This is the introduction and summary to the sixth phase of an ongoing project on Social Security Programs and Retirement Around the World. The first phase described the retirement incentives inherent in plan provisions and documented the strong relationship across countries between social...

Workers nearing retirement face many important, and often irreversible, choices. We collected detailed demographic and financial literacy data on over 1,500 workers nearing retirement at three large companies to assess how individuals are planning for retirement. Many respondents display limited...

Governments around the world are reacting to extended lifespans and troubled pension finances by increasing the age of retirement benefit entitlement. One concern that arises is how those who are not working before reaching entitlement age are able to bridge their consumption to the age of...

This is the introduction and summary to the fourth phase of an ongoing project on Social Security Programs and Retirement Around the World. The first phase described the retirement incentives inherent in plan provisions and documented the strong relationship across countries between social...

Many firms give post-retirement increases in pension benefits to retirees even though the pension contract does not require such increases. A leading explanation of this behavior is that benefit increases are part of an implicit contract where retirees accept lower initial benefits in return for...

This paper examines why pension plans increased their liabflities by giving benefit increases to persons no longer working even though almost al lof them were not required to do so by any legally enforceable contract. In our model workers and firms have implicit contracts under which...

Employers have been launching phased retirement programs to help workers navigate the transition from work to retirement more effectively. This paper examines the experience of the phased retirement system for tenured faculty in the University of North Carolina system. After phased retirement...

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 whether...