Retirement planning

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Retirement planning, in a financial context, refers to the allocation of savings or revenue for retirement. The goal of retirement planning is to achieve financial independence.

Contents

The process of retirement planning aims to: [1]

Obtaining a financial plan

Producers such as a financial planner or financial adviser can help clients develop retirement plans, where compensation is either fee-based or commissioned contingent on product sale; see Professional certification in financial services. Such an arrangement is sometimes viewed[ by whom? ] as in conflict with a consumer's interest, and that the advice rendered cannot be without bias, or at a cost that justifies its value. Consumers can now elect a do it yourself (DIY) approach. For example, retirement web-tools in the form of a calculator, mathematical model or decision support system are available online. A web-based tool that allows client to fully plan, without human intervention, might be considered a producer. Key motivations of the DIY trend are many of the same arguments for lean manufacturing, a constructive alteration of the relationship between producer and consumer.

A good retirement plan should consider: [2]

Personal planning

[5]

Modeling and limitations

Retirement finances touch upon distinct subject areas or financial domains of client importance, including: investments (i.e., stocks, bonds, mutual funds); real estate; debt; taxes; cash flow (income and expense) analysis; insurance; defined benefits (e.g., social security, traditional pensions).

There is often a complex interaction between the things that the person can control over time (like their investment mix, saving level while working, spending level in retirement and, to an extent, the timing of retirement and part time work undertaken) and things that are outside their control (like market performance, inflation, tax and social security rules and the length of their lifespan). [6]

From an analytic perspective, each domain can be formally characterized and modeled using a different class representation, as defined by a domain's unique set of attributes and behaviors. Domain models require definition only at a level of abstraction necessary for decision analysis. Since planning is about the future, domains need to extend beyond current state description and address uncertainty, volatility, change dynamics (i.e., constancy or determinism is not assumed). Together, these factors raise significant challenges to any current producer claim of model predictability or certainty. Volatility in investment markets raises questions for everyone, participants, and fiduciaries alike. With the growth of 401(k) and other individual account retirement plans, many participants are responsible for investing their retirement savings. [7]

Stochastic modelling

Retirees often face significant financial risk in retirement (unless they have guaranteed products like defined benefit pensions or lifetime annuities). Each individual doesn’t know how long they will live or what sequence of market returns they will experience in retirement.

Ideally, retirement models should calculate the probability of achieving the person’s required living standard for as long as they live, and calculate the probability of achieving various other goals. Quantitative specialists and actuaries will fit a statistical distribution to key random variables that impact results - such as market returns, human lifespans and inflation rates. These can be used to generate probability weighted scenarios of what a retiree could experience over the decades in retirement.

The Monte Carlo method is a common form of a mathematical model that is applied to predict long-term investment behavior for a client's retirement planning. [8] Its use helps to identify adequacy of client's investment to attain retirement readiness and to clarify strategic choices and actions. It's important to note the investment domain is only a financial domain and therefore is incomplete on its own. Depending on client context, the investment domain may have very little importance in relation to a client's other domains—e.g., a client who receives a guaranteed annuity or social security pension.

Modern retirement models are starting to applying similar techniques at household level too – projecting all significant assets, liabilities, and incomes of the household and stress testing a full range of market sequences and lifespan scenarios (for each spouse). [9] The approach can deal with the complex interdependencies between subject areas (domains) mentioned above as well as tax and legislative provisions.

Other models

Contemporary retirement planning models have yet to be validated in the sense that the models purport to project a future that has yet to manifest itself. The criticism with contemporary models are some of the same levied against Neoclassical economics. The critic[ who? ] argues that contemporary models may only have proven validity retrospectively, whereas it is the indeterminate future that needs solution. A more moderate school believes that retirement planning methods must further evolve by adopting a more robust and integrated set of tools from the field of complexity science. Recent research has explored the effects of the elimination of capital income taxes on saving-for-retirement opportunities and its impact on government debt. [10]

See also

Related Research Articles

Retirement is the withdrawal from one's position or occupation or from one's active working life. A person may also semi-retire by reducing work hours or workload.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pension</span> Retirement fund

A pension is a fund into which amounts are paid regularly during an individual's working career, and from which periodic payments are made to support the person's retirement from work. A pension may be:

A pension fund, also known as a superannuation fund in some countries, is any program, fund, or scheme which provides retirement income.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Personal finance</span> Budgeting and expenses

Personal finance is the financial management that an individual or a family unit performs to budget, save, and spend monetary resources in a controlled manner, taking into account various financial risks and future life events.

A registered retirement savings plan (RRSP), or retirement savings plan (RSP), is a type of financial account in Canada for holding savings and investment assets. RRSPs have various tax advantages compared to investing outside of tax-preferred accounts. They were introduced in 1957 to promote savings for retirement by employees and self-employed people.

Tax advantage refers to the economic bonus which applies to certain accounts or investments that are, by statute, tax-reduced, tax-deferred, or tax-free. Examples of tax-advantaged accounts and investments include retirement plans, education savings accounts, medical savings accounts, and government bonds. Governments establish tax advantages to encourage private individuals to contribute money when it is considered to be in the public interest.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Retirement plans in the United States</span>

A retirement plan is a financial arrangement designed to replace employment income upon retirement. These plans may be set up by employers, insurance companies, trade unions, the government, or other institutions. Congress has expressed a desire to encourage responsible retirement planning by granting favorable tax treatment to a wide variety of plans. Federal tax aspects of retirement plans in the United States are based on provisions of the Internal Revenue Code and the plans are regulated by the Department of Labor under the provisions of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA).

The Social Security debate in the United States encompasses benefits, funding, and other issues. Social Security is a social insurance program officially called "Old-age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance" (OASDI), in reference to its three components. It is primarily funded through a dedicated payroll tax. During 2015, total benefits of $897 billion were paid out versus $920 billion in income, a $23 billion annual surplus. Excluding interest of $93 billion, the program had a cash deficit of $70 billion. Social Security represents approximately 40% of the income of the elderly, with 53% of married couples and 74% of unmarried persons receiving 50% or more of their income from the program. An estimated 169 million people paid into the program and 60 million received benefits in 2015, roughly 2.82 workers per beneficiary. Reform proposals continue to circulate with some urgency, due to a long-term funding challenge faced by the program as the ratio of workers to beneficiaries falls, driven by the aging of the baby-boom generation, expected continuing low birth rate, and increasing life expectancy. Program payouts began exceeding cash program revenues in 2011; this shortfall is expected to continue indefinitely under current law.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Financial adviser</span> Professional who renders financial services to clients

A financial adviser or financial advisor is a professional who provides financial services to clients based on their financial situation. In many countries, financial advisors must complete specific training and be registered with a regulatory body in order to provide advice.

In the United States, an annuity is a financial product which offers tax-deferred growth and which usually offers benefits such as an income for life. Typically these are offered as structured (insurance) products that each state approves and regulates in which case they are designed using a mortality table and mainly guaranteed by a life insurer. There are many different varieties of annuities sold by carriers. In a typical scenario, an investor will make a single cash premium to own an annuity. After the policy is issued the owner may elect to annuitize the contract for a chosen period of time. This process is called annuitization and can also provide a predictable, guaranteed stream of future income during retirement until the death of the annuitant. Alternatively, an investor can defer annuitizing their contract to get larger payments later, hedge long-term care cost increases, or maximize a lump sum death benefit for a named beneficiary.

A private pension is a plan into which individuals privately contribute from their earnings, which then will pay them a pension after retirement. It is an alternative to the state pension. Usually, individuals invest funds into saving schemes or mutual funds, run by insurance companies. Often private pensions are also run by the employer and are called occupational pensions. The contributions into private pension schemes are usually tax-deductible.

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to finance:

A life annuity is an annuity, or series of payments at fixed intervals, paid while the purchaser is alive. The majority of life annuities are insurance products sold or issued by life insurance companies however substantial case law indicates that annuity products are not necessarily insurance products.

Financial gerontology is a multidisciplinary field of study encompassing both academic and professional education, that integrates research on aging and human development with the concerns of finance and business. Following from its roots in social gerontology, Financial gerontology is not simply the study of old people but emphasizes the multiple processes of aging. In particular, research and teaching in financial gerontology draws upon four kinds of aging or "'four lenses" through which aging and finance can be viewed: population aging, individual aging, family aging, and generational aging. While it is problematic that "demography is destiny," demographic concepts, issues, and data play a substantial role in understanding the dynamics of financial gerontology. For example, through the lens of population aging, demography identifies the number of persons of different ages in cities and countries—and at multiple points in time. Through the lens of individual aging, demography also notes changes in the length of time—number of years lived in older age, typically measured by increases in life expectancy. From in its founding years in the beginning of the 21st century, one primary interest of Financial Gerontology has been on baby boomers and their relationships with their parents. The impact of these two kinds of aging on finance are reasonably apparent. The large and increasing number of older persons [population aging] in a society, no matter how "old age" is defined, and the longer each of these persons lives [individual aging], the greater the impact on a society's pattern of retirement, public and private pension systems, health, health care, and the personal and societal financing of health care. The focus on boomers illustrates also the other two lenses or "kinds" of aging. How boomers deal with the social, emotional, and financial aspects of their parents' aging is a central aspect of family aging. And how boomers may differ from their parents born and raised twenty to forty years earlier, and differ from their Generation X and Millennial children and grandchildren, are substantial aspects of generational aging.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Defined benefit pension plan</span> Type of pension plan

Defined benefit (DB) pension plan is a type of pension plan in which an employer/sponsor promises a specified pension payment, lump-sum, or combination thereof on retirement that depends on an employee's earnings history, tenure of service and age, rather than depending directly on individual investment returns. Traditionally, many governmental and public entities, as well as a large number of corporations, provide defined benefit plans, sometimes as a means of compensating workers in lieu of increased pay.

At retirement, individuals stop working and no longer get employment earnings, and enter a phase of their lives, where they rely on the assets they have accumulated, to supply money for their spending needs for the rest of their lives. Retirement spend-down, or withdrawal rate, is the strategy a retiree follows to spend, decumulate or withdraw assets during retirement.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pensions in Canada</span> Overview of pensions in Canada

Pensions in Canada can be public, private, and collective, or come from individual savings.

In France, pensions fall into five major divisions;

Income drawdown is a method withdrawing benefits from a UK Registered Pension Scheme. In theory, it is available under any money purchase pension scheme. However, it is, in practice, rarely offered by occupational pensions and is therefore generally only available to those who own, or transfer to, a personal pension.

The Swiss pension system rests on three pillars:

  1. the state-run pension scheme for the aged, orphans, and surviving spouses ;
  2. the pension funds run by investment foundations, which are tied to employers ;
  3. voluntary, private investments.

References

  1. Hershey, Douglas A.; Jacobs-Lawson, Joy M.; McArdle, John J.; Hamagami, Fumiaki (2007). "Psychological Foundations of Financial Planning for Retirement". Journal of Adult Development. 14 (1–2): 26–36. doi:10.1007/s10804-007-9028-1. S2CID   143157387.
  2. "10 Good Practice Principles for Retirement Modelling" (PDF).
  3. Baulkaran, Vishaal; Jain, Pawan (January 27, 2024). "Behavioral Biases of Financial Planners: The Case of Retirement Funding Recommendations". Journal of Behavioral Finance: 1–14. doi:10.1080/15427560.2024.2305412. ISSN   1542-7560.
  4. Baulkaran, Vishaal; Jain, Pawan (January 27, 2024). "Behavioral Biases of Financial Planners: The Case of Retirement Funding Recommendations". Journal of Behavioral Finance: 1–14. doi:10.1080/15427560.2024.2305412. ISSN   1542-7560.
  5. "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on July 29, 2012. Retrieved July 17, 2016.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  6. "Good Practice Principles for Retirement Modelling | Actuaries Institute" (PDF).
  7. "Retirement Plans: How to Prepare & Protect Your Investment Accounts | HORAN".
  8. Guest (January 14, 2016). "Planning Your Retirement Using The Monte Carlo Simulation".
  9. "Stochastic Modelling at Household Level". Jubilacion. Retrieved March 15, 2023.
  10. Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, "On Efficiently Financing Retirement", November 2011.