With the introduction of the concept of anchoring, Tversky and Kahneman opened the door to a new way of thinking about and addressing the financial decision-making process. For more than four decades, subsequent research has expanded upon their idea. Yet, plan sponsors and participants continue to remain uninformed of the dangers of anchoring.
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Never belittle the question or the person asking the question. These are sincere queries that represent commonly held beliefs. These beliefs live a Schrodinger Cat-like existence, being generally not quite true and not quite false. It’s critical, for the benefit of all retirement savers, that these questions be asked and that fiduciaries encourage their asking. This is the only way that allows the fiduciary to respond in the second noteworthy way: By using these questions to refute misconceptions and promote good retirement saving decision-making.
For all the talk and concern about Congress cutting the contribution caps for 401k plan, the real news appears to be just the opposite. Sometimes, it’s better to wait for the final result rather than get worked up about what you think may happen.
While much has been written of the lack of retirement savings among Americans, the most widely talked about change – lowering the cap on tax deductions – could exasperate the lack of retirement savings.
The primary reasons for small businesses that you don’t offer 401k plans are cost, complexity, and liability exposure. The traditional 401k plan has a lot of baggage rolled to those areas. It’s complicated. It’s definitely not easy. For local business of 10 to 15 employees that have so many different things they have to deal with, they just aren’t in position to want to have to deal with the baggage with the 401k plan.
According to the Investment Company Institute, only 1.9% of all Roth IRAs are rollovers. Why aren’t more opting to rollover into Roths?
If you want to understand how sophisticated plan sponsors think, you need to talk to sophisticated plan sponsors. For many years, Dale Neibert served as part of a two-man operation that headed one of the nation’s most sophisticated 401k plans. He explains how this plan sponsor incorporated advance behavioral finance techniques, and how it avoided some of today’s most dangerous fads.
Just because the new Rule won’t be enforced until January doesn’t mean retirement savers can’t take advantage of it. This does, however, require individuals become self-reliance and look out for their own good. But how is that any different for all other consumer decisions?
Ted Benna says ERISA/PBGC – not the 401k – killed pension plans and that pensions no longer make sense given our current job-hopping demographics. He also says a lot more in this must read interview.
Remember, it’s not what you know that’s important, it’s knowing that you don’t know what’s important that’s important.
