Income in retirement--especially of the sure-thing variety--can be tough to come by these days. Lower interest rates have meant that you need to have saved a lot to generate a decent fixed-income stream.

Dividend-paying stocks are one way to put a dent in this problem. There are plenty of options out there--stocks that have been paying consistent and even growing dividends for years, sometimes decades. We have covered some long-time dividend boosters before. We have a few new ideas this time around:

Data as of 8/3/17

In this list, GE, Pfizer, and Iron Mountain have been increasing their dividends for a relatively short period of time (five to seven years); at the other end of the spectrum, VF Corp has increased its dividend for 44 straight years.

If you diversify across a number of stocks and industries, the risk that one or two stocks will blow up your retirement income plans (by cutting or eliminating their dividends) is minimized. In the above list, we’ve got pharmaceuticals, utilities, apparel manufacturing, record storage, minerals, and an industrial conglomerate. That’s pretty decent diversification.

Even so, this is the stock market we’re talking about. Nothing can be taken for granted. You want a way to stress test some of your assumptions, keep track of your progress, and make adjustments as necessary.

We recently wrote a post that talked about how there are so many options now for tracking investments, bank accounts, and other kinds of accounts that lead to money flowing in and out of your life. That’s great--getting into the habit of keeping track of these things is something everyone should do. But you’ll also want some way to help you predict such flows--especially when it comes to retirement, where you won’t have a salary to fall back on.

Things you’ll want to see projected include:

• Income. Where does it come from? Does it increase or decrease over time? Do certain income sources appear or disappear at certain intervals? With the right program, you can account for these things and see how they might affect a retirement plan.
• Capital Gains. This is very tricky to try to make a guess at. A proper retirement planning program can estimate what kind of capital gains you might expect on your investments--and how much of those gains you’ll need to realize.
• Taxes. You’ll need to account for taxes on the above items for sure--another item where guesswork is less than ideal.
• The Worst Case. What if your assumptions about income or investment returns end up being too aggressive? You’ll want some idea of just how much being wrong might cost you. A solid retirement planning program can walk you through various scenarios to see what impact a worst-case scenario would have on your retirement plans.

Keep an eye on your savings and your spending on a regular basis in the present, but be sure you are doing the same looking out toward your retirement years as well.