Job Market Monitor
Pension
US / The Middle Class Retirement Crisis
Retirement security for those currently or recently in the middle class is no sure thing. 49% of the private work force has neither defined benefit (traditional pensions) or defined contribution (401(k)) retirement plans, while public sector pensions are coming under increasing attack. The United States has the highest elder poverty rate, 25% (measured as 50% … Continue reading
Pennsylvania / Budget proposes pension reform, 400 layoffs plus the elimination of 500 other positions
Gov. Tom Corbett today asked his Republican-controlled Legislature for pension reform, transportation investments and a $90 million increase in basic education funding in his 2013-14 budget. The Republican governor’s $28.4 billion blueprint, if approved by lawmakers, is $679 million higher than the current year’s budget and includes no tax increase. It does, however, propose 400 … Continue reading
US / Defined contribution retirement plans cost more than defined benefit
Private industry employers now spend more per employee hour worked for defined contribution retirement plans (retirement plans that specify the level of employer contributions and place those contributions into individual employee accounts) than for defined benefit retirement plans (plans that provide employees with guaranteed retirement benefits that are based on a benefit formula). March 2012 … Continue reading
US / State of Local Government Pensions: aggregate unfunded liabilities of $574 billion
State government pensions have attracted considerable media and scholarly attention. Less well understood are the nation’s 3,196 locally administered plans. The paper represents a first step toward filling this gap. After reviewing issues common to state and local plans, it summarizes existing data and research on local pensions. Like many institutions now prevalent in state … Continue reading
Sweden / Older immigrants face lower pensions
Immigrants to Sweden who move here before their 35th birthday have enough time to work towards a pension that is almost equal to people born in Sweden, but older immigrants risk lagging behind socio-economically, a new statistics review shows. “Income levels differ sharply, depending on when in life one immigrated to Sweden,” Statistics Sweden (Statistiska … Continue reading
US Public Pension Funding / Aggregate underfunding of $0.895 trillion
The Milliman Public Pension Funding Study independently measures the aggregate funded status of the 100 largest U.S. public pension plans using basic actuarial principles and reported plan liabilities and assets. The aggregate accrued liability information provided has been determined on a uniform basis with respect to the interest rate assumption across all of the plans … Continue reading
Pension Plan / Less than a third of Fortune 100 Companies offer a defined benefit plan to newly hired salaried workers
In 2012, the number of Fortune 100 companies offering new salaried employees only a defined contribution (DC) plan rose, as it has for many years. Today, less than a third of these companies offer any DB plan to newly hired salaried workers, and only 11 still offer a traditional DB plan to new hires. Large … Continue reading
UK – Pension – Reforms ‘could cut retirement income’
Workers who switch jobs several times could lose up to a quarter of their potential pension funds under proposed reforms, critics have warned. The new system of automatic enrolment into pensions means that an increasing number of workers will have savings for their retirement. However, with the average employee changing jobs 11 times during their … Continue reading
US – Study shows $1.2 trillion gap for public pensions
The largest 100 public pension funds have around $1.2 trillion of unfunded liabilities, about $300 billion above the nearly $900 billion they reported themselves, according to a new actuarial study to be released on Monday. The pension systems reported a median funding level of 75.1 percent. The study by the actuarial firm Milliman, which used … Continue reading
Washington – Retirements surge, new hires plummet
The federal government’s long-awaited retirement wave is here, and it’s smacking headlong into the biggest hiring slowdown in a decade. And it’s not just retirements. Overall attrition shot up in 2011, which caused the government’s total workforce to drop by its greatest amount since the height of the government downsizing in 1999. With no end … Continue reading
Japan – How to meet the wishes of an army of willing elderly workers
The thought of retiring after more than four decades made Hirofumi Mishima anxious. Instead of looking forward to ending his three-hour daily commute, Mishima wanted to work, even if it meant another hour on the train. “Keeping a regular job is the most stimulating thing for me,” said Mishima, 69, who spent six months trawling … Continue reading
UK – Huge Drop in membership of private pension schemes
The Office for National Statistics has recorded a significant downwards trend in employee membership of private sector defined benefit (DB) schemes – down from 34 per cent in 1997 to 9 per cent in 2011. Overall, employee membership of employer-sponsored pensions in the private sector fell from 46 per cent in 1997 to 32 per cent … Continue reading
UK | As many as 1 in 10 will delay retirement
As many as one in ten Britons planning to retire this year will delay their exit from the workplace, research revealed. Some 68% of those planning to postpone their retirement based the decision on financial pressures making it difficult for them to afford being out of employment, the Prudential Class of 2012 study showed. However, … Continue reading
UK | Millions of workers force to work past 75
Millions of workers will be forced to work past the age of 75 because they are in the dark on how much they need to save for a comfortable retirement. The Pensions Policy Institute, which carried out the research, said that people were not saving enough, although living longer, volatile stock markets and plunging annuity … Continue reading
Transitioning into Retirement: The MetLife Study of Baby Boomers at 65
Despite the popular belief that Baby Boomers will continue to work well past the traditional retirement age of 65, those born in 1946 are retiring in droves, according to Transitioning into Retirement: The MetLife Study of Baby Boomers at 65. This study is a follow–up to the 2008 MetLife Mature Market Institute study, Boomer Bookends: … Continue reading
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