Category Archives: Pensions

The Pension Series (Part 25): Pension Design

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Defined benefit pensions are not created equal.

I wish they were, mainly because it would make my job of explaining pensions easier, but that simply isn’t the case. Most pensions are designed differently than each other. In some cases, pension design varies significantly, in others only slightly. However, in almost all cases, these variations in pension design produce unique plans.

This fundamental truth is key to understanding the potentially decisive role of a defined benefit pension (DBP) in a pensioner’s retirement outcome. This truth is also vital for understanding a DBP’s influence during an employee’s decision to depart a pensionable job before reaching retirement eligibility. Academics and economists call this departure decision a voluntary turnover decision. However, I call it a Golden Albatross moment for those in a pensionable job. Future pensioners and current pensionable employees must understand their pension design in both the retirement and Golden Albatross scenarios. They can do this by examining their pension’s design elements. Continue reading →

The Pension Series (Part 24): The Golden Albatross vs. Black Pensions

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Black Pensions Matter

On April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, while supporting a Black sanitation workers strike (Hutchinson, 2019). Most Americans probably know those sad facts because they either lived through them or studied them at school. However, most Americans probably don’t know that the sanitation workers’ demands included a “10% wage increase, fair promotion policies, sick leave, pension programs, health insurance, and payroll deduction of union dues” (Estes, 2000, p. 158). Civil Rights advocates, like Dr. King, saw pensions and the organization of Black labor as one of many ways to improve the lives of Black workers and a method to level the economic playing field (Schmitt, 2008). So, believe it or not, Black pensions matter, and have for a long time.

Jobs and civil rights. The issues haven’t changed (Library of Congress, 28th August 1963).

I don’t wade into the subject of race and pensions lightly. But, up to this point, my work on the Golden Albatross worth vs. worth it decision framework has focused solely on the issues a generic pensionable worker would need to consider. And, since I’m a White-guy, it’s reasonable to assume that my vision of that generic worker was White … and a guy.

My lack of consideration for how the Golden Albatross decision framework might need to adapt based on either sex or race seems myopic. It looks incredibly myopic when considering the global re-emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement in 2020, as well as the unequal devastation caused by the COVID-19 along racial and socioeconomic lines. As a result, this article marks my first effort to correct my mistake. Continue reading →

The Pension Series (Part 23): Organizational Culture and Pension Signals

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The Long Road to Pension Signals

I struggled with categorizing this post. It’s ultimately about the importance of pension signals that companies and organizations broadcast to their workers. For that reason, I made it a part of the Pension Series. However, I meander through several (somewhat funny) stories, and explain the importance of organizational culture, prior to arriving at pension signals. As a result, I could have placed it in my Life and Money section. In any case, if you don’t have the time to read my well crafted narrative, no worries, just skip to the last two sections. You’ll miss a lot of the context, but capture the main points. On the other hand, if you have time to take the long road to pension signals, please read onwards … which is actually downwards. Continue reading →

The Pension Series (Part 22): Analyzing Public Pension Plan Safety

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How Safe Is My Pension?

Pension plan safety is one of the most popular and relevant topics among the potential pensioners who read my blog. It’s popular because much like Social Security, chronic underfunding of certain types of pensions receives a lot of bad press in the U.S. As a result, many people think that all pension plans are circling the drain. While that isn’t true, as with most things in life, determining the truth about your pension plan’s safety is a somewhat subjective and complicated journey. However, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t strive to answer the question, especially if the Golden Albatross has trapped you in its maw.

Pension plan safety

Instead of a circling the drain, how about a black hole sun?

There’s a reason why I started the Pension Series with the topic of pension safety. I said it then, and restated it more recently in my book; no issue cuts straight to the chase quicker than pension plan safety. That’s especially true when trying to determine if staying for a pension is worth it. If you are facing the gut-wrenching stay or leave decision at your pensionable job, and you decide there’s a high probability the pension won’t be there at retirement, then you may not require any further analysis. In other words, the realization that the pension won’t be there as promised effectively ends the internal debate. Continue reading →

The Pension Series (Part 21): Lump-Sum Buyout Offers

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Grumpus the Prognosticator

Considering that I’m publishing this article during the COVID-19 Pandemic, I want to take a few paragraphs to acknowledge that these are troubled times without turning this into an article exclusively about the pandemic. As COVID-19 causes mass lock-downs and lay-offs all over the world, it’s forcing people to examine what their jobs and careers mean, especially if they no longer have one. Looking past the immediate onset of events, many are also questioning what employment will look like in a post-pandemic world with no vaccine close at hand. On the surface, then, it seems like an awkward time to publish an academic study of pension lump-sum buyout offers, which many people associate with the retirement end of a pensionable career.

Lump-sum buyout

Let me look into my crystal ball. I hope we can look back in a year and say I was wrong.

However, if the economic impact of the pandemic continues to suppress interest rates and cause significant amounts of market volatility, or a prolonged bear market, it will weaken many pension funds, similar to 2008 and 2009. Some will even enter the dreaded death spiral that I covered in Part 20 of the Pension Series. Under these circumstances, I’d expect lump-sum buyout offers to proliferate as pension funds de-risk to shore-up their finances. The two main methods for de-risking are lump-sum buyout offers and the same sort of Pension Risk Transfers (PRTs) I examined in Part 14 of the Pension Series. Therefore, it’s reasonable to assume that with more lump sums on offer more employees will take them, especially if they believe their pension funds are in the type of trouble I outline in Part 1 of the Pension Series.

Continue reading →

The Pension Series (Part 11) : Pension Lump Sum Case Study — Updated

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Substantive Revision

This is a substantive revision to the original Pension Series Part 11 article I published on 18 JAN 2018. I updated this article because I have a new method for calculating the Total Dollar Value (TDV) of pensions that do not possess a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA). The new method is far more accurate than the old method, so I am updating all articles in which I used the old method. That said, the new formula didn’t change the results of this case study because the estimated value of the pension annuities on offer increased vice decreased. As a result, the new method only strengthened the recommendation I made for the ChooseFI listener to concentrate on comparing the difference in value between her $75,740 lump sum offer and the lifetime annuity starting at age 60. 

Any additions I made to the text are in blue. Sentences from the old version of this article that discuss my old TDV method are struck through. I only used the feature a few times in the text, mostly to replace the old TDV steps with the new. As a result, the article itself remains fairly coherent.  Continue reading →

The Pension Series (Part 13): The Master Pension Value Calculator (Updated)

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Substantive Revision

This is a substantive revision to the original Pension Series Part 13 article I published on 04 FEB 2018. I updated this article because I have a new method for calculating the Total Dollar Value (TDV) of pensions that do not possess a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA). The new method is far more accurate than the old method, so I am updating all articles in which I used the old method. That said, the new formula didn’t change the results of this case study because the estimated value of the pension increased, instead of decreased. As a result, it only strengthened the argument for Ms. Money Penny to stick with the lifetime annuity. 

The major changes for this article are in the spreadsheet, not in the text itself. If you downloaded and used the old spreadsheet, you should delete it and download the updated version. Any additions I made to the text are blue, and I only used the strikethrough feature a few times in the text, mostly to replace the old TDV with the new sum. As a result, the article itself remains fairly coherent.  Continue reading →

The Pension Series (Part 19): Pension Annuity vs. Lump Sum Analysis (Again) — Updated

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Substantive Revision

This is a substantive revision to the original Pension Series Part 19 article I published on 23 June 2019. I updated this article because I have a new method for calculating the Total Dollar Value (TDV) of pensions that do not possess a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA). The new method is far more accurate than the old method, so I am updating all articles in which I used the old method.

I notified BrewDog (the subject of this article) and provided him with updated Master Pension Calculator spreadsheets that utilize my new method. I did this because the TDV of his no COLA pension changed significantly when I used the new formula. As a result, I also updated the two spreadsheets embedded in this article and some of the text. If you downloaded the old spreadsheets, delete them, and download the new spreadsheets with the new formula. The text changes are noted in blue below and include strike throughs of the original article’s verbiage when needed. I kept the italicized format for the verbiage cut and pasted from newer emails between BrewDog and myself. 

My apologies for any inconvenience this update may cause, or already has caused. I’m well aware that the updated version of this article no longer reads as clean and easy as the original post. However, I’m committed to ensuring the information shared on this blog is accurate. As a result, when new circumstances alter the accuracy of an old post, I feel obliged to update it, even at the expense of readability.      

If you want more information on why I updated the TDV formula for no COLA pensions, you can go to Part 4 of the Pension Series for the abridged version. That is the source article for all my TDV calculations, and as such I updated it first. If you’d rather read a more in-depth explanation about the impacts of inflation, and the correct way to incorporate it into TDV calculations, then you’ll need to wait for my book, “The Golden Albatross: How To Determine If Your Pension Is Worth It“. It’s currently scheduled to be published in early 2020 by ChooseFI publishing.

Continue reading →

The Pension Series (Part 4): Total Dollar Value (TDV) of Your Pension (Updated)

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Mea Culpa

This is a substantive revision to the original article I published on 01 October 2017 entitled “The Pension Series (Part 4): Total Dollar Value (TDV) of Your Pension.” I am making this substantive revision because I have updated the formula to calculate the Total Dollar Value (TDV) for pensions without a Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA).

In my two-and-a-half years of blogging, this is only the second major revision I’ve made to an article. However, as a result of updating the formula, it will not be my last. Several other articles in which I attempt to calculate the TDV of people’s pensions also need to be changed. I will update and re-publish those articles, much as I did with this one, with notifications to all my readers. But, since this article explains TDV calculations of no COLA pensions, I needed to start with this one. Continue reading →

The Pension Series (Part 20): Pensions, Volatility, and Risk

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Pssssst

Hey! Over here. It’s me, Captain Obvious. I’m one of Grumpus Maximus’s many alter egos. Kind of like that guy from the movie Glass, but all good, no beasts. Don’t tell him, but I snagged the keyboard when he wasn’t looking. I wanted to let everyone know that stock market volatility is back. You already knew that? Of course you did, that’s why I’m called Captain Obvious. What you may not have noticed is that the volatility is spreading. It’s in the bond market now as well as the stock market. Even the U.S. housing market is starting to tremble in certain places.

I told GM that he should’ve written about volatility months ago, but he said too many Financial Independence (FI) bloggers were already writing about it. Plus, he hadn’t taken the time to determine if volatility posed any kind of risk to people’s pensions, or the pension funds that back them. I suspect he was just being lazy. Either that or too busy with his retirement plans to care about all three of his loyal readers. Well, I’m here to tell you that I finally convinced him to research the issue and write a post. Just remember that, when you leave your comments at the bottom of the page. Captain Obvious, out!

Continue reading →