in the past of having started work at age 9 when his father fell on hard times. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT *** “We are definitely looking at the fluctuations, and likely adding time to our ‘need to work’ timeline. Mr. Bessent is mistaken.” — Becky O’Hara, Havertown, Pa. “I wanted to retire and still wait until 70 to collect Social Security, and that is a delicate balance if the value of my investments has dropped significantly.” — Karen Walrath, Beaverton, Ore. “If I’m faced with retirement from the federal work force now and re-entering the job market at age 59¼, I’m going to have to take a very, very different approach to finances. How the market behaves right now can potentially have catastrophic impacts for me.” — Sue Zwicker, Greenbelt, Md. “I do take a few moments most days to check the markets, mainly out of curiosity, but also to see if I need to rebalance.” — Jeff Schmierer, Brookfield, Conn. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT “I just retired 18 months ago, and sequence risk is by far the financial issue I worry about the most.” — Dennis Scholl, Miami Beach *** So about that “sequence risk” thing: All it means is that if you start your retirement when markets are falling, you may be selling assets as your overall portfolio is declining. And when that balance falls (both from market declines and selling assets to pay for everyday spending once you’re not working), it leaves you with less money that could benefit from eventual market recoveries. All of that increases the chances that you’ll run out of money before you die. It’s a big deal — big enough that someone running the Treasury Department would presumably consider it when suggesting that recent retirees aren’t carefully watching their “savings accounts,” which readers took to mean retirement accounts. “Bessent is supposed to be a smart guy, so I doubt that he believes what he is saying,” writes Douglas Frazier of Savannah, Ga. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT When you have to stand up in public and defend a stock market decline that your boss — the president, who likes firing people — caused, it may indeed be hard to believe everything you may be forced to say. But that doesn’t excuse ignoring questions that many people on the cusp of retirement must consider — and how hard it is to answer them when people have retirement “savings” accounts that include stocks. Mr. Bessent is correct that at least some people don’t look each day — it was under 10 percent of my 400 correspondents. *** “Why look and make myself sick? We have an investment plan. I’ll stick to it and keep working a while longer. I like my job. Looking will hurt my head. Working lets me do something positive.” — Teresa Meinders Burkett, Tulsa, Okla. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT “We don’t check day-to-day fluctuations. It’s too frustrating and scary, and at this point there’s nothing we can do about it.” — Mindy Evanter, Marblehead, Mass. “I do not look at my portfolio daily, but I certainly monitor the market and, like most others over 60, am alarmed by the market response to the Trump tariffs. Secretary Bessent’s comments may have made sense historically, but when the administration takes actions that impact the global economy and lead to great uncertainty, investors become concerned.” — Patrick Grum, Atlanta *** In a perfect world, you’ve done everything right while getting ready for retirement. You’ve had good jobs when you wanted them and luck with your health along the way. You’ve saved more than what you need to pay for a 30-year retirement. You have several years of money stashed someplace safe to use while waiting out a sizable stock market downturn. You have the fortitude to not panic-sell — or panic-buy — investments at the wrong time. But most people are not that lucky or are prone to worry that their luck will run out right when they want to stop working. For now, some of those people have at least managed to maintain their senses of humor. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT *** “Yes, I am checking. It’s a compulsive behavior right now, though I haven’t looked yet today. Why, I do not know. Please, no tariffs on Xanax.” — Jene Teague, Austin, Texas “Fluctuations look like this: WWWWWWW. I don’t pay much attention.

Investing in choppy markets, especially with an unpredictable president at the helm, can be distressing. It can be even more so if you are relying on these investments to pay for something as important as your child’s college tuition and you need the money in the foreseeable future. Plenty of busy parents found themselves in this position last week, reminded by the recent market plunge that college enrollment was creeping up on them, and some may not have dialed back their risky stock positions, or at least not enough. But situations like this serve as another reminder: Market uncertainty is a constant, yet it is part of the game we are forced to play to finance our future selves’ needs and wants. Markets periodically plunge because of global financial crises, pandemics and technology bubbles, as well as when the president of the United States seemingly pushes it over the edge with his index finger, which is essentially what happened after President Trump announced an aggressive tariff plan that sparked a trade war. When Mr. Trump noticed on Wednesday that U.S. government bond markets were trembling, or getting “yippy,” as he called it, he paused most of his so-called reciprocal tariffs. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT The markets rejoiced, sending the S&P 500 soaring 9.5 percent, before sliding nearly 3.5 percent on Thursday and recovering 1.8 percent on Friday, with one measure of volatility reaching levels last seen during the pandemic-induced sell-off in 2020. The S&P 500 has sunk 12.9 percent since Feb. 19, when it reached an all time closing high. Nobody knows what comes next, or how this movie ends. If you have money in a 529 college savings plan — or in another type of investment account — now is the time to reassess whether your mix of stocks and bonds is appropriate for your time frame and your stomach for risk. If you cannot afford to lose a particular pot of money and you need it soon, it is time to develop an exit strategy. For everyone else, you have the luxury of time to come up with a better long-term plan. I need the money now (or really soon). Now what? If you need the money in less than a year, it shouldn’t be in stocks, period. Some financial planners said they would even swallow some losses now (by moving money into cash, even if your investments are lower), but there are several other things you might consider as well. “I’d suggest looking at whether they have other resources to cover the first year — like cash flow, gifts or student aid — while they give investments some time to recover,” said Daniel Milks, a financial planner in Greenville, S.C. If you borrow more than you anticipated during the first year to avoid touching your investments, keep in mind that you can use up to $10,000 of money inside a 529 to pay off federal and many private student loans early (per beneficiary over their lifetime). Another idea: Temporarily pause or reduce savings to pay more tuition directly. I have some time. What should I do? Sometimes the best solution is the simplest — the one that reduces complexity and decision-making and puts things on autopilot. Sure, there may be more precise investing strategies, but there’s a perfectly fine one called a target-date fund. If you have a big tuition bill coming up in September and you were in an appropriate and well-managed fund like this, after these past two weeks of bluster and insane volatility your portfolio is down just 0.35 percentage points. No lost sleep over that. Target-date funds — whose mix of investments gradually gets more conservative as a college enrollment date approaches — can be helpful for people who want a hands-off approach. But that means you’ll need to do a bit of work upfront to analyze the funds, or hire someone to help you out (a fiduciary, always). Many 529 college savings plans provide these funds on their investment menu, but they’re not all created equally. Funds from different providers that have the same enrollment date can have different mixes of investments, and some may be riskier because they have more aggressive stock allocations. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT Don’t forget to consider the type of bond and cash investments it holds, too. Bonds typically serve as a ballast when stocks drop, but they are not impervious to all shocks, as we saw this week. You’ll also need to understand how the fund evolves over the years as you approach the enrollment date. How quickly does it change? What does it look like when college is just five or three years away? Would you be comfortable with that mix, at that point in time, if the market dropped 30 percent? And how does that compare with similar funds? What are the costs? (Stick with low-cost index funds, which simply track the performance of large swaths of the market and do not try to beat it.) CJ Stermetz, a financial planer and founder of EquityFTW, a firm in San Jose, Calif., said the funds work especially well in times like these, because parents don’t have to worry. They know their college money is being whisked into safer investments as time marches on. Indeed, the target enrollment date funds are similar to those targeting a retirement date, but the former sheds stocks more quickly given the compressed time frame: The funds generally start with 95 percent in stocks and 5 percent in bonds but then shift about five percentage points of the stocks into bonds each year, Mr. Stermetz explained. If you were buying a Vanguard fund for a newborn now, with an enrollment date of 2043, that’s where you’d start. It was down about 6.5 percent year-to-date, as of Thursday’s market close. But by the time college is three years away (like Vanguard’s 2028/2029 fund), there’s about 25 percent in stocks, 54 percent in bonds and 20 percent in cash equivalents. That fund was down just 1.06 year-to-date as of Thursday. Once college is just a year or two out (2026/2027), 19 percent of investments are in stocks, 47 percent in bonds and 34 percent in cash equivalents, while the target enrollment for the 2024/2025 academic year has just 15 percent in stocks. That’s down 0.35 percent as of Thursday. “This may not be ‘optimal,’ in the sense that it’s a one-size-fits-all product, but most parents are fine with that since it means it’s one less thing they have to think about,” Mr. Stermetz added. Keep in mind that if a fund’s enrollment date that aligns with your child’s feels too aggressive, you can choose one for an older child; it will have less invested in stocks. If you cannot afford to lose any money, Eric Maldonado, a financial planner in San Luis Obispo, Calif., suggests another approach: When your child is in high school, put the cost of the corresponding year of college into cash or money market funds. For example, if your child is a freshman in high school, put your freshman college tuition in cash, and so on. “Whatever your mix of strategies, the key is to shift your mind-set as college nears,” said Mallon FitzPatrick, head of wealth planning at Robertson Stephens. “At some point, the goal isn’t to grow the money anymore. It’s to make sure it’s there when you need it.”

The Jupiter Island home comes with 200 feet of waterfrontage on the Intracoastal A mansion that reportedly has a past connection to Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates has gone up for sale in South Florida. The seller is seeking a whopping $23.5 million for the nearly 9,500-square-foot waterfront home on Florida’s Jupiter Island, its listing held by Susan Hemmes of ONE Sotheby’s International Realty showed. Inside the massive U-shaped home, there are a total of four bedrooms and seven full bathrooms. Its "expansive" master suite comes replete with "separate master bathrooms" and custom closets, the listing said. It even has its own bar. The home touts an open floorplan with "grand living spaces" geared towards entertaining guests, it said. Its home office features built-in bookshelves and extensive wood paneling. The mansion also includes an indoor pool and heated spa in a massive room featuring many windows that let in the Florida sunshine, photos showed. The listing reported the home has a "whole-house speaker system and Lutron lighting control system" installed. The property "offers the ultimate in luxury living, complete with direct access to the water, a private dock with a lift, and sweeping views that promise tranquility and elegance," per the listing. Its boat lift can accommodate up to 30,000-pound boats, according to the listing. The large property boasts 200 feet of waterfront on the Intracoastal Waterway. That waterway that runs some 3,0000 miles along the Atlantic coast. Its outdoor amenities also include a sizable patio. Its landscaping features paspalum grass. There is a SWAT Mosquito system to repel pesky insects, per the listing. The waterfront property is extremely private, with three sides bordering no neighbors. The home has space for a total of eight vehicles in its garage. For electric vehicles, it also has its own charging station. The seller has owned the Jupiter Island home since 2018, when they bought it from Front Range Investment Holdings LLC, property records showed. Mansion Global reported Gates, who cofounded Microsoft about 50 years ago, is linked to that LLC that previously owned it. The entity had ownership of the home for about nine years, per property records. The listing described the overall property as a "rare gem in one of the most coveted locations along the Intracoastal." Jupiter Island is a barrier island. About 820 people live there year-round, according to the town’s website. It has 3.4 miles of beaches, VisitFlorida reported.

Add this to worries about the likely impact of tariffs: costlier car insurance. The new tariffs on imported cars, metals and parts announced by the Trump administration are expected to raise vehicle prices by thousands of dollars if they remain in place. And because parts used in auto repairs will also become more expensive, the average cost of automobile insurance is expected to increase. The average annual premium for a full-coverage auto policy was just over $2,300 at the end of last year, according to an analysis by Insurify, an insurance comparison shopping website. The site initially estimated that premiums would increase just 5 percent this year, based on factors like inflation and insurer losses. How much of an impact could tariffs have on car insurance costs? With the addition of the tariffs, Insurify now projects premiums to rise at least 16 percent, or $378, to almost $2,700 on average nationally — about $256 more than without tariffs. The analysis includes the tariffs on steel and aluminum, those on imported cars and those on imported auto parts scheduled to take effect May 3. (Tariffs announced in February on products from Mexico and Canada were adjusted to exempt some goods, including cars and auto parts, that comply with the free trade agreement President Trump negotiated in his first term, according to Insurify. If that exemption is lifted, the increase in automobile premiums could be as high as 19 percent, the analysis found.) An Insurify spokeswoman said the Trump administration’s announcement on Wednesday, pausing double-digit global tariffs for 90 days, didn’t change the company’s projections. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, in response to a reporter’s question after the announcement, indicated that the pause didn’t apply to certain tariffs like those on automobiles. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT “Things that increase the cost of repairs impact prices,” said Robert Passmore, vice president of personal lines with the American Property Casualty Insurance Association, whose members are big insurance companies. About 60 percent of parts used in auto shop repairs are imported from Mexico, Canada and China, the association has said. The price of car insurance has soared in recent years for a variety of reasons, including more claims resulting from driving habits that deteriorated during the pandemic, the use of more expensive technology in cars, and damage from strong storms and hail. While increases had recently begun to moderate, the cost of motor vehicle insurance still rose 7.5 percent in March compared with a year earlier, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. When will the increases affect driver policies? Consumers won’t see the impact in their rates immediately, Matt Brannon, a data reporter at Insurify, said. Rather, higher premiums will probably arrive by the end of the year, depending on when your policy renews. Michael DeLong, the research and advocacy associate for Consumer Federation of America’s campaign for fair auto insurance, said that car insurance is regulated by the states and that insurers must gather several months of claims data, rather than blaming tariffs generally, to show their requests for higher rates are warranted. “They have to justify it,” Mr. DeLong said. Can I do anything to help keep my auto premium down? There’s no magic solution to ease the impact of tariffs, said Jon Linkov, deputy autos editor at Consumer Reports. But since the anticipated impact is months away, now is a good time to review your policy to make sure you don’t have coverage beyond what you need or to make other changes that will help tamp down increases from factors beyond tariffs. “If you usually just rubber-stamp your new premium,” Mr. Linkov said, “reach out to your insurer.” Ask what changes the insurer recommends to save money. If your car is old and of low value, you may be able to save by dropping optional protections like collision, which covers damage to your car after an accident, or “comprehensive” coverage, which covers theft and damage from things like falling trees, hail or flood. A rule of thumb suggested by the Insurance Information Institute, an industry group, is that you should consider dropping optional coverage if the car is worth less than 10 times the annual insurance premium. (Liability coverage, which pays for injuries to others or damage to property you cause when driving, is required in nearly all states, although minimum coverage amounts vary.) You could also consider raising your deductible, an amount you must pay out of pocket when filing a claim. If you have a $500 deductible, you could lower your premium by as much as 25 percent by raising the deductible to $1,000, Mr. Linkov said. But make sure you can cover that amount, if you do need to file a claim. “Do you have the cash available?” he said. “Make sure you put the savings aside, so you’ll have it if you need it.” If you have young adults on your policy, check to see if it would be less expensive to have them get their own coverage. “It may be time to kick them off,” Mr. Linkov said. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT It can pay to shop around, experts said. You can use various online marketplaces, but use a backup email for receiving quotes to avoid being inundated with inquiries from insurers. Have your current auto policy in front of you when you shop to be sure you are getting apples-to-apples quotes for the same coverage, Mr. Passmore said. (And before getting your hopes up, read about my colleagues’ failed experience in shopping for cheaper rates.) Should I try a system that monitors my driving? You can save money by allowing an insurer to install a device in your car that monitors your driving behavior or tracks your driving on your phone, Mr. Passmore said. Discounts of 10 percent are common just for signing up. The systems typically gather information such as how far you drive, what time of day you drive, braking and acceleration, and phone use. Mr. Passmore said he used one himself and found that it had made him a better driver: “I was surprised how much hard braking I was doing.” But both Consumer Reports and the Consumer Federation have concerns about such systems because they lack privacy protections. There’s little regulation, as of yet, about what exactly insurers can do with the data they collect, Mr. Linkov said. If, however, you are driving less — perhaps because you have moved and have a shorter commute or are working at home — by all means contact your insurer with the new mileage total and ask for your policy to be re-rated, Mr. Linkov said. Fewer miles driven means a lower risk of accidents, which should translate to lower rates. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT Becoming a safer driver can also help you avoid accidents and speeding tickets. So taking a “defensive driving” course may save you money. “Driver history is still the most important part of how your rate is set,” Mr. Brannon said. Insurers may offer discounts for having premiums taken directly from your bank account or for student drivers who maintain good grades. So ask about those, too. Can I save money in repairs? If you always get service from the dealership where you bought your car, it may be worth checking around to see if an independent repair shop could save you money, Mr. Linkov said. Ask around for references and start out with a basic service like an oil change or tire rotation. If the shop doesn’t turn routine maintenance into a hard sell for more expensive work, consider taking your business there. Should you ever have to file an insurance claim, he said, a knowledgeable mechanic can advise you on issues like whether it’s acceptable to use cheaper “aftermarket” parts for certain repairs or if you should push your insurer to cover parts from the original manufacturer, which is often preferable.

The Social Security Administration said on Tuesday that people seeking retirement or survivor benefits could continue to file applications over the phone, reversing a much criticized change that was expected to force tens of thousands of Americans to visit offices in person each week. The agency has been in a state of tumult ever since Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency arrived inside its headquarters, enacting deep staff cuts and other policy and technical changes, which has caused widespread anxiety and confusion among both employees and beneficiaries. The planned restriction on phone services was one of those changes: Social Security said last month that individuals could no longer file for benefits or make changes to direct deposit banking over the phone. The policy, which was to take effect on April 14, was announced as part of a broader effort to reduce fraud, particularly around direct deposits. But the change came as Mr. Musk and other administration officials repeatedly exaggerated fraud levels to the public — providing no evidence for their claims. “The agency has assessed cases of widespread fraud in teleclaims and found minimal instances,” Doris Diaz, the agency’s acting deputy commissioner for operations, said in an April 7 memo obtained by The New York Times, to Leland Dudek, the acting commissioner. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT After backlash from beneficiary advocates and lawmakers, who pointed out that phone restrictions would route more people to field offices as their staff levels were being cut, the phone restrictions were partly rolled back. Less than two weeks after the change was announced, the agency said it would allow people to use the phone to file for disability, Supplemental Security Income and Medicare. Those filing for retirement or survivors benefits, however, were still required to file online or in a field office. But now, those restrictions have largely been reversed. Everyone, including those filing for retirement or survivor claims, will be able to do so over the phone, unless their files are flagged as being suspicious. (In that case, individuals will need to provide identification in person, just as they do when online claims are flagged.) Beneficiaries looking to make changes to their direct deposit accounts, however, will need to do so either online or in person at a field office. To strengthen its fraud capabilities for many telephone claims, the memo suggested installing a fraud analytic tool by April 14. A White House official said the agency’s anti-fraud team established new technological capabilities quickly, and its updated software allowed it to perform fraud checks on phone claims. “Under President Trump’s leadership, the Social Security Administration is taking bold steps to transform how they serve the public — improving frontline customer service, modernizing their technology, protecting beneficiaries and securing the integrity of their programs,” said Liz Huston, a White House spokeswoman. The Social Security Administration estimated that it might flag roughly 70,000 of an estimated 4.5 million annual claims filed, according to a post on X, the social media service owned by Mr. Musk. “Telephone remains a viable option for the public,” the agency said, fully reversing its stance from less than a month prior.

Trump administration officials made the rounds this weekend to try to answer the nearly unanswerable: Why tank the stock market by starting a trade war? And are you subtracting trillions of dollars in unrealized losses out of people’s savings on purpose? Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” was particularly odd. “Most Americans in a 401(k) have what’s called a 60/40 account,” he said, without explaining what he was talking about. These accounts, he added, “are down 5, 6 percent on the year.” Most Americans in a 401(k) do not have a 60/40 account. By saying so, Mr. Bessent understates the risk in people’s portfolios, the fear they feel and how being frightened can affect their retirement security if they sell while scared. Let’s take this apart a bit. A 60/40 fund, for most people in workplace retirement accounts, is a mutual fund that contains 60 percent stocks and 40 percent bonds or other investments that tend not to be as volatile as stocks. Often, funds like these have a target date for a year close to when a person intends to retire. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT That 60 percent in stocks may not be all U.S. equities, which is important because many markets outside the United States have done much better this year. And Mr. Bessent is right that these funds are doing better than the overall U.S. stock market this year, which is down around 13 percent. But while many 401(k) investors do put money in funds with a mix of asset types, this is not the correct way to take the temperature of the nation’s retirement investments. According to data on millions of 401(k) plan participants collected by the Employee Benefit Research Institute and the Investment Company Institute, 68 percent of participants put money in target-date funds as of the end 2022. But only a small fraction of those funds maintain a 60/40 balance like those that Mr. Bessent mentioned, since each fund on offer at any given employer has a different stock allocation. The stock percentage ratchets down over time to decrease risk as you approach retirement, so younger people are likely to have much more than 60 percent stocks in any given target-date fund. According to the Investment Company Institute, just 41 percent of 401(k) balances (the actual dollars at stake) were in hybrid funds like target-date ones at the end of last year. And at the end of 2022, 71 percent of all 401(k) assets were in stocks. The Treasury Department did not respond to a request for comment. Mr. Bessent is in his 60s and wealthy, and when you write or talk about personal finance, it’s easy to fall into the trap of anchoring to your own stage and place in life. Most employers are good about nudging investors into balanced funds, but plenty of people lack that assistance because they don’t have a workplace retirement plan. Instead, they’re on their own, either because their employer has no savings vehicle or because they work for themselves. Mr. Bessent now has access to a federal employee workplace retirement plan that is one of the best such plans in existence, and it’s chockablock with low-cost target-date funds. And while Mr. Bessent may himself have only 60 percent of his money in stocks, younger, less experienced 401(k) investors in their 20s and 30s had close to 90 percent of their investments in stocks at the end of 2022. That kind of sky-high stock exposure means more volatility at a time like this. More volatility raises the possibility of getting frightened and selling all your stocks, particularly if you don’t have 40 years of experience watching your retirement account balance spike and plunge. And fear-based selling could mean missing out on future gains if you don’t start buying stocks again at the right moment. Also, big stock market declines can scare young people away from investing in the first place. Not starting early costs people a lot of money over time, since you miss out on the opportunity to let your portfolio ride over decades. Those 60/40 funds turn out to be a very good thing. My colleague Jeff Sommer regularly points to the merits of a balanced approach to investing. Most of us should allocate our retirement savings this way. But when Mr. Bessent make those funds into some kind of supposedly reassuring touchstone, it ignores the sheer terror of a moment like this and the real pain of stock market declines.

President Trump has vowed that he wouldn’t cut Social Security benefits, but his administration’s actions, led by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency, have upended the agency, leaving many beneficiaries concerned that the popular program and their payments may be imperiled. Several players from the private equity world are now embedded inside the Social Security Administration, which is embarking on deep jobs cuts and other policy changes. At the same time, top Trump administration officials continue to perpetuate falsehoods about widespread fraud, even after the allegations are quickly debunked. These rapid-fire changes have unfolded ahead of the arrival of the incoming commissioner, Frank Bisignano, whose nomination was advanced by the Senate Finance Committee but awaits a full vote by the chamber. Many beneficiaries have questions. Here’s what we know. Are my benefits at risk? Only Congress can make changes to the program’s benefits, which are sent to 73 million people each month. But hollowing out critical pieces of the program’s operations also presents risks, current and former employees said, especially at an agency like Social Security, which has complex policy rules and an aging technical infrastructure. The employees serving the public have institutional knowledge that takes time to acquire and master. Advertisement SKIP ADVERTISEMENT But the agency announced plans to cut about 12 percent of its work force, or roughly 7,000 employees, when staffing is already at a 50-year low. Not having enough seasoned staff to handle the rising tide of baby boomers and other claimants, as well as the complex system that pushes out payments, could threaten its ability to serve the public and potentially delay benefits. Some cracks have already begun to show, with increased system outages to the agency’s online services, including my Social Security accounts. Field staff members say various outages have always occurred, but not at the frequency they’re experiencing now. So far, the technology offices are losing 326 members of their 1,600-person staff, according to the union that represents many agency workers. Employees have said more cuts are expected. Employees inside the agency said they agreed that modernization was needed and that there were plenty of efficiencies to be found. But making haphazard cuts to critical staff before making changes to technology and processes is a risky endeavor, current and former employees and executives said. Many of those employees specialize in maintaining Social Security’s complex set of computer systems, in which dozens of web applications are layered on top of a programming language developed in the 1970s. As crucial members of the technical staff leave the agency, there are fewer experienced hands to perform routine maintenance and address issues when they arise. Will it become more difficult to file for benefits? I’ve recently heard from many readers who have had different experiences. Some have filed for retirement benefits online without any issues, and began receiving them within 30 days. But others have been unable to log in to their Social Security accounts to download tax documents, have struggled to make appointments for field offices or have waited for several hours on the phone to reach a customer service representative. Your experience may vary based on where you live, the staffing levels nearby or the phone centers you reach. Calls to the agency have risen 30 percent from last year, according to agency data, with more people getting “polite disconnects,” where a prerecorded message tells callers to try again later. The agency has said it has “not permanently closed or announced the permanent closure” of any field offices. But many of them are losing critical mass. More than three dozen offices are each losing at least a quarter of their staff, as we reported here. The agency has said it plans to reassign more employees to the front lines, but it will take time to retrain workers. Many former executives and policy experts are concerned about rising system outages as more employees depart, which can also affect individuals’ access to benefits. Do I need to go to a local office to prove my identity? If you are already receiving benefits, you do not need to go to a Social Security field office to prove your identity. In fact, the agency recently put out several messages on social media platforms stating that enrolled beneficiaries do not need to do anything. What policy changes are being made? The agency had announced a plan in mid-March to curtail its phone services, forcing everyone to file for benefits online or in person. But after facing fierce backlash, it rolled back the plan less than a month later. Now, everyone, including those filing retirement and survivor claims, can continue to do so over the phone, unless their application is flagged as being suspicious. (In that case, individuals will need to provide identification in person, just as they do when online claims are flagged.) Beneficiaries looking to make changes to their direct deposit accounts, however, will need to do so either online or in person at a field office. What happens when a beneficiary is mistakenly paid too much? During the Biden administration, the agency said it would no longer withhold a full monthly payment to claw back overpayments — which are often caused by agency errors — but would instead withhold a maximum of 10 percent until the balance was repaid. The goal was to avoid creating a financial hardship for beneficiaries, who often rely on these payments. The Trump administration has reversed the policy and resumed collecting the entire check until the overpayment is repaid. Is my personal information at risk? Potentially. The agency keeps vast troves of personally identifiable information, including earnings records and medical information, at least some of which members of Mr. Musk’s team have sought access to. A federal judge issued a temporary restraining order barring the agency from granting DOGE workers access to sensitive records stored in its systems, or keeping any data they may have already taken. What sort of false information is circulating about the program? Social Security has a 99.7 percent payment accuracy rate, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, while 0.5 percent of its budget goes to administrative costs. Mr. Trump, Vice President JD Vance, Mr. Musk and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick have spread falsehoods about rampant fraud inside the program, often even after their claims have been quickly debunked. Many current and former employees, along with policymakers and advocates, are concerned that they’re trying to undermine trust in the program. Mr. Musk continues to repeat unsubstantiated claims that social insurance programs like Social Security are used as a “gigantic magnetic force” that attracts “illegal aliens” from all over the world. There is no evidence to support that, and undocumented workers actually pay more into Social Security than they receive in benefits. The program receives about $20 billion in net cash flow from undocumented workers each year, the agency told The New York Times last year. After learning that millions of people in the database did not have recorded deaths, Mr. Musk and Mr. Trump claimed that millions of dead people were receiving payments. As my colleagues have reported, there aren’t zombie beneficiaries, a conclusion the agency reached in 2023, when it said cleaning up the database wasn’t worth the investment because almost none of the beneficiaries were being paid. Mr. Musk, and most recently Mr. Vance, made the false claim that 40 percent of calls to the agency are made by fraudsters. That allegation seems to stem from a statistic that the agency released, but that was misunderstood: Criminals try to redirect beneficiaries’ deposits into their own accounts — and 40 percent of that direct deposit fraud is associated with someone calling the agency to try to change bank information, while the other 60 percent is attempted online. (My colleague Linda Qiu has provided a more detailed explanation.) Musk calls Social Security a Ponzi scheme. Why? Mr. Musk is not the first to refer to the program as a Ponzi scheme, which is a criminal investment fraud where early investors are paid with money collected from later investors in order to create the illusion of a profit or investment returns. Social Security is not an investment scheme. It’s an insurance program that provides retirement, survivors and disability benefits to roughly 73 million people. But critics like Mr. Musk often turn to that analogy because Social Security is a pay-as-you-go program, which means that the incoming payroll contributions that finance the program are used to pay for benefits to eligible retirees, disabled workers and survivors. What would it mean to privatize Social Security? Social Security is a public program, funded by payroll taxes and run by civic servants, who, like all federal workers, take an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Revenue is largely invested in Treasury bonds. The program is not overseen by Wall Street firms, taxpayers do not pay high fees for investment management and its systems are largely operated and maintained by federal employees. Privatizing Social Security, in part or entirely, could take different forms. Instead of running most of the machinery, for example, the government could outsource more of it to for-profit corporations, which would be in keeping with Mr. Trump’s ethos, though it would increase the program’s costs. But privatization usually refers to establishing individual private accounts, an idea that was last thrust into the public debate roughly two decades ago by President George W. Bush, who proposed diverting some payroll taxes into investment accounts. The idea faced fierce public opposition, and it hasn’t gained any traction since. Privatization had been suggested as a way to strengthen the program’s finances, though most proposals would hasten the depletion of the program’s trust fund, reduce guaranteed benefits and require borrowing. It would also fundamentally shift the underpinnings of the program toward becoming one based on notions of property and private ownership, and away from social insurance, where risks are pooled and spread across a population. Proponents of Social Security have laid out incremental changes that would shore up its finances without such major shifts. Larry Fink, the chief executive of the investment giant BlackRock, recently raised the idea at a conference, suggesting private accounts to supplement the program. How is Social Security funded? President Franklin D. Roosevelt intended the program to be self-sufficient. It has a dedicated revenue source, primarily from payroll taxes (also known as FICA taxes). In many cases, workers split the burden with their employers; each currently pays 6.2 percent on earnings up to $176,100, for a total of 12.4 percent. By law, Social Security, unlike Medicare, cannot use money from the federal budget’s general revenues to pay benefits. The payroll taxes go into the agency’s trust funds. When there is a surplus, the extra money is largely invested in a special type of Treasury security that pays interest to the trust fund. Does Social Security contribute to the deficit? No, though it depends on whom you ask. Because Social Security is a self-contained system, cutting benefits would not shrink the deficit. President Ronald Reagan explained its effect on the budget in this 1984 clip: “If you reduce the outgo of Social Security, that money would not go into the general fund to reduce a deficit. It would go into the Social Security Trust Fund. So Social Security has nothing to do with balancing a budget.” Although Social Security is considered “off budget,” economists and government prognosticators may also view it as part of the so-called unified budget, which includes all federal activities when evaluating everything that affects the economy. From that perspective, Social Security can make the deficit look larger. Is the program facing financial trouble? Social Security has experienced a financing shortfall for years, partly because of demographic changes. Falling birthrates mean fewer people are paying into the program, thousands of baby boomers are retiring daily and retirees are living longer and collecting benefits for longer periods. In addition, a larger share of the country’s income base is not subject to the tax, compared with years past. This is because an ever-growing share of high earners’ income is not subject to payroll taxes. As a result of these shifts, the trust fund that pays the program’s retiree benefits is expected to run dry in 2033, when tax revenue will be enough to pay 79 percent of scheduled benefits. That means beneficiaries’ checks would be reduced by 21 percent if Congress did not intervene and make fixes to bolster the program. Several of Mr. Trump’s policy initiatives, if enacted, are expected to worsen that shortfall. How much of Americans’ spending does Social Security account for? Using one measure, U.S. consumer spending is $20 trillion annually. Assuming all beneficiaries spend their payments in a given year — or roughly $1.6 trillion — that would fund about 7.5 percent of spending. “That’s huge,” said Jason Fichtner, who held several positions at Social Security, where he was appointed by Mr. Bush, including chief economist. “Regardless of the measure you use, Social Security benefits provide the economic security for millions of Americans and is the primary source of income for many people over age 65.” “Without Social Security, 22 million more adults and children would fall below the poverty line,” he added. “While the macro economy would withstand a short shock due to a disruption in Social Security benefits, the impact on many households could be insurmountable.” Does the government ‘raid’ the program’s trust funds? No. When there is a surplus of payroll tax revenue, it’s invested in a special type of Treasury security, which pays interest to the trust fund. Since the trust fund money is invested in Treasury securities, the money is essentially being lent to the federal government (to use however it wants, and it must eventually be repaid). That’s where the confusion arises and why some people believe that the trust fund is used to pay for things unrelated to the program. But it’s really no different from what happens when the government sells Treasury securities to other investors, like China.

When Zach Gilyard, an art director in Brooklyn, got his first tattoo as a senior in high school, he did what most teenagers do and didn’t tell his parents. But not for the reasons you might think — Gilyard’s father and older siblings are all heavily tattooed, and Gilyard, like his mother, thought he would never join them. But on a whim 2006, he got a winged foot on his ankle to represent running, and kept it hidden around his family. “It was not very me,” he said in a phone call, of getting inked. “I kind of liked that it was a bit of a thrill for me, because it was a time where I couldn’t control the situation. I was doing something permanent.” Twelve years and several tattoos later, Gilyard abruptly decided to reverse course shortly after beginning a black-ink traditional patchwork sleeve on his left arm, starting with a panther head on his shoulder. It was big and bold, as intended, but left Gilyard feeling unsettled. “I always had a bit of buyer’s remorse every time I got one. It would last a week or two, and then I’d be happy that I did it,” he said. But this time, the feeling didn’t subside. “I had it for maybe a month, and I freaked out about it — it sent me into a whole panic. I couldn’t explain why. I just didn’t want it, so I told myself in that moment that I was going to get rid of it.” Roughly a quarter of people regret at least one of their tattoos, according to a 2023 Pew Research study surveying nearly 8,500 people in the US, as well as a smaller, separate study conducted in Turkey published the previous year. But it’s only fairly recently that tattoo removal has become more reliable and widely available. (This writer can attest to that; in 2008, she had a self-administered teenage stick-and-poke lasered off. It was an ordeal.) Celebrities have often drawn attention for their disappearing ink: Angelina Jolie famously removed Billy Bob Thorton’s name after their divorce in 2003; Megan Fox lasered off her portrait of Marilyn Monroe; and Pharrell told British Vogue in 2008 he was trying an experimental alternative that involved growing new skin. Most recently, Pete Davidson appeared newly bare-chested in a Valentine’s Day campaign for Reformation while undergoing removals of some 200 tattoos, though paparazzi shots following the ad revealed he is still sporting lots of faded ink. In Gilyard’s case, he wasn’t lasering hundreds of tattoos, but it has taken more than half a decade and several thousand dollars to remove a handful of them, including the stubborn, highly saturated panther head. Now, that’s nearly gone, showing only a ghostly impression against the freckles on his skin. Other, smaller designs are even further along and barely noticeable to him, he said. “Results do vary, person to person, tattoo to tattoo,” said laser technician and tattoo artist Tim Goergen, who has been treating Gilyard at his shop, Gotham Tattoo Removal, in Brooklyn. Tattoo ink sits in the dermis layer, or second layer, of the skin permanently because ink molecules are “too big for the body to break down,” Goergen explained in a phone interview. Laser machines release fast pulses of energy that heat and break the ink down into tinier particles, triggering an immune response that processes them through the lymphatic system. (A recent study in Sweden has linked tattoos — and their removal — with an increased risk for lymphoma, though its authors said more research is needed.) Tattoos that are easier to remove are usually older, made of black ink, have finer lines, and sit closer to the heart where there’s better blood flow, he said. Goergen charges between $100 and $450 for an individual session, while Removery, a national chain, cites $100-615 on its website. It’s difficult to predict how many sessions a client’s desired results will take, whether that’s fading a tattoo for a cover-up or complete removal, Goergen noted, “because everybody’s different.” Amending ‘younger decisions’ Why people remove their tattoos is often as idiosyncratic as why they get them. Sasha Goldbas-Nazarian, who lives in Los Angeles, decided to start laser treatments when she met her now-husband, who shares her Jewish faith but comes from a more conservative, Iranian family. Interpretations of the Torah, as well as associations with the Holocaust, have led tattoos to long be considered forbidden or taboo within Judaism, though contemporary attitudes towards it have somewhat shifted. “When we first met, he didn’t believe that I was Jewish because I had tattoos,” Goldbas-Nazarian recalled with a laugh. “He was like, ‘I’ve never really met any Jews that have tattoos.’” He eventually offered to pay to remove her most visible tattoos, which she said were “younger decisions” made when she was in high school and college, including a star on her ankle done — unprofessionally — by her friend with a tattoo machine; a horseshoe and star on her upper back; and the initials “UWS” for New York’s Upper West Side, where she grew up, on her wrist. (Disclosure: This writer is a childhood friend of Goldbas-Nazarian, and a former colleague of Gilyard). Goldbas-Nazarian accepted, partly because her tattoos were faded and blurred and often invited questions, and partly because covering them with makeup for formal events had become a hassle during their relationship. But she didn’t anticipate how long it would take — or that it would be much more painful than getting tattooed in the first place, despite the fact that the laser sessions only last a handful of minutes each. “Even though (the sessions are) fast, it’s still really painful. And you can smell your skin burning a little bit, which grossed me out,” she recalled. She’s gone for the treatments on and off for years but has had to pause for an extended period while pregnant, per the medical spa’s policies, and as a new mom. She has no desire to rush back, either. “Honestly, even though I still have a lot of sessions to do, I’ve been putting it off just because of how painful it is,” she said. Freckles gone wrong Though tattooing might typically bring to mind large, custom artworks or small flash pieces, cosmetic tattoos have become popular for their ability to enhance facial features and makeup — a so-called “semi-permanent” option for people wanting to remove the daily hassle of filling in their eyebrows or adding beauty marks. But, cosmetic tattooing, which uses an alternative ink meant to produce a more natural finish on the skin, comes with its own set of challenges — as Z, who lives in the UK and prefers to go by her first initial to remain anonymous, discovered around three years ago. Her tattoos were tiny, resembling freckles across her forehead, nose and cheeks to replace natural ones she’d lost due to a rare side effect from a severe illness. She knew she would lose her hair during treatment, she said, but wasn’t aware that her complexion would drastically change. “Growing up, I had a face full of freckles — my nickname was actually ‘Freckles,’” Z said in a phone interview. “Then I got quite poorly, and basically my freckles and all my moles faded away. And so when I was well again, I felt really weird about my face, because it felt so bare.” After she came across a YouTube video of cosmetic freckle tattooing, she thought she would be able to get her freckles back. “But it went very wrong for me,” she said, explaining that the results didn’t feel natural. “You could tell that they were drawn on.” Unpleased with the outcome, she would cover them with makeup, but they still showed through. Cosmetic tattoo ink is meant to eventually fade, but it doesn’t always. It also runs the risk of turning into other colors such as pink or orange over time, or when treated with laser. Z said she did her research and requested regular tattoo ink, but she does not believe her practitioner honored that request. Having more melanated skin put Z at a higher risk of hypopigmentation, a loss of skin pigment, during her tattoo removal. “There is no guarantee of perfect removal for any skin type, but it does become a little bit tougher on darker skin types,” explained Jordan Butler, founder of JHB Tattoo Removal, who has been treating Z, and sees clients with a range of complexions. “A lot of people that have come in and seen me in the past… have been told that they can’t have (a) tattoo removal, that it’s not possible. It’s definitely possible in most cases.” Though better laser technology in recent years has improved results and lessened unwanted outcomes such as hypopigmentation, Butler and Goergen emphasized that the outcome does depend on a technician’s knowledge and care. Ink pigment colors are targeted using different wavelengths, and some (like the one that targets warmer shades) are more “aggressive” than others, Goergen explained. “It’s possible to strip natural melanin out of the skin with the red or orange or yellow (inks),” he said. That’s why patch-testing is crucial, Butler said, which he did extensively with Z. Her first session was painful, she said, but the discomfort has lessened over time — “now it’s barely anything,” she commented — and her healing has been straightforward. “I think we’re almost there,” Z said of her progress. “It’s so much better than what it was.” Looking for a fresh start Jayne Foo, a financial consultant based in Singapore, has experienced the more extreme side of recovery over the past few months as she’s embarked on the removal of around 70% of her tattoos, including one of her two full sleeves, a chest piece and a large stomach piece. And, for her 14,600 followers on Instagram, she’s documenting the entire laborious experience — open wounds, fluids and all. Redness, soreness and swelling are all common; but blistering can occur too, which Foo has experienced after both of her first two sessions. “I always knew I wanted to get tattoos, but as a young girl, I never had the money to get nice tattoos, so I just plastered anything I wanted on my body without thinking of how it would look in the future,” she told CNN in a phone call. On why she’s getting the tattoos removed now, she said: “I want a fresh start. I want to reclaim my skin.” That’s the message Foo also hopes to share with her social media followers as she embarks on the yearslong process. She’s not the first influencer to document it — and some have begun partnering with clinics to promote and show results. But videos on social media are often limited to the session itself, which can be deceptive due to “frosting,” which appears to immediately lighten the ink but is actually a temporary effect that occurs briefly (for about 15-20 minutes) when the laser hits the ink,before returning to normal. Foo’s videos show the hours and days following her treatments, during which she experienced large, intense blistering and extreme itching from the scabbing that followed, the latter for which she was eventually prescribed antihistamines. “The first time I had it done, my arm swelled up twice the size,” she recalled. “I wasn’t expecting that at all.” For the first few days of healing, she chose to remain indoors completely to minimize contact. “It’s just too much of a hassle to leave the house,” she said. “You have to be very mindful of your surroundings and you have to keep yourself clean.” Foo said she will continue to chronicle her treatments, as “it’s important to be real about it.” Accustomed to documenting many parts of her life online, including her fitness and travel, she also thought it would be “weird” to “suddenly not have tattoos” in her posts. Conversely, Gilyard has taken a more discreet route and has kept his removal process mostly private — including from his parents once again. Though, they eventually noticed his faded tattoos. “My dad finally looked at my tattoos one day and asked why they look like an old man’s,” Gilyard said. “My mother just asked me how much it cost, and asked me how much the tattoos themselves cost, and just said it was all a waste of money,” he laughed. “But I think she’s happy that some are going away.”

Another Sunny Isles Beach condo worth $9.6 million is linked to the Macedo family, according to a report The wealthiest religious broadcaster in the world is looking to offload his luxury condo in Florida. The beachfront residence of Brazilian billionaire televangelist Edir Macedo in the ultra-exclusive Porsche Design Tower Miami is now listed for just under $14.6 million after a price cut, according to public real estate records. Macedo, founder and bishop of the Igreja Universal do Reino de Deus (Universal Church of the Kingdom of God), is no stranger to lavish living or controversy. His net worth is estimated at $1.8 billion, ranking him 1,901st on Forbes' real-time billionaire index. By comparison, Kim Kardashian's net worth is $1.7 billion. PALM BEACH, THE WALL STREET OF THE SOUTH, HAS A HOT LUXURY REAL ESTATE MARKET The Porsche Design Tower, a $560 million architectural marvel completed in 2017, is famous for its car elevators that transport luxury vehicles directly into private condo garages. In 2013, The Real Deal reported that "nearly two dozen of the homes — 22 — under contract will belong to billionaires." The tower has a mandatory homeowners association with monthly fees ranging from $4,277 to $12,069. Macedo’s neighbors over the years have included international celebrities like Lionel Messi, Colombian pop star Maluma, Mexican actress Thalía and Andrea Romanello Ferdinand, daughter of Patrick Romanello, who The New York Times reported was "alleged to be an associate of the Bonanno crime family." But the Florida condo might not be the only real estate Macedo’s family holds in the U.S. According to a property intelligence database reviewed by watchdog group the Trinity Foundation, another Sunny Isles Beach condo worth $9.6 million is linked to the family. Yet, according to the Trinity Foundation's research, the Miami-Dade County property appraiser lists only a shell LLC as the owner with no names publicly attached. The Trinity Foundation, a nonprofit that investigates religious fraud, has long tracked Macedo’s financial activities. "Macedo’s empire includes media companies, banking interests, and international real estate," the group noted, citing his control of Brazil’s Record TV network and Banco Renner. The Universal Church isn’t just active in Brazil. It operates worldwide, including in Portugal, Mexico and the United States. The church even built a modern version of Solomon’s Temple in São Paulo, Brazil. Despite its clear wealth and power, the church's "Contact Us" page on its U.S. website claims "the Universal Church does not provide financial aid programs." Their 24/7 livestream available on the Universal Church's website currently offers "Blessed Water" for sale, which purports to heal everything from depression to cancer. According to the Trinity Foundation, the organization also owns four private jets and a helicopter, assets rarely seen in the nonprofit religious world. Macedo’s empire has had legal troubles. In 2008, he and nine of his associates were charged in Brazil with laundering roughly $2 billion. As reported by The Associated Press, "The church allegedly used fake companies to launder the money, moving the assets abroad and then returning them in the form of loans used by Macedo and his accomplices to buy businesses, prosecutors said." Brazilian courts ultimately did not convict Macedo or his co-defendants. More issues surfaced in 2019, when authorities in Angola charged four leaders of Macedo’s church with financial crimes, including money laundering. According to Ver Angola, the fallout led to the expulsion of 22 Brazilian church members by Angolan immigration officials.