Description: The article summarizes the work of three past Retirement Section Chairs, what they did and what they are currently doing for the 100th Anniversary Edition.

Description: Read the October 2018 issue of Retirement Section News published by the Retirement Section. Newsletters provide practical information for the working actuary, articles on trends that impact sections and news about section activities.

Description: Describes the challenges of using replacement ratios for retirement planning and suggests alternative approaches including spending strategies such as the 4% rule or divide your age by 20 (Feel Free spending) rule. Identifies and prioritizes different types of spending needs including sustenance, lifestyle, health care and bequest. In addition the article provides data showing how spending typically drops as retirees age and discusses how to take this into account when planning when to retire or how much to spend in retirement.

Description: Many retirement actuaries have experience developing, implementing, and monitoring Liability Driven Investing (LDI) strategies for plan sponsors. These strategies typically involve modifying a plan’s investment strategy to remove a significant portion of the investment and interest rate risk now or at some point in the future when specific triggers are met. The tactics often involve the use of fixed income assets to cash flow and/or duration match the liabilities. In the spirit of helping actuaries expand their roles in an evolving defined contribution world, this article explores the application of LDI and derisking strategies within defined contribution and individual retirement accounts. The economic theory behind this approach is called the lifecycle hypothesis, or lifecycle finance. The benefits of the lifecycle finance method are that it provides a safe approach to save for retirement and a secure source of floor income during retirement. Similar to pension plans, each individual has his or her own idiosyncratic needs, wants, and risks that should be considered. Actuaries are uniquely situated to help defined contribution plan sponsors, individuals, and even themselves implement the lifecycle finance approach by developing and distributing tools and methods that focus on income (rather than wealth), LDI strategies, and personalization.

Description: This article provides a perspective on the SOA’s Aging and Retirement research reports, and on the types of research that are included. The SOA does a lot of research on different retirement topics, and many people are not aware of the scope of this work. This article offers an overview of the big picture as we think about the future. The article describes longer-term challenges to the US retirement system and recent developments that have affected the system and created uncertainty. It provides an overview of what individuals have said about retirement and their view of post-retirement risks and planning in a variety of consumer research studies. It then reviews some of the research and provides information on summary reports which provide insight on the findings from multiple related research reports. It also provides information about consumer education and what is currently available and in process. It then focuses on how the SOA is helping retirement professionals understand current and expected change and discusses areas of uncertainty as we help those we serve deal with change.

Description: Discussion of FinTech including PIMCO research on 401(k) use of managed accounts and observations about cybersecurity, genetic data, and retirement spend down.

Description: This fifth call for essays aimed to gather perspectives, opinions and data on how to advance the state of effective retirement planning tools, products, and strategies to assist individuals, financial advisors, employers and other stakeholders. The goal was to meet two objectives: (1) identify retirement risks, and (2) how to better plan for and maintain a secure retirement.

Description: Read the May 2020 issue of Retirement Section News published by the Retirement Section. Newsletters provide practical information for the working actuary, articles on trends that impact sections and news about section activities.

Description: A generational perspective on the decline of traditional defined benefit plans and hope for the future. Do we need to wait until all the actuaries and plan members from the old DB system have retired before a new system can emerge?