There are two basic types of risk that investors try to balance when saving for retirement: longevity risk and market risk. Using an asset-liability framework, we demonstrate how creating a defined contribution plan that encourages participants to contribute early, contribute increasing amounts,...

We outline how to use historical analogies or macroeconomic models to generate inputs for mean-variance optimizations. Additionally, we present an alternative framework for thinking about "efficient" portfolios. Our framework focuses on selecting from amongst return distributions instead of...

The market crisis of 2007 and 2008 shattered many investors' notions of the efficiency and stability of markets. It also likely shattered a lot of investors' confidence in asset allocation schemes. Some advisors thought they were following sound strategies, only to have severely adverse results....

We provide a framework to help evaluate the cross-sectional importance of asset allocation. Not only can the framework be used to evaluate - ex-post - the importance of asset allocation, but it can also be used to develop expectations - ex-ante - about the importance of asset allocation

This paper serves as a general guide to asset allocation. It answers the following questions: (1) What is asset allocation? (2) What are asset classes? (3) What is a normal allocation? (4) When should an allocation deviate from the norm?