Morningstar Research & Common Workplace Retirement Plan Assumptions

Its episodes like these that were one of my primary motivations for starting the podcast, examining current beliefs or messaging in the marketplace and applying contemporary critical thinking to examine if they are still valid and reliable for both employers and employees in workplace retirement plans.  If you sponsor a 401(k) or other workplace retirement plans you have likely been given some off the cuff guidance on how much your employees should be saving for retirement, what is an adequate amount of income someone should be able to replace in retirement, what returns should people expect from their retirement savings and likely many others.  To help stress test these and other topics, I have David Blanchett, Head of Retirement Research at Morningstar to explore things!  He did such a great job so I'm not gong to steal his thunder; but I will say some things you have likely heard hold up, and others simply don't.  While we tackle some meaty topics, I was incredibly impressed with David's ability to break all this down in an easy to digest manner, but also tie back why this is important for both employers and employees to get their arms around to improve retirement outcomes.     Guest Bio David Blanchett, PhD, CFA, CFP® is head of retirement research for Morningstar Investment Management LLC. In this role, he works to enhance the group's consulting and investment services and conducts research primarily in the areas of financial planning, tax planning, annuities, and retirement. His research has been published in a variety of industry and academic journals and received a number of awards, most recently the Journal of Financial Planning's 2014 and 2015 Montgomery-Warschauer Award and the Financial Analysts Journal's 2015 Graham and Dodd Scroll Award. He is a frequent speaker at industry conferences and is regularly quoted in the national media. He holds a master's degree in financial services from the American College, a master's degree in business administration from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business, and a doctorate in personal financial planning program from Texas Tech University. 401(k) Fridays Podcast Overview Struggling with a fiduciary issue, looking for strategies to improve employee retirement outcomes or curious about the impact of current events on your workplace retirement plan? We've had conversations with retirement industry leaders to address these and other relevant topics! You can easily explore over seventy-five prior on-demand audio interviews here. Don't forget to subscribe as we release a new episode each Friday!