September 2024

Sustainable Personal Finance : Planning for an Eco-Friendly Future

By Nur Wardina Azhar This study explores the emerging field of sustainable personal finance, focusing on strategies for planning an eco-friendly financial future. As environmental concerns become increasingly urgent, individuals are seeking ways to align their financial decisions with sustainability goals. This research examines the integration of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) criteria into various aspects of personal financial planning, including budgeting, investing, risk management, and retirement planning. The study analyzes contemporary issues such as green investing, eco-friendly insurance options,...

Financial Inclusion, Inequality, and Retirement Trends Among Older Workers

By Issac Marcelin & Wei Sun The study develops a financial inclusion index comprising three dimensions: usage, barriers, and access to financial resources. It employs a Principal Component Analysis to determine the weights of each dimension. This index helps assess the impact of financial inclusion on various factors like ethnic groups, minorities, human capital, retirement, wealth outcomes, and mental well-being. Our research reveals new psychological and sociological impacts of accessing financial products. Households with higher financial inclusion scores are likelier...

As life expectancy increases, Olivia S. Mitchell says it takes financial planning to take the worry out of extra retirement years

Career paths are rarely straight lines, but as new technologies transform jobs at a dizzying pace the twists and turns can throw retirement plans off course. Born to globe-trotting economist parents, Olivia S. Mitchell was introduced to economic principles early on. At the age of five, while living in Pakistan, she observed construction workers pouring concrete by bucket brigade rather than using a cement truck and asked her father why. “Labor is cheaper than capital,” he responded. Mitchell went...

August 2024

UK. Almost four in 10 pensioners have retirement regrets

Almost four in 10 (39 per cent) pensioners have retirement regrets, research from Hargreaves Lansdown has found. The research revealed that the top regret for retired people was failing to put together a plan early enough (15 per cent). In addition to this, one in 10 said they regretted not boosting contributions early enough, while 1 per cent said they wished they had taken financial advice. The research also revealed that 3 per cent of pensioners said they wish they had kept...

The Time is Right for a National Retirement Savings Plan

Experts on retirement saving have plenty of assorted ideas for making 401(k) plans work better. But most agree on the top priority: get them into the hands of more people. Only about half of private-sector US workers are covered by an employer-sponsored retirement savings plan at any given time—and that figure hasn’t budged much over the years. The lost opportunity to save at the workplace translates into far too many people retiring with paltry savings or none at all, leaving them reliant...

July 2024

How Gen X Can Catch Up on Retirement Savings

Generation X—the cohort of people born between 1965 and 1980—is now squarely in middle age. This phase often brings worries about aging, mortality, and a general decline in overall life satisfaction. Retirement preparedness is another major worry. Based on BlackRock’s 2024 Read on Retirement report, only 60% of survey respondents in this generation believe they’re on track to retire with the lifestyle they want, compared with 77% for Generation Z, 72% for millennials, and 68% for baby boomers. Another survey from Transamerica puts some additional context...

Reality bites for Gen X retirement

The Slacker generation might have been slacking off when it came to planning for retirement: Gen X consistently ranks in surveys as the least-prepared group for when they stop earning. Why it matters: The first members of Gen X were born in January 1965, which means they turn 59½ this month and can start withdrawing money from 401(k) and other retirement accounts without paying a penalty. The big picture: As Gen Xers get older, they are getting increasingly worried about looming financial problems in...

US. Retirement Readiness Confidence Robust

Confidence in financial readiness to retire is robust, despite the vagaries of inflation and other economic factors and the after-effects of the pandemic.  And that confidence is especially attuned to participating in a retirement plan. The Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) in its 2024 Retirement Confidence Survey reports much strong confidence. However, it’s more than twice as high among those with retirement plan coverage than among those who lack it. Among respondents who are covered by a retirement plan, 77% of...

2023 Defined Contribution Pension and Savings Report

By Gemma Burrows The 2023 survey contains data on 122 of the FTSE 350 companies and 140 other leading UK employers, which makes this one of the largest UK DC Pension and Savings Surveys in the industry. As always, we would like to thank those who took part in this survey and helped us to conduct this research and bring these valuable insights. Get the report here ___ Since our last survey, we have seen turmoil in investment markets, inflation rise into double-digit...

Retirement Benefit Distributions for California Educators

By Robert L. Clark, Denis Pelletier & Beth Ritter Distribution choices by individuals retiring from CalSTRS are examined for participants that retired between 2016 and 2023. Women are much more likely to select a member-only annuity while a larger proportion of men select a J&S annuity that provide survivor benefits. Being married is a dominant factor in the selection of J&S annuities. Greater final annual salary, older ages at retirement, and more years of service are associated with a greater probability of choosing...