Employer Strategies

As the 2012 Republican presidential hopefuls travel across the country to make their case for the White House and health reform moves forward, have you looked into the future of YOUR business? Have you considered the potentially devastating impact to your business? How about the possibilities and tremendous opportunities to continue making a difference in the lives of your clients and prospects?

Lawmakers are investigating three pharmacies in Maryland and North Carolina for diverting critical but scarce drugs from patients to wholesalers, who are then able to resell the medicine at sometimes big markups.

Employers across America face unprecedented challenges in providing competitive employee benefits while still controlling costs. Public-sector employers face additional obstacles from revenue shortfalls and increased public scrutiny of government spending. Yet employers, both public and private, have access to many proven solutions that can help them control and even reduce costs while continuing to offer a strong benefits package. …

With the Supreme Court tackling constitutional challenges to the Affordable Care Act during oral arguments March 26-28, the Kaiser Family Foundation has published a 10-page primer of the issues and arguments before the court.

Skinner is a welcome decision for plan fiduciaries. It is, however, only the first appellate opinion on the subject post-Amara. Additionally, the facts of the case were not particularly compelling for the plaintiffs, since they received accurate information before making their retirement decisions and thus never relied on the faulty SPD. Undoubtedly other courts will tackle the issue of ERISA remedies in the coming months. In the meantime, however, employer/plan administrators should continue to subject their plan documents and benefits communications to a careful review to ensure their accuracy and clarity. Skinner teaches that, in the context of benefit communications, an ounce of prevention is truly worth a pound of cure.

More Americans are feeling optimistic about their retirement savings, according to a new survey.

More than half of U.S. employers say they are expanding the use of technology to manage costs associated with employee benefits programs. This is according to new research from Prudential Financial.

The Department of Labor is not going to let push-back from the financial services industry delay its fiduciary rule for advisers who handle retirement plans — but that does not mean the regulation will be out anytime soon.

Financial services firms, advisers and brokers can get themselves caught in their own tracks on social media, worrying excessively about Securities and Exchange Commission rules on disclosures, marketing and communication, as well as Financial Industry Regulatory Authority guidelines.

The economy is causing employees, particularly younger generations, to turn with greater interest to employers for help with establishing financial security. According to a new survey, nearly half of all employees say that because of the economy they are counting on employers’ benefits programs to help with their financial protection needs, and that percentage climbs to 55% for Gen X workers and 66% for Gen Y.