Earlier this year, the Department of Labor and the Treasury put out a Request for Information (RFI) on lifetime income options for retirement plans. Last week was the deadline, and they got some great responses. My favorite is from the American Academy of Actuaries. Not surprising, since I’m an actuary. But they pointed out something [...]
There’s a great article on funding OPEB liabilities by the MN State Auditor’s office. It’s written for counties, but it applies as well to cities, school districts and other government employers in Minnesota. Whether or not to pre-fund OPEB liabilities isn’t a no-brainer. It’s standard practice for public pensions, and it’s required for private pensions. [...]
Just ran across this, in Consumer Reports of all places. It’s about the new DB(k) plan, a 401(k)/defined benefit combo that came in as part of the Pension Protection Act of 2006 (PPA), first available in 2010. We’ve never thought the DB(k) would have much appeal, but what do we know? I thought cash balance [...]
Several states (Minnesota, Iowa, Indiana and Florida) have a “mandated” implicit rate subsidy. That means almost every public-sector employer in these states has an OPEB liability. Each of these states has a statute that says public employers: must allow retirees to stay in the health plan until age 65, and can’t charge them any more [...]
We’re on the last wave of compliance with GASB 45 accounting for other post-employment benefits (OPEB). The biggest calendar-year employers (Phase 1) started in 2007, midsize (Phase 2) in 2008. Now it’s 2009 audit season, when smaller employers (Phase 3) will shift from cash-basis OPEB accounting to GASB 45’s accrual basis: recognizing the cost over [...]
There’s an intriguing provision in the new health care reform law for retiree medical plans: 80% reinsurance for each early retiree’s claims between $15,000 and $90,000. The official summary is here. There’s a fixed amount of money available for this, just $5 billion. When it’s gone, it’s gone. And remember that $5 billion doesn’t go [...]
I’ve been amazed at how many times this little tidbit about the popularity of cash balance plans has appeared and reappeared in the news. That’s great, because many employers and financial planners are still unaware of what’s possible. It makes sense that a big surge has come since 2001. That was just after the [...]
For a while now, we’ve been sharing knowledge around the office with “what I learned today” emails. Now we’re going to start sharing it with the rest of the world. Off we go…
