Not All 401(k)s are Created Equal; Should They Be?
Teresa Ghilarducci's proposal for mandatory U.S. retirement plans is no more radical than changes proposed overseas.
Why Bruce Springsteen Is America’s Most-Likely Income Annuity Buyer
Cannex, the Canadian-American annuity data shop, has just released its analysis of 2017 sales of immediate and deferred income annuities. It turns out New Jersey-ites buy the most income...
A ‘Blueprint’ to Sell Income Annuities Direct
Abaris Financial, founded in 2014 to market SPIAs, DIAs and QLACs online, has rebooted itself as Blueprint Income. It hopes to sell single-premium immediate and deferred annuities as well...
Flat Rich: How Airbnb Saved the Quinteros’ Retirement
How a family in Seville, Spain, fixed their retirement income shortfall by investing in two Airbnb apartments in Barrio Santa Cruz, a magnet for lovers and other tourists.
The Fragility of VA Living Benefit Guarantees
Their reliance on VA with living benefits has made life insurers 'more like pension fund managers because they have risky assets and guaranteed liabilities,' write economists at NYU-Stern and...
Spain’s Pension Outlook: Sunny with a Chance of Austerity
To study the Spanish retirement system, RIJ has temporarily relocated to Seville. We start with a look at the public pension system (a contributory, pay-as-you-go system like Social Security...
Morningstar’s Take on Income Annuities
In a recent article, Morningstar's Canadian research director shows, mathematically, how one might use term life insurance and income annuities (in sequence) to cope with one of life's known...
The Elusive ROI of Financial Wellness Efforts
Estimates for the return-on-investment from financial wellness programs vary. One source puts the savings at $50 per employee per year for every incremental (1 to 10) increase in average...
Anecdotal Evidence: Voya, Northwestern Mutual and Fake DOL Comments
New Year's reflections on: Voya's departure from the annuity business, Northwestern Mutual's new live-for-today television ads, and the Wall Street Journal's exposure of counterfeit postings on the DOL fiduciary...
Jellyvision Knows Financial Wellness
In this first of a two-part series on financial wellness, RIJ talks with the customer insight chief of a leading vendor in the field. 'We ask, ‘Where is the...
‘Public-Option’ Workplace IRAs Proceed in Oregon, California
“The day after President Trump signed the repeal , we had a press conference and announced that we were proceeding as planned,” said Katie...
A Simple Idea for Increasing Annuity Sales
'Annuitization decisions can be improved by getting people to think about how annuities help people avoid running out of wealth in old age,' said the Wharton School's Olivia Mitchell,...
The Crypto-Capitalist and His Digital Tontine
“This problem needs to be solved,” Dean McClelland, founder of TontineTrust, told RIJ. With the fervor of a convert, he believes that cryptocurrencies, blockchain, smart contracts and...
Tontines: A New Threat to Annuities?
Life insurers like to say that they have a monopoly on longevity risk mediation. Digital tontines could prove them wrong.
Cannex Launches Annuity Comparison Tools
Advisors, brokerages, IMOs and insurers will be able to use the Toronto-based data company's new analytics to make apples-to-apples comparisons of variable and fixed indexed annuity contracts and their...
Where Defined Contribution Falls Short
The defined contribution system, despite its standardized designs, regulations and contribution limits, reproduces (and may amplify) the economic disparities in the workforce it covers (or fails to cover).
Research Roundup
We summarize five papers: “The Sustainability of U.S. Household Finances," “The Great Debt Boom: 1949-2013,” “Living Below the Line: Economic Insecurity and Older Americans in the States, 2016,” “Building...
A Bitter Sandwich on Thanksgiving
An elderly widow recently suffered a bad fall. Her children, one of whom is still paying college tuition for one of the grandchildren, face the prospect of paying $12,000...
The Word of the Week Is: Thanks
A short note from RIJ... It focuses on gratitude but also includes a hint of changes we plan for 2018.
The Ambiguity of Tax Deferral
A failure to agree on whether or not there's 'government money' in tax-deferred savings accounts has complicated our debates over the DOL fiduciary rule, the need for a harmonized...
