Description: Various studies suggest that the baby boomers have not saved sufficiently to provide for their retirement (e.g., CIA 2007). It is anticipated that the baby boomers will have to liquidate some or all of their assets to supplement their retirement income. This paper estimates the likely size of the asset liquidation and estimates the impact that an asset liquidation of such magnitude may have on asset prices.

Description: To help the next generations to retire with financial security, financial services companies, employers, and financial advisors must do more. There are two paths to doing more: providing programs that work without individuals making choices on their own, and providing more education and encouragement. This paper is an attempt to move these efforts forward by presenting ideas for what consumers, employers, financial professionals, financial services companies, and government should do to help deal with the ongoing retirement challenges.

Description: This report presents the results of a 2003 telephone study among Americans ages 45 to 80. The purpose of the study was to evaluate Americans’ awareness of potential financial risks, how this awareness impacts the management of their finances with respect to retirement and how Americans are managing the process of leaving the workforce.

Description: Paper by Max Rudolph for the SOA on historical views on systemic risk and its applications.

Description: This report provides the results of a VA survey on policyholder behavior in the tail on VA products containing guaranteed minimum benefits.

Description: Data call soliciting information on Credit Risk Study Loss Experience Study: Private Placement bonds and credit risk events for 2003-2010.

Description: The project goals are: • Illustrate an analytical framework using stochastic forecasts and efficient frontiers for hypothetical retirees, for determining retirement income generators (RIGs) that could be offered in a DC retirement plan. • Determine the RIGS or combination of RIGs that could be considered optimal according to specified criteria. • Encourage plan participants, plan sponsors, and advisors to adopt a portfolio approach to developing retirement income strategies.

Description: This paper focuses on credibility when used in the underwriting and pricing of group medical insurance. In this report, group medical refers to broad comprehensive major medical coverage that reimburses the insured for practically all necessary health-related services, subject only to a very high payment limit and modest member cost-sharing in the form of copays, deductibles, and coinsurance. Readers are expected to have some familiarity with this coverage.

Description: The purpose of this endeavor was to undertake a research project on term conversion experience with a particular focus on conversion rates and mortality experience of term to permanent converted policies.

Description: Most Canadian stakeholders to date have focused on DB-like implementations of TBPs, many of which are very complex arrangements with multiple layers of benefit security-enhancing features. In order to help stakeholders understand the contribution of each element to this complex whole, it is instructive to start from a much simpler design and ask: • What are the fundamental characteristics of a simple TBP? • How do benefits behave when using simple tools to manage risk? • What other features could be considered to enhance benefit security and stability, if desired? To answer these questions, the SOA’s research project investigated several design options under a variety of assumptions. Each permutation had the same sponsor commitment (same starting asset value, plus annual contributions of 10% of pay) and the same general structure for the target benefit (a percentage of career-average-earnings times years of service, without an explicit indexation provision either before or after retirement) but they each had a different benefit adjustment mechanism and/or investment policy.