Description: This report highlights the findings of the 2009 survey and focuses on issues in the survey specifically as they relate to retirement concerns unique to women.

Description: This report presents the results of a 2005 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: This is an Excel workbook that contains detailed reviews of the literature that was searched in the course of a study that explored pre-retirement influences on attitudes and decisions regarding retirement. The research study, conducted by Linda Smith Brothers, reviewed sixty papers written since 1990, and summarized their important points under several categories. The workbook contains a description of the specific categories covered and how they are addressed by each of the sixty papers that were reviewed.

Description: In this article, author Anna Rappaport discusses highlights and wake-up calls from the December, 2009 Annual Retirement Security Symposium.

Description: Chapter 7 suggests that there are two general families of hypotheses about the sex mortality differential: constitutional - biologic/genetic, and external - social/cultural/environmental/behavioral. The author gives a thorough review of the literature and studies performed. The conclusion offered is that there are significant biological reasons for the differential, but that these are often masked by environmental factors. From Why Men Die Younger: Causes of Mortality Differences by Sex, M-LI01-1.

Description: Some of the methods used to measure the sex mortality differential are life expectancy, death rates at a given age, age-adjusted death rates, and average age at death. From Why Men Die Younger: Causes of Mortality Differences by Sex, M-LI01-1.

Description: This paper uses data from two longitudinal surveys to examine the relationship between psychological well-being and financial well-being of older women and men, with specific interest in differences by marital status and duration of widowhood. The Wisconsin Longitudinal Study WLS provides a look at the consequences of relatively early widowhood. The Health and Retirement Study HRS has interviewed a representative sample of individuals 50 and older over the last two decades. We use the data from that survey to examine the adjustment to widowerhood over a larger age range, but with likely less precision to measure differences among women of a single age.

Description: This report provides key findings from the 2005 Risks and Process of Retirement Survey related to issues of particular importance to women. The report also focuses on differences and similarities in the retirement risks faced by men and women.

Description: Chapter 3 examines historical mortality estimates that differentiate between male and female starting as far back as 1600 years ago and through the centuries to modern times when more reliable data becomes available. From Why Men Die Younger: Causes of Mortality Differences by Sex, M-LI01-1.

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.