Healthcare

October marks the start of open enrollment season for many American workers — their annual opportunity to reconsider and re-elect the benefits made available by their employers. “The Growing Importance of the Workplace,” the first in a series of research briefs stemming from Prudential's Sixth Annual Study of Employee Benefits, found that 80% of workers believe the workplace is an important source for personal insurance and savings products.

Here’s a scenario for you: a group health and wellness client you’ve represented for over ten years approaches you to be his/her adviser on a 401(k) plan. Congrats! You’ve worked hard to position yourself as a valued adviser. No doubt you’d like to reap the fruits of your labor. But your next action is extremely important. It may have not only ethical consequences, but legal ones as well. It is vital that you go forward with a…

A top Labor Department official defended the controversial plan to expand the definition of "fiduciary" to cover people providing advice to retirement plans on a commission-based model, a proposal strongly opposed by industry groups representing independent broker-dealers and advisers.

In the midst of a gaping hole in life insurance coverage, Mintel Comperemedia, a research and consulting agency that specializes in direct marketing, released statistics regarding the life insurance sector’s marketing targets and finds that carriers are drifting further and further away from the bull’s-eye.

President Obama's sweeping health care overhaul will top the agenda in the new Supreme Court term that opened on Monday and could be the most momentous in decades.

A significant number of advisers who serve 401(k) plans will ramp up their retirement income planning practices over the next few years, according to a new report from Principal Financial, called the “2011 Best Practices in Retirement Income Planning Study.”

After several years of relatively modest premium increases, annual premiums for employer-sponsored family health coverage increased to $15,073 this year, up 9% from last year. On average, workers pay $4,129 and employers pay $10,944 toward those annual premiums.

Twenty-five percent of employers have little or no understanding of specialty pharmacy and 53% have only a moderate understanding of this challenging benefit according to a new survey released by the Midwest Business Group on Health.

Executives, business owners and other high net worth individuals are actively looking for ways to preserve their estates, not only for their family members, but also for charitable organizations.

I couldn't believe my eyes. I stood a mere three feet away from the mentalist Alain Nu, who lightly pinched the handle of the heavy, solid spoon between his thumb and fingertip. As I watched in amazement, the curved handle of the spoon . . . slowly began to . . . bend! . . . and it continued to bend . . . without Nu touching it.