This book provides a comprehensive appraisal of social security in Japan, where traditionally the burden of welfare provision has been the main responsibility of the family and employers, rather than the state. However, an ageing population, changes in family structure and continued recession...

Economic theory predicts that employer-provided retiree health insurance (RHI) benefits have a crowd-out effect on household wealth accumulation, not dissimilar to the effects reported elsewhere for employer pensions, Social Security, and Medicare. Nevertheless, we are unaware of any similar...

Many organizations provide retirement planning seminars to their employees as a benefit to help them make better informed retirement decisions.  This study examines the participants in 85 seminars conducted by five companies in 2008 and 2009 to determine how much learning takes place and...

Studies examining pension distribution choices have found that the tendency of private-sector workers is to select lump sum distributions instead of life annuities. In the public sector, defined benefit pensions usually offer lump sum distributions equal to employee contributions, not the...

We report results from a field experiment in which a randomized subset of newly hired workers at a large financial institution received a flyer containing information about the employer's 401(k) plan and the value of contributions compounding over a career. Younger workers who received the flyer...

State and Local Retirement Plans in the United States explains how economic and political events have shaped the development of pension plans in the last century, and it argues that changes in the structure and generosity of these plans will continue to shape policy and funding in the future. It...

While retiree health plans are a dying benefit in the private sector, all US states and many local governments extend health insurance coverage to their retired employees. This book is the first to thoroughly examine public sector health insurance plans. Retiree Health Plans in the Public Sector...

Workers plan and save for retirement throughout their careers. Individuals must navigate complex financial instruments and understand public and employer-provided retirement plan characteristics. Beginning when a worker is first hired, most employers provide the option to contribute to...

During the 1970s, defined benefit pension plans increased their liabilities by giving benefit increases to persons no longer working even though almost none of the plans were required to do so by any legally enforceable contract. Our model of these adjustments has workers and firms agreeing to...