Q: I was downsized this summer. I’ll soon be 50 and am looking for a new job. I have a pension from my previous employer. Is it better to leave the pension where it is until I’m older or is it better to begin receiving pension payments at a smaller amount? How can I find out if it’s insured?

- D.C., via e-mail

A: When you start collecting your pension, part or all of that money will be taxable income to you. If your employer contributed all of the money without including the cost in your taxable wages, the amount will be fully taxable, notes Susan Moore, a certified financial planner in Watertown, Mass.

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After you find a new job, you may not want to receive that pension payment, especially if it puts you in a higher tax bracket than you’ll be in when you retire. For example, if pension payments push you into the 25 percent tax bracket now, but you expect to be in the 15 percent bracket after you retire, you’ll lose more of your pension payments to taxes by starting the payments early.

While you could start the pension now and invest it for retirement, consider that it may take a fairly aggressive (i.e., risky) portfolio to break even with what you would have had if you started payments at retirement. If the risk doesn’t pay off, you could end up with less than you would have by taking the payments at retirement.

Ask your employer for your pension’s “summary plan description” to determine if it is insured by the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corp., a federal agency that protects defined-benefit plans.

Advice for a new investor just starting out

Q: I have just started my first professional job. The company has no pension or 401(k), but it gives employees 10 percent of their salary to invest as they please for retirement purposes. I earn $50,000 a year and I plan to match my employer’s 10 percent contribution for a total of 20 percent. But where should I invest the rest of my money after I’ve maxed the allowable $5,000 limit that a traditional IRA/Roth IRA provides?

T.M., via e-mail

A: Neel Tiku, a financial planner in Waltham, Mass., says the initial objective for any investor is to first ensure he or she has an emergency fund for unpredictable but certain future events.

That kitty should amount to three to six months of your living expenses, and should be in either a savings or taxable brokerage account. Keep it liquid: You want to make sure you can lay your hands on it quickly. That could mean a money market fund, or even a mutual fund that invests in bonds.

Once you’ve fed the emergency kitty and the IRA, Tiku would look again to either a savings account or taxable brokerage account. This time, he would consider investments with a higher return potential, such as individual stocks, mutual funds, or ETFs (exchange traded funds).

Tiku also favors some diversity, and would approach these investments with the idea of splitting the money three ways: U.S., international and emerging markets.

Creditors are watching all your credit cards

Q: I have three credit cards and missed a few payments on one of them. Are the other two creditors allowed to raise my interest rate or penalize me in any way?

- J.K., Susanville, Calif.

A: This issue arises because of the “universal default” clause found in some credit-card agreements, says Jeremy Portnoff, a fee-only financial planner in Westfield, N.J. Check the fine print, he says, and you may uncover something similar to this: “If the cardholder is reported as delinquent on an account with any other creditor, we may increase the APR [annual percentage rate] on your account up to the maximum default APR.”

If your agreement has this clause, then the issuer can raise your rate if you’re late with another creditor, says Portnoff. Another factor that can increase rates on other cards is a sudden drop in your credit score. Banks monitor people’s credit for any excuse to charge more interest, Portnoff says. If your credit is good, look for another card that doesn’t have this clause, he says.

 Got a question? Submit it to Steve Dinnen at money@csmonitor.com. Dinnen’s Financial Q&A column appears the first week of each month.