Among the duties of a retirement plan fiduciary is the duty to monitor the administration of the plan and to assure that policies and procedures are in place to minimize the risk of errors and deficiencies. While monitoring...more
401(k) plans are a world of contradictions. It’s one of the few employer provided benefits that an employee usually pays for through their account balance. It’s a retirement plan that an employer offers that the employee has...more
Recent articles in the New York Times have added to he discussion of what amount is needed to retire. Focusing on $1,000,000, which is less than the cost of an average apartment in Manhattan, the first article suggests that...more
I am a fan of the original Highlander movie with Christopher Lambert and Sean Connery. The subsequent sequels and television series make the cannon of the series nonsensical, but I do love the original. Maybe it’s because of...more
One of the most important jobs in having clients as a retirement plan provider is retaining them and the fact is that happy clients rarely leave. Too often, plan providers lose clients over a lack of communication. As Led...more
Splitting up marital assets in a divorce is challenging enough when you are dealing with property in the here and now. When it comes to assets accrued for the purposes of future retirement, things can get even more...more
Many public companies allow their employees to invest a portion of their retirement plan balances in company stock. By making a company stock fund an available investment in a 401(k) plan, employees may share the potential...more
The President’s recent budget proposal would impose a new cap on tax-favored retirement benefits. Annual contributions and accruals under tax-favored plans are already limited, but this would be a complex new limit...more
George Carlin said that all you need in life is a place for your stuff. Carlin said that all a house really is; is a place for your stuff. When it comes to being a retirement plan sponsor, retirement plan sponsors need a...more
PBS’ Frontline had a scathing report on 401(k) plans called “The Retirement Gamble”. The Retirement Gamble had no roulette tables or free drinks; it was a rather sobering look at the troubles affecting 401(k) plan and...more
From time to time, we hear about threats to the Social Security System – even talk about eliminating it for younger workers. Some reports indicate that about half of Americans have less than $10,000 in savings, while other...more
Would you leave money on the table for the government to take instead? Would you not maximize your retirement savings because your accountant or third party administrator (TPA) told you that you had to give the same amounts...more
Over time, there are so many full time positions in the workforce that are as obsolete as the Atari 2600 in my garage. Many people remember the milkman or the diaper man who made deliveries or the woman who worked the...more
In Tibble v. Edison Int’l, 10-cv-56406, 2013 WL 1174167 (9th Cir. Mar. 21, 2013), the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that 401(k) plan fiduciaries breached their duty of prudence in selecting investment options for the...more
Many plan sponsors have selected so-called “target date” funds as the default investment under the plan sponsor’s 401(k) or other qualified plan. A target date fund is one that includes investments in different asset classes...more
Under the rules of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (“CFTC”), certain collective investment vehicles and other entities that, directly or indirectly, invest in “commodity interests” may be “commodity pools” whose...more
On January 2 , 2013, President Obama signed the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (H.R. 8) (the “Relief Act”) into law. While the principal intention of the Relief Act was to avert the key elements of the “fiscal cliff” by...more
The Internal Revenue Service has announced cost of living adjustments (COLA) applicable to dollar limitations for retirement plans for 2013. Employers should make sure that the individuals in charge of their payroll...more
On January 2, 2013, President Obama signed into law the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (the “Act”), more commonly known as the fiscal cliff legislation. Among other things, the Act amended the tax code to remove some of...more
On January 2, 2013, President Obama signed the American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 (the “2012 Act”). The 2012 Act expands the ability of participants in 401(k) and other eligible retirement plans to convert their pre-tax...more
Whether your employer has set up a new 401(k) plan, or you are now eligible to participate, or deciding to participate after years of not deferring, you will have many questions concerning participating in the plan. The...more
Employers and plan sponsors must comply with numerous filing and notice deadlines for their retirement and health and welfare plans. Failure to comply with these deadlines can result in costly penalties and excise taxes. To...more
The newly enacted American Taxpayer Relief Act (H.R. 8) includes a significant new opportunity to perform “in-plan” conversions of pretax dollars to Roth (after-tax) dollars of funds held in defined contribution retirement...more
The best retirement savings plan begins when you are young and just starting out. If you have the discipline to follow a few simple rules, by the time you reach retirement age, you should be able to do what you want, where...more
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