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Funding Savings Needed for Health Expenses for Persons Eligible for Medicare

Even though the new health reform law will reduce some health costs in retirement for many people, retirees will still need a significant amount of savings to cover their out-of-pocket health expenses when they retire, according to a new report by EBRI. For instance, EBRI finds that men retiring in this year (2010) at age 65 will need anywhere from $65,000–$109,000 in savings to cover health insurance premiums and out-of-pocket expenses in retirement if they want a 50–50 chance of being able to have enough money; to improve the odds to 90 percent, they’ll need between $124,000–$211,000. Women in particular will need more savings than men because they tend to live longer. EBRI Issue Brief Dec 1, 2010 16 pages

401(k) Plan Asset Allocation, Account Balances, and Loan Activity in 2009

The average 401(k) retirement account balance rose 31.9 percent in 2009, according to a report released today by the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI) and the Investment Company Institute (ICI) analyzing a group of consistent participants. The rise in 2009 was in line with the 2003–2007 pattern of steady increase in account balances and in contrast to the 27.8 percent decline in 2008. EBRI Issue Brief Nov 22, 2010 68 pages

"Retirement Plan Participation: Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP) Data, 2009," and "Variation in Public Opinion About Health Reform, by Plan Type: Findings from the 2010 EBRI/MGA Consumer Engagement in Health Care Survey"

Retirement Participation: The latest SIPP data show 59 percent of all workers over age 16 had an employer that sponsored a pension or retirement plan for any of its employees in 2009, down from previous levels (60 percent 1998 and 63 percent 2003), and the same as in 2006. Public Opinion About Health Reform: Most individuals with private health insurance have negative expectations of how the new law will affect them personally. Individuals with traditional health coverage tend to have more positive views than those with high-deductible or consumer-driven health plans. Press release EBRI Notes Nov 18, 2010 20 pages

'Retirement Savings Shortfalls for Today’s Workers' and 'The Impact of the COBRA Premium Subsidy on Coverage'

Retirement Savings Shortfalls: Recent analysis by EBRI finds that the average retirement savings shortfall is about $48,000 per individual—and that adding nursing home and home health care costs would in some cases almost double that amount.

COBRA: The federal subsidy to help laid-off American workers pay for continued health care through the COBRA program helped fewer individuals than expected—in part because COBRA premiums remained unaffordable for many families even with the subsidy, according to a new article by EBRI.

EBRI Notes Oct 14, 2010 24 pages

Employment-Based Retirement Plan Participation: Geographic Differences and Trends, 2009

New analysis by the nonpartisan Employee Benefit Research Institute shows the employment-based retirement system, while still critical to Americans’ retirement income security, continues to feel the pressure of the recent economic downturn: The number of American workers participating in a retirement plan continued to decrease last year, adding to the trend that began with the recession of 2008 and reaching its lowest level in a decade. EBRI Issue Brief Oct 13, 2010 44 pages

Sources of Health Insurance and Characteristics of the Uninsured: Analysis of the March 2010 Current Population Survey

EBRI’s calculations from recently released data from the U.S. Census Bureau show that employment-based coverage remains the dominant source of health insurance, but continues to erode, declining by more than 2 percentage points last year. Overall, the percentage of individuals under age 65 with employment-based coverage declined from 61.1 percent in 2008 to 59 percent in 2009—its lowest level in the 15-year period between 1994 and 2009. EBRI Issue Brief Sep 22, 2010 40 pages

IRA Balances and Contributions: An Overview of the EBRI IRA Database

This report provides initial results of a new EBRI database on individual retirement accounts (IRAs), which for the first time allows researchers to more accurately measure IRA assets and ownership across multiple data providers, and to track retirement assets as they move through different types of retirement plans. For instance, the EBRI IRA Database finds that when owners of more than one IRA are identified and their assets are combined, their total IRA balance is about 25 percent higher than the unaggregated account average within the database. The EBRI IRA Databases unique in that it can link the accounts of individuals with more than one account in the database, thus aggregating total IRA assets and giving a more realistic picture of their IRA-based retirement savings. Not only will EBRI be able to link individuals within and across data providers in the database, but in the near future it will also be able to link the data with participants in 401(k) plans, allowing retirement funds to be tracked as they are generated, rolled over, and ultimately used. The data security techniques used by data providers assure that EBRI has no ability to identify individuals so that all privacy is assured. EBRI Issue Brief Sep 21, 2010 20 pages