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Employee Benefits Jobs
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Webcasts and Conferences
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Risk Management Solutions for Cash Balance Plans
"At a theoretical level, cash balance plans might seem impervious to movements in interest rates: Although rising rates would require a plan to pay larger benefits in the future, they would also reduce the time value of money, which might be expected to offset the increased benefit payout. However, this perspective misses the complex interest rate sensitivities inherent in cash balance plans' liabilities. Selecting plan assets with the goal of hedging against shifts in interest rates is just as important for cash balance plans as it is for defined-benefit pension plans."
(Treasury & Risk)
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2014 Pension Buy-out Sales More than Double Previous Year
"Group pension buy-out sales reached $8.5 billion in 2014, [nearly] a 120 percent increase over the 2013 total of $3.8 billion ... 'After many years of staying in the $1 to $2 billion range, sales in the pension risk transfer buy-out market have eclipsed $3.5 billion for three consecutive years,' said Michael Ericson, analyst for LIMRA Secure Retirement Institute."
(LIMRA)
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Text of House Committee Inquiry to DOL on Fiduciary Rulemaking (PDF)
"It is clear coordination between SEC and DOL is vital to ensure a functioning regulatory framework; it is unfortunately far less clear that such coordination is occurring. We are especially disappointed and alarmed by Commissioner Gallagher's allegations that no meaningful engagement has occurred ... This is inconsistent with public pronouncements from the administration."
(Committee on Education and the Workforce, U.S. House of Representatives)
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Congressional Leaders Say DOL Is Out of Bounds on Fiduciary Rule
"The [DOL] is overstepping its authority with its expanded fiduciary rule and should allow adequate public comment in the process, according to a letter sent by two congressional chairmen to the Office of Management and Budget.... They also said the DOL was out of bounds in the first place, reminding the OMB director that the Dodd-Frank Act gave the [SEC] the responsibility of developing a uniform fiduciary standard of care for broker/dealers and investment advisors."
(InsuranceNewsNet.com)
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How Do You Define 'Success' for Your Defined Contribution Plan? (PDF)
"This [article] presents an overview of common measures of DC plan success and other, less well-known contributing factors before describing a systematic approach to measuring a DC plan's effectiveness and determining what actions to take to make ongoing improvements. More importantly, it puts forth a process under which the plan can achieve success."
(Sibson Consulting)
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Startup Aims to Provide Cheaper Retirement Accounts for Small Firm Employees
"There are a couple of big problems with small-business retirement plans: Many small employers don't offer 401(k)s or other savings plans to their workers. And at companies that do, participants are often saddled with high fees. Financial-technology startup Honest Dollar says it has a plan to change that, with a new option that is both simple and cheap. Like the 'robo' financial advisers, the Austin, Texas, company will deliver its services online and will offer investment portfolios of low-cost exchange-traded funds ... But the focus is on providing a service to employers: Companies will be charged a flat $10 per employee per month, with no set-up fee, and 'it takes them less than 90 seconds in most cases to set up the account,' says Will Hurley, chief executive of the company[.]"
(The Wall Street Journal; subscription may be required)
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Redefining Retirement in the Health Care Industry (PDF)
"On average, the value provided by nonunion retirement programs at health care organizations is 4.6% of pay per annum. This compares to 6.3% of pay per annum provided by retirement programs at Fortune 500 organizations.... Close to 90% of health care organizations offer some form of matched savings program to new employees. This compares to 97% of the Fortune 500 ... Fifty-three percent of health care organizations in our study provide more than one retirement program to employees, typically a matched savings plan plus a 'core' plan that does not require employees to contribute. This compares to 71% of the Fortune 500.... Employees are automatically enrolled in 37% of the matched savings plans in our study. This ... is significantly lower than the 67% and 65% ... in general industry and Fortune 500 respectively."
(Aon Hewitt)
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How Do You Know When It's Time for a New Retirement Plan Adviser?
"At least annually, your adviser should review with you the plan's design and its provisions to ensure they match how you operate the plan and your organization's goals. If you do make a change to your plan design or integrate new options such as auto-enrollment, your adviser should walk you through this process to ensure you are meeting compliance requirements and that your employees understand these new developments. Your adviser should also be ensuring fiduciary documents, such as your Investment Policy Statement, are up-to-date."
(Employee Benefit News)
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S&P 1500 Pension Funded Status Increases 6% in February
"The estimated aggregate funding level of pension plans sponsored by S&P 1500 companies increased from 74% as of January 31, 2015 to 80% as of February 28, 2015. Increases in interest rates used to calculate corporate pension plan liabilities coupled with gains in equity markets increased funded status by 6%. The estimated aggregate deficit of $486 billion as of February 28, 2015 improved by $168 billion from the end of January, which is the largest single month improvement seen since ... 2007."
(Mercer)
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Pension Finance Update as of February 28, 2015 (PDF)
"During February, pension sponsors reversed losses they suffered in January, as both stocks and interest rates moved higher on the month. Both model plans we track gained ground last month -- Plan A improved 6%, while Plan B gained 3% -- leaving both plans essentially even for the year through February."
(October Three Consulting)
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New Jersey Pension Overhaul Hits Snag
"Sixteen unions representing public sector workers are ramping up their fight to force the administration to invest more into the pension system. They say they plan to file two lawsuits calling for [Gov. Chris] Christie to make a larger pension payment in his newly introduced budget."
(The Wall Street Journal; subscription may be required)
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Five Facts About the Current Retirement Market
"Americans have an estimated $24.2 trillion in retirement assets ... IRAs make up the largest single share of the retirement market with an estimated $7.3 trillion ... An estimated $324 billion was rolled from plans to IRAs in 2013 ... There are more than 600,000 people with $1 million in an IRA ... More than 300 people are thought to hold more than $25 million in IRAs."
(Slott Report)
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[Opinion]
Will Switching Government Workers to Account-Type Plans Save Taxpayers Money?
"Advocates of these types of plans say they are a compromise between those who want to maintain traditional pension plans and those who push for a transition to a 401(k)-style system. However, DC and hybrid plans, which can collectively be referred to as account-type plans, fail on three important points: They do not help states save money.... They create more workforce management problems than they solve.... They increase retirement insecurity."
(Economic Policy Institute)
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[Opinion]
Modeling a 'Tontine' Pension Plan to Provide Reliable Income for Retirees (PDF)
77 pages. "A tontine is a financial product that combines the features of an annuity and a lottery. In a simple tontine, a group of investors pool their money together to buy a portfolio of investments and, as investors die, their shares are forfeited, with the entire fund going to the last surviving investor.... [V]ariations on the tontine principle ... could be used to create 'tontine pensions' through which large employers could provide retirement income for their employees. These tontine pensions would have several major advantages over most of today's pensions, annuities, and other retirement income products."
(Jonathan Barry Forman & Michael J. Sabin, via University of Pennsylvania Law Review)
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Press Releases
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