Two issues may have a tremendous impact on the adequacy of retirement income for today's workers: The growth of 401(k) pension plans and the possible privatization of Social Security. Workers are becoming increasingly responsible for the adequacy of their retirement income by determining how...

This paper investigates the characteristics of US and Canadian pension funds that allocate assets to hedge funds. The typical pension fund that invests in hedge funds is a large sophisticated pension fund that diversifies its portfolio across numerous classes of investments, private equity in...

This paper studies whether U.S. public pension funds reach for yield by taking more investment risk in a low interest rate environment. To study funds' risk-taking behavior, we first present a simple theoretical model relating risk-taking to the level of risk-free rates, to their underfunding,...

We investigate the characteristics of infrastructure as an asset class from an investment perspective of a limited partner. While non U.S. institutional investors gain exposure to infrastructure assets through a mix of direct investments and private fund vehicles, U.S. investors predominantly...

We use historical particularities of pension funding law to investigate whether managers of U.S. corporate defined benefit pension plan sponsors strategically use regulatory freedom to lower the reported value of pension liabilities, and hence required cash contributions. For some years, pension...

We use historical particularities of pension funding law to investigate whether managers of U.S. corporate defined benefit pension plan sponsors strategically use regulatory freedom to lower the reported value of pension liabilities, and hence required cash contributions. For some years, pension...

US state pension plans generally use overstated discount rates based on historical performance, creating the appearance of healthy funding at the cost of future underfunding. Conversely, adopting a US Treasury discount rate, or another alternative suggested by previous literature, would cause...

Imagine: You are a public pension fund trustee, employee or investment advisor. The legislature of your state passes a law that requires you to divest some or all of your stock holdings in companies that do business with a specific country. You seek the advice of an outside research firm that...

We study the volatility of US defined benefit pension plans sponsored by private and public companies. We find significant differences in pension plan volatility related to the ownership of the sponsoring firm. The impact of the funded status of pension liabilities on risk-taking for publicly...