Jack and Stanley's Buyout Adventure

Louise Karch is a career consultant with Carswell Partners in London, Ontario.

This practical book is intended to help downsized Canadians manage the
legal and tax issues associated with a severance package. The author
acknowledges that sudden involuntary retirement or dismissal makes good
decision-making with respect to a buyout package difficult because of
the emotional stress associated with the event. To ease the
psychological burden, she has created two personable characters, Jack
and Stanley, who explore their various options by visiting with other
downsized Canadians and learning from their mistakes and successes.
Topics include understanding minimum tax, timing your RRSP contribution,
business startup, the impact of withdrawing RRSP money, and using
one’s severance to buy income-generating property. The book is an easy
read, and Jack’s and Stanley’s visits to men and women of different
ages and races make it refreshingly inclusive. The narrative style makes
complex information simpler and dry tax topics more engaging.

At the end of each chapter, there is a review of the key principles
covered. Readers would have benefited more from having this material
presented as chapter introductions before the narrative began. Key words
could then have been highlighted in the reviews, making subsequent
references easier. Thankfully, the text is well indexed, so the current
arrangement is not too much of a drawback.

The severance amounts in the book seem very high, especially for
positions of lower responsibility. Relevant Web site addresses (absent
here) would be a helpful addition to revised editions.