Retirement Security Law Commons^™

Dark Accounting Matter, Colleen Honigsberg

Seattle University Law Review

Physicists calculate that approximately 85% of the matter in the universe is composed of “dark matter” that “does not absorb, reflect, or emit electromagnetic radiation and is therefore difficult to detect.” The S&P 500 currently trades at a price-to-book value of 4.2, suggesting that book value accounts for less than 20% of the S&P 500’s market value. The remaining 80% appears nowhere in these firms’ balance sheets—it is invisible to contemporary accounting techniques and constitutes “dark accounting matter.”

Some “dark accounting matter” is composed of factors commonly described as components of “ESG.” Human capital, for example, is an intangible asset …

The Real Reason The Investor Class Hates Pensions, David H. Webber

Shorter Faculty Works

No issue in America today better illustrates the divergent interests of working Americans and the 1 percent than pension reform. Substantial empirical evidence shows that America’s favored retirement vehicle — the 401(k), recently renounced by its own inventors — is grossly inadequate and will leave tens of millions of Americans with insufficient retirement assets. And yet states and cities are busy converting traditional pensions into these failing 401(k)s or equivalents, to the great benefit of money managers and the finance class.

In Pursuit Of Good & Gold: Data Observations Of Employee Ownership & Impact Investment, Christopher Geczy, Jessica S. Jeffers, David K. Musto, Anne M. Tucker

Seattle University Law Review

A startup’s path to self-sustaining profitability is risky and hard, and most do not make it. Venture capital (VC) investors try to improve these odds with contractual terms that focus and sharpen employees’ incentives to pursue gold. If the employees and investors expect the startup to balance the goal of profitability with another goal—the goal of good—the risks are likely to both grow and multiply. They grow to the extent that profits are threatened, and they multiply to the extent that balancing competing goals adds a dimension to the incentive problem. In this Article, we explore contracting terms specific to …

One Fund Solution And The Pension Crisis, Gordon Butler

Cleveland State Law Review

The next forty years of economic life will be dominated by one underlying theme: dealing with the retirement income security of a growing, aging and longer-lived global population. This is a "can’t run, can’t hide" problem that will affect the lives of almost every human being on the planet . . . Whether you are light in your pension account, whether you have more money than Croesus, whether you live in the well-funded Netherlands, or whether you are a put-upon unambitious young male in Japan who sees no future for himself, you cannot escape this problem.

Before you read very …

Finding A Financial Planner, Emily G. Brown Jd

Pension Action Center Publications

This fact sheet provides information on how to find the right financial planner to help you meet your retirement planning goals. This fact sheet suggests things to consider prior to picking a financial planner and answers questions like:

• What do financial planners do?
• How do you know if you need a financial planner?
• How do you find the right financial planner?
• What type of professional title does a financial planner have?

Your Former Employer’S 401(K) Plan, Jeanne Medeiros Jd

Pension Action Center Publications

When you leave a job where you have participated in a 401(k) plan, you may have a number of different options about what to do with the money in that account. This fact sheet explains those options and offers guidance about the pros and cons of each option.

Here are some frequently asked questions answered in this face sheet:

Q. Can I leave my money in my former employer’s plan?

Q. What are my other options?

Q. If I decide to withdraw the account balance from my former employer’s plan, how do I do that, and how long should it …

Hardship Withdrawals And Loans: Some Words Of Caution, Emily G. Brown Jd, Jeanne Medeiros Jd, Ellen Bruce Jd

Pension Action Center Publications

As defined benefit pension plans become more and more rare, the responsibility of saving for retirement falls increasingly on individuals. Many studies have been published about the average or median balances in retirement savings accounts and virtually all of them have reached the same conclusion - most Americans aren’t saving enough money to last them through their retirement years.

In this fact sheet we will take a look at one of the factors that contributes to this problem, that is, the availability of loans and hardship withdrawals from 401(k) retirement accounts, which can lead to lower account balances overall. Sometimes, …

Privitizing Social Security: Administration And Implementation, Karen C. Burke, Grayson M.P. Mccouch

UF Law Faculty Publications

This article considers administrative issues that bear on the structure and implementation of any universal, mandatory system of personal accounts within the Social Security system. The central issues involve tradeoffs between relatively standardized, low-cost options with constrained individual choice and limited risk, on the one hand, and more flexible, higher-cost options with enhanced opportunities for individual control and greater risk, on the other hand. A centralized system modeled on the Thrift Savings Plan for federal employees could balance these goals by offering participants a relatively narrow range of investment and withdrawal options, with correspondingly low administrative costs and limited risks. …

The Effects Of Partial Privatization Of Social Security Upon Private Pensions, Kathryn L. Moore

Law Faculty Scholarly Articles

Social Security does not provide retirement income in a vacuum. Rather, commentators often refer to our national retirement income system as a three legged stool, with Social Security representing one of the legs and employer sponsored pension plans and individual savings representing the other two legs. Because changes in one leg of the stool are likely to have a direct impact on the other two legs, policymakers must not consider Social Security changes in isolation, but should take account of their effect on employer-sponsored pensions and individual savings. This Article analyzes how one of the most popular proposals, partial privatization, …

Right To Retirement Benefits: Board Of Education Of West Islip Union Free School District V. New York State Teachers' Retirement System

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.