Annuity News

Investment News columnist Darla Mercado wrote an interesting piece of the difficulty of making meaningful comparisons among annuities and related retirement income products. Mercado focuses on the challenges created by the lack of benchmarks in the retirement income industry. Unlike the investment industry where benchmarking and transparency of product features are standard, lifetime income products are opaque and complex. Mercado examines the defined contribution plan sponsor market where...

The Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) is a Washington DC based public policy organization. Among the many programs sponsored by CSIS is the Global Aging Initiative—a program focused on “exploring the long-term economic, social and geopolitical implications of demographic trends." The CSIS Global Aging Initiative is a rich source of demographic content. One of the more interesting pieces of content is what is referred to as the Global Aging Preparedness Index ...

Geneticists at Stanford University recently published the results of an experiment demonstrating that acquired traits can be passed along to offspring. Scientists had previously rejected the notion that offspring could inherit characteristics that a parent organism developed during their lifetime. The Stanford scientists demonstrate that an organism’s behavior and environment are factors that do influence the genes it passes along to offspring. The Stanford epigenetics study focused on...

The first Social Security cost of living adjustment (COLA) since 2009 will go into effect in January 2012. Social Security beneficiaries will receive a 3.6 percent cost of living adjustment beginning in January. This 3.6 percent increase is equivalent to an average of $43 per month for each program participant. This is welcome news to 55 million program beneficiaries—many of whom are largely reliant on Social Security. After the increase, the average monthly Social Security benefit will...