When is the best time to tell your employees about how good your pension plan is? “Before someone else tells them about theirs,” said Keith Baker, payroll and benefits manager at the U.K. arm of Starr Companies, during a session at Benefits Canada‘s 2020 DC Plan Summit in Montreal in February. Sharing his organization’s overhaul […]
In 2016, when Aon’s Calum Mackenzie departed the U.K. for Canada, he left behind a pension industry still reeling from the introduction, a year earlier, of an annual charge cap on defined contribution plan investment funds. But when Mackenzie, now the consultancy’s Canadian head of investment, recently caught up with a former colleague on the […]
In the U.S., target-date funds in workplace retirement plans have grown from $5 billion in 2000 to $734 billion in 2018, with many benefits for plan members. A new working paper by Olivia Mitchell, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School, and Stephen Utkus, principal and director of the Vanguard Center for Investor […]
While previous research has indicated that defined contribution pension plan members benefit from a limited number of core investment options because it reduces choice overload, is this still true now that automatic enrolment and default funds are becoming more common? According to new research by Morningstar Inc., more investment options in a DC arrangement could […]
With cohorts in the workforce behaving differently as they prepare for retirement, it’s important for plan sponsors to consider these differences along gender and generational lines. At Benefits Canada’s 2019 Defined Contribution Investment Forum in Toronto on Sept. 27, Jean Young, senior research associate at the Vanguard Center for Investor Research, shared a survey that […]
As a solution to employee inertia, many plan sponsors with defined contribution arrangements are looking at setting automatic features as their plan’s default option. When the Royal Bank of Canada redesigned its DC plan in 2012, it introduced auto-enrolment for all new plan members following a six-month waiting period. Before the change, employees had a […]
Defined contribution plan sponsors have to stay aware of plan design developments to improve their benefits offerings for their specific workforces, according to a new report by Callan. As workplace demographics shift, it’s important for plan sponsors to make sure their DC plan features are keeping up with those changes to ensure the benefits they’re providing are most effective […]
A disconnect exists between defined contribution plan sponsors’ intentions and actions when it comes to helping employees with financial wellness, according to a new survey by J.P. Morgan Asset Management. Among more than 800 U.S. DC plan sponsors, 74 per cent said they have a very or somewhat high commitment to employees’ fiscal health, although […]
While the process has been slow to date, it’s clear the migration to defined contribution pension plans will continue in Canada. Defined benefit assets comprised about 47 per cent of total financial wealth in 2007, compared to assets in DC plans and other group retirement savings accounts, which made up about 38 per cent, said Colin Ripsman, president […]
Simplifying DC plan enrolment should begin by eliminating the “tyranny of choice,” making it easier for plan members to just get started, according to Tom Reid, senior vice-president of group retirement services at Sun Life Financial. “We’re not saying choice is bad, but at certain moments choice is really not the most welcome thing and […]