Description: Provides a summary of key points from the ERISA Advisory Council Report on Outsourcing (2014). The report provides interesting and important perspectives and the article encourages the reader to look at the report and consider the issues raised.

Description: The author presents the perspective that employers use of PBGC guarantees may cost taxpayers in the long run and suggests that Congress should address this issue.

Description: This article provides an excerpt from the PBGC Actuarial Valuation Report with greater detail concerning the valuation of future benefits than is presented in the PBGC's Annual Report for 2000.

Description: The impact of bond default risk on retirement benefit obligations describes how the probability default on a bond is similar to the probability of death for an annuitant. Bonds are used to cash flow match retirement obligations cash flows to funding from bond. Just as the probability of non-payment happens on the liability side, we can do the same with selected bonds. The end result may be an adjustment to the discount rates used.

Description: A summary from the Trustees report: SMI Trust Fund: Estimates under Alternative II Assumption for Aged and Disabled Excluding End-Stage Renal Disease Enrollees

Description: This article explores the findings of a survey which indicates that employers who offer both a pension and a savings plan have plans that are more generous, use more channels for employee communication, and are more attentive to plan management activities. From Pension Section News, February 2002, Issue No. 48.

Description: This articles lists the 2003 updated annual amounts for federal agencies and programs that affect pension programs.

Description: Defined contribution plans need to do more than simply offer participants a menu of investment choices--the average worker is not building a secure retirement. Because both employers and employees face constraints, the solution is not as straightforward as delaying retirement or boosting contributions. Features like automatic enrollment can help somewhat, but are not enough. Truly innovative solutions are needed. There are numerous different proposals for improved retirement plans, both in the US and internationally. Individual proposals often contain an evaluation section dealing with benefits and risks, but what is lacking is a full quantitative evaluation framework that can be uniformly applied to a number of different proposals. This essay lays the groundwork for a potential research project to build such a quantitative assessment framework.

Description: An excerpt from the 2003 Annual Report of the Board of Trustees of the Federal Hospital Insurance and Federal Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Funds which describes the basic methodology and assumptions used in the estimates for Medicare Part B under the intermediate assumptions.

Description: This article summarizes the approach taken by the Canadian Institute of Actuaries to develop mortality tables and mortality improvement scales for use in Canadian pension plans based on Canadian population data. It also summarizes the additional factors pension actuaries have to consider in using the new tables and scales.