Financial planning

Pension and benefits administrators are needed more than ever to both guide and direct their employees towards healthy retirement savings and lifestyles.

Nobody is sure what the economy will do in 2015, but investment fund managers remain positive about investments in equities and alternative assets over the long-term.

In as bold a move as its strongest blend, coffee powerhouse Starbucks late Monday upped the ante to its college degree program the company first unveiled last summer.

Political and financial pundits alike have talked about a retirement gap or even crisis for years. But as the demographic skews older the crisis is becoming more real.

Because employees aren't actively engaging in their retirement plans on a regular bases, a slight uptick has been seen in employers including managed account options in their workplace 401(k) and 403(b) plans.

Workers and retirees know what they should be doing to prepare for retirement but when it comes to action, neither group is prepared.

Now, more than ever, the retirement plan services industry is placing a greater emphasis on in-plan guaranteed income solutions to help employees achieve better retirement outcomes.

Defined contribution plans have become one of the fastest-growing segments of the retirement industry, representing $7 trillion of the $24 trillion in retirement system assets in 2014, and while private companies have been at the forefront of the change, but government entities are following suit, which means DC plans will become even more important in the years ahead.

You may have noticed that there's a new trend sweeping the financial services industry: robo-advisers. These services use algorithms to automate investing, manage individual portfolios and provide financial guidance.

Continued lawsuits over excessive 401(k) fees are on track to force providers to change the way they deliver products and end a practice that appears to be a “showcase of impropriety.”

The amount of money socked away in retirement accounts jumped up 6% with U.S. retirement assets totaling nearly $25 trillion at the end of December 2014.

The 401(k) industry may be the next slice of the financial services industry to be targeted by technology disruptors.

At current savings rates, Americans are on track to replace over half of their current income in retirement. Having access to a workplace-sponsored retirement plan, meanwhile, is the No. 1 factor in determining retirement success.

Fewer than one in five American workers are contributing to traditional individual retirement accounts, with many pointing to a lack in financial confidence to afford such contributions as one of the biggest reasons for not investing.

A lack of understanding about the benefits of having both an individual retirement account and a 401(k) or 403(b) may help explain why some Americans are not contributing or considering an IRA as part of their retirement strategy.

California's struggling to pay for health care for retired state employees, with an estimated $72 billion in medical costs coming in the next 30 years. Gov. Jerry Brown's solution: Make workers start contributing money to pay for the health care they'll need after retiring.

The funded status of all U.S. multiemployer pension plans dropped from 81% at the end of 2013 to 80% at the end of last year.

Fortune 500 companies are increasingly asking their CEOs to tie their personal wealth more substantially to that of their shareholders.

Like the recycling of paper, glass and plastic, the recycling of retirement savings through automated portability benefits everyone and is easy to implement.

How many of your employees will be short of money in retirement if they ignore the prospect of requiring long-term care? Answer: All of them.