Spend 'til the End

Spend 'til the End By Laurence J. Kotlikoff and Scott Burns (Simon & Schuster, 336 pages, $26) Here's unexpected advice in today's economy: Don't save too much. So argues Boston University economist Kotlikoff and his cowriter in this personal finance treatise. They instead promote "consumption smoothing," a planning method whose practitioners maintain the same standard of living throughout their lives. Other economists have praised the concept, but worry it's too complicated for consumers to pull off themselves. Which might be just fine by Kotlikoff, who also sells a consumption-smoothing software tool, ESPlanner.