USA Today – Aug 12, 2014

If you are woefully behind on saving for retirement, then try to delay gratification on purchases, save your raises and pay off credit cards, financial experts say.

A national survey out Tuesday shows that about 36% of workers have less than $1,000 in savings and investments that could be used for retirement, not counting their primary residence or defined benefits plans such as traditional pensions, and 60% of workers have less than $25,000.

Like workers, many retirees are also short on funds, with 29% of them having less than $1,000 in savings and investments, and 58% of them having less than $25,000, according to a telephone survey of 1,000 workers and 501 retirees from the non-profit Employee Benefit Research Institute and Greenwald and Associates.

By Brenton Smity, The Hill – Aug 12, 2014

The trustees of the Social Security Trust Funds released their report on July 28. The details of the report clearly show that the crisis in Social Security is not only deepening but widening as well.

The conventional measure of the report is the exhaustion point of the trust fund, which continues to be 2033. That is the point at which financial consequences start falling on retirees. That date didn’t change, but every other measure of the crisis has changed for the worse.

The reasonable solvency of the system was reduced over the course of 2013 from 19 years to 18 years. This reduction means that for the first time in history on average someone retiring today at normal retirement age expects to outlive full benefits. Anyone who is 48 years old or younger roughly expects to retire after the system pays depleted benefits. This, believe it or not, is the good news.

By Michael Cohn, Accounting Today – Aug 11, 2014

In addition, nearly half of adults were not actively thinking about financial planning for retirement, with 24 percent saying they had given only little thought to financial planning for their retirement and another 25 percent saying they had done no planning at all. Of those who have given at least some thought to retirement planning and plan to retire at some point, 25 percent said they didn’t know how they will pay their expenses in retirement.

By Vipal Monga, Wall Street Journal – Aug 11, 2014

 government accounting maneuver to pay for road repairs, subways and buses will allow many U.S. businesses to delay billions of dollars in pension contributions for retirees.

President Barack Obama on Friday signed a $10.8 billion transportation bill that extends a “pension-smoothing” provision for another 10 months. In short: companies can delay making mandatory pension contributions, but because those payments are tax-deductible some businesses will pay slightly higher tax bills, which will help pay for the legislation.

Companies with 100 of the country’s largest pensions were expected to contribute $44 billion to their plans this year, but that could be slashed by 30% next year, estimated John Ehrhardt, an actuary at consulting firm Milliman.

International Paper Co. IP -0.95% , for example, had planned to set aside $1 billion by 2016 to fund its $12.5 billion U.S. defined benefit plan. The paper company says it now expects to funnel that money into other projects, including share buybacks or investments in new plants. 

Wall Street Journal – Aug 11, 2014

Why There Is No Single Fix to Social Security

BUD HEBELER: Having participated in a national conference on this subject, I understand the political difficulties in making any change at all.

In fact, the political realities are that changing only one thing has to be so severe that the change would completely alienate one segment of the voters.

Therefore, both the political and financial realities are that three or four things must be done simultaneously:  

By Dan Kadlec, Time – Aug 10, 2014

It seems counter intuitive: Of all Americans who retired since the Great Recession, more retired earlier than expected than later than expected, a new Fed report shows.

This finding appears to be at odds with everything we’ve heard about the growing need to delay retirement and — my all-time favorite oxymoron — work in retirement.

Yet the numbers don’t lie: 15% of those who have retired since 2008 did so earlier than planned; only 4% did so later than planned. This is according to the latest Fed data, which goes to September 2013.

The data clearly show what we all know: In order to make ends meet, workers intend to stay on the job longer, not shorter. Two in five workers 45 or older plan to delay retirement. Among pre-retirees 55 to 64 years old, only 18% expect to retire on time and stop working altogether. A quarter expects to work as long as they can and another quarter expects to work part-time or become self-employed in retirement.

By Ben Ritz, The Hill – Aug 7, 2014

Social Security pays the benefits of retirees and disabled workers through a combined 12.4 percent payroll tax it collects from wage earners and their employers. Of that, 10.6 percent is obligated to pay Old Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI) benefits and 1.8 percent is obligated for Disability Insurance (DI). Additionally, income taxes collected on these benefits are funneled back into the program.

By Jonnelle Marte, Washington Post – Aug 7, 2014

Yes, you read that correctly.

The sobering statistic was one of many released by the Federal Reserve on Thursday as part of its report on the economic well-being of U.S. households, which surveyed more than 4,100 people online last year between mid-September and early October.

By John W. Schoen, CNBC – Aug 7, 2014

Which is in greater need of repair—the pothole-riddled nation’s highways or underfunded corporate pension funds?

According to Congress, which last month approved a $10.8 billion patch to prevent the Highway Trust Fund from veering into insolvency, the answer is potholes.

The White House on Wednesday held up the short-term fix as an example of congressional gridlock, as Vice President Joseph Biden ripped Congress for kicking the Highway Trust Fund can just a few miles down the road.

“Hell, Congress can’t even decide on a gas tax to keep the highway system going,” he said. 

By Beth Franklin, Investment News – Aug 7, 2014

I received an interesting question from an individual investor during one of my recent Social Security presentations.

The woman, a client who attended a financial planning firm’s retirement symposium where I was speaking in McLean, Va., wanted to know why her Social Security benefit had declined this year.

Was she younger than her full retirement age and still working? I asked.

No, she replied.