So, How Much Does It Take to “FIRE”?

For every nineteen people who have trouble saving much of anything for retirement, there is one on the other end of the savings spectrum who is almost religious in his or her zeal for saving and retiring early.  And more power to these folks.  As proof that these “hyper savers” actually exist and to learn more about their philosophies, you can visit the Reddit forum called “Financial Independence,” which is closely related to FI/RE (Financial Independence/ Retire Early).  According to the forum (which has almost 400,000 subscribers), “FI/RE is about maximizing your savings rate (through less spending and/or higher income) to achieve FI and have the freedom to RE as fast as possible.”

Actuaries Want Plan Sponsors to Provide More Complicated Benefit Statements

In its July 6, 2018 letter to Senator Johnny Isakson, sponsor of the Lifetime Income Disclosure Act, the American Academy of Actuaries (AAA) suggested several “improvements” to Senator Isakson’s act applicable to hard-copy defined contribution plan statements provided to plan participants.  As opposed to the relatively simple and straight-forward requirement proposed by the senator that at least one participant statement per any 12-month period contain “the lifetime income stream equivalent of the total benefits accrued with respect to the participant,” the AAA would like to see plan sponsors provide significantly more information to their participants.  Needless to say, this additional information would make the hard-copy benefit statement required by law much more complicated to prepare and potentially more confusing to participants.