This paper focuses on the use of reverse mortgages or home equity conversion mortgages (HECMs) to enhance retirement security. If present trends continue, many American households working today will face a significant retirement funding gap, and this study asks whether reverse mortgages can be...

This paper reviews the literature on the recent benefit and funding landscape of state and local government employee pension plans. Many plans, with generous benefit structures and inadequate funding, are in troubled financial shape. The state of Connecticut pension plans are a good illustration...

There are adjustment factors for early and late claiming of retirement benefits in Social Security which depend on the age when benefits are claimed. These adjustment factors are seriously out of date, as both interest and mortality rates have declined since the rules were designed and put into...

This stochastic simulation analysis compares funding costs and volatilities for private sponsors of traditional defined benefit (DB), pension equity (PE), cash balance (CB), and defined contribution (DC) retirement plans. Plan provisions of equivalent benefit generosity in the different plan...

This paper focuses on the use of reverse mortgages or home equity conversion mortgages (HECMs) to enhance retirement security. If present trends continue, many American households working today will face a significant retirement funding gap, and this study asks whether reverse mortgages can be...

This paper explores the extent to which retirees can and do insure themselves against longevity risk in private pension plans. We first review the theoretical and empirical results on the value of annuities, and discuss reasons why households may choose not to further insure themselves against...