So first question...it is my understanding with 401ks that if you own company stock, you can opt to have the dividend paid directly to you rather than reinvested, and you pay income tax rates on it with no age penalty. Now...if you retire early do you retain this benefit? Basically the situation is I work for a large utility company and will end up with a decent chunk of company stock in my 401k...so the plan is in early retirement if the extra income was needed beyond my post tax brokerage dividends, I could simply redirect my 401k dividends from reinvesting to pay directly to me, and it would be taxable as income and would be taxed at a very low rate as my income would be low. My retirement income will mainly be dividend income in a post tax brokerage account, and ideally I'd have enough to just let the 401k keep compounding, but would the 401k dividend pay outs from company stock be a viable backup source of income or would they get hit with the 10% early withdrawal penalty if I retired prior to 55?
Second question...is an IRA worth it? I make too much for a roth or a traditional IRA deduction. Other income sources post 55 will be a small pension(31k dollars a year, but I got 33 years to go to collect it), an annuity(not sure on the pay out it depends on how long I work and what period of time I opt to collect it over), SS, a 401k balance that will probably be 1m+ that will have to get withdrawn eventually, and the possibility of a few apartments worth of rental income and/or a part time job just for something to do. So basically I'm not getting any tax benefits today for putting money into an IRA, its locking my money into a position where I have to deal with withdrawal rules, and it may ultimately end up getting withdrawn at a fairly high rate anyhow since I will have several other streams of retirement income. Should I just ignore the IRA and put the money in my post tax brokerage instead, or is there something I'm overlooking here?