Lisa V. Gillespie

Women may have advanced academically and up the career ladder, but there is still a ways to go in terms of retirement readiness. A new study from ING Retirement Research Institute shows that on average, women have $41,000 less saved than men over the course of a lifetime. For women with children, that gap expands to $61,000.

Employers are giving employees more flexibility to work from home and work various hours as long as employees get work done, but they’re not willing to pay more for various work-life benefits. This is according to a new study released Monday from the Society for Human Resource Management and the Families and Work Institute.

There were 48.4 million Hispanic people in the U.S. as of 2009, making it the largest ethnicity in the nation. On top of it, Hispanics make up 14.8% of the civilian labor force. Projections suggest that "language minority students" (those who speak a language other than English at home and who have varying levels of proficiency in English) will comprise over 40% of elementary and secondary students by 2030.

Cathy Meyers had already fought cancer twice, once in 1992, again in 2003, before she was diagnosed for a third time with neuroendocrine cancer in the pancreas in 2009. She thought her time was up. How could fate hand someone a proverbial death sentence three times in a row, with the third being the same cancer that sent Steve Jobs to his deathbed?

Creating an adequate amount of income for individuals to live comfortably in retirement will require a combination of several income producing strategies, as well as knowing what constitutes realistic and "safe" withdrawal rates from retirement plans, according to a recent issue brief by the Institutional Retirement Income Council.

Something is costing your health plan a whole lot of money, and it's largely due to uninformed choice. No, it's not lax benefit selections, but rather early induced deliveries.

Cost increases for health care are perhaps slowing down somewhat, with employer health benefit expenditures not expected to increase in 2012 at the same explosive growth rate of recent years. Costs for all types of medical plans are expected to increase by 9.9% for 2012, according to a survey by Buck Consultants. It's the first time since 2001 that Buck's survey has projected cost increases less than 10% for any type of plan. The firm has been conducting its survey since 1999.

The intersection between religion and business is a heated one, with the most recent flare-up sparked by a provision in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act that mandates employers cover the cost of contraception in their health plans. Although the Obama administration exempted houses of worship from the rule, it still requires coverage be made available to employees of religiously affiliated organizations such as hospitals and universities.

As a HR/benefits professional, do you ever feel like you’ve got the worst job in the world? If so, you’re wrong, according to CareerCast, which lists human resources manager at No. 3 among its 2012 Best Jobs rankings.

Benefits managers working 10 years ago may remember two politicians who crossed the aisle to create retirement plan design policy that featured both Republican and Democrat ideology: Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Ben Cardin (D-Md.). The duo trumpeted features such as auto-enrollment and the Comprehensive Retirement Security and Pension Reform Act, signed into law under the Economic Growth Tax Relief and Reconciliation Act in 2001, which set higher contribution limits, simplified discrimination tests, a tax credit for low-income savers and incentives for small-business retirement programs. Portman and Cardin have joined forces yet again to set policy designed to meet today’s retirement challenges.

Working Americans households probably will experience a potential income drop of 28% in retirement, and 38% retiree households report not having sufficient enough income to cover monthly expenses. This is according to new research from Fidelity today that shows retirement income gaps could force significant sacrifices among workers retiring tomorrow and in 50 years.

Young people plan on working well into retirement — not necessarily due to financial need, but because they want to stay active and involved. This is according to new survey results from T. Rowe Price, showing that 69% of respondents between the ages of 21 and 50 plan to work either part-time or full-time during their retirement years. Among those who plan to work at least part-time, most (75%) will do so because they want to stay active and involved; only 23% believe they will do so because they will not have saved enough money.

Ironic as it may be, despite high unemployment and the perception of a surplus of talent, HR/benefits professionals and hiring managers may be forced to choose from limited quantities of high-skilled workers, a new Deloitte study shows.

This article is the first in a two-part series examining the challenges in achieving true parity for mental health benefits. This article explores the history of mental health parity legislation, while the second installment - scheduled for EBN June 1 - will address barriers to care due to lack of access and provider shortages.

Lyndsey Allen used to work across the street from Zappos' main office in Henderson, Nev. She'd sit in her cube, watching Zappos staffers stage impromptu parades around the parking lot in themed garb. She was perfectly content at her current job, but wanted something different. For six months, she prowled the Zappos job site and when a recruiter position opened, she pounced. A year-and-a-half later, she conducts phone interviews at a desk in the middle of the Zappos office, where those spontaneous parades now play an important part in her daily work.

In a recent analysis of its client base, New York Life Retirement Plan Services found that despite a low interest rate environment, stable-value funds remain a heavily utilized retirement plan investment option with 50% participant utilization.

Managers have an enormous impact on the performance, job satisfaction, engagement, motivation and turnover rates of the employees under their direction, a new study reveals. According to PsychTests.com, which conducted the study, using the Management Skills and Styles Assessment, when a workplace is well-managed, it can look like there is actually very little management going on, and employees seem to manage themselves. However, the firm concludes, to achieve this kind of atmosphere requires a strategic and positive leader.

Cost increases for health care are perhaps finally slowing down, with employer health benefit expenditures not expected to increase in 2012 at the same explosive growth in recent years. Costs for all types of medical plans are expected to increase by 9.9% for 2012, according to a survey by Buck Consultants, the first time since 2001 that Buck's survey has projected cost increases less than 10% for any type of plan. The firm has been conducting its survey since 1999.

Small businesses aren’t known for offering rich retirement plans; workers in firms with fewer than 100 employees are much less likely to have a retirement plan available to them than workers in large firms, according to the Small Business Administration. The financial services industry is making inroads to service small business retirement needs, however, most recently with the Merrill Edge Small Business 401(k) through Bank of America. This retirement solution offers small business owners, who generally have 401(k) plan assets under $250,000, a simplified, easy-to-manage retirement plan with lower costs than many traditional 401(k) plans, enabling small businesses to provide an important benefit to their employees.

What better way to take lessons of branding a wellness program than from one of the top-branded companies in the world, Procter and Gamble? The producers of timeless product lines like Old Spice and Tide recently introduced Vibrant Living, P&G’s in-house line of benefits specially designed to help employees live healthier.