|
February 2005
Welcome to Prairie Post, Blue Prairie
Group's monthly e-Newsletter about Human Resource and Institutional Retirement & Investment issues.
|
|
|
|
In this issue...
|
|
-
The
Future of Retirement Plans According to the Just Released Modified
Delphi Study
- COMMENTARY:
Five Trends to Watch in 2005
-
CASE STUDY: Weyerhaeuser's Approach to Addressing Women's Retirement
Needs
-
Top
Ten Issues Found In EPTA Audits
-
American Jobs Creation Act Has Broad Range
-
Stressed Workers
Want Elder-Care Benefits: Some Companies Give Flex Time to Care for
Aging Parents
-
Consumer-Directed Health Plans: CEOs' Perspectives
on Success
-
Long-Term Care
Insurance Policies Are a Hard Sell in the Workplace
-
Be Careful with
Deferred Compensation -- New Rules May Cost You Money Now
-
New FASB Rules Make
Stock Options an Expense -- Companies Using Tactics to Lighten the Costs
|
|
|
|
The Future of Retirement Plans According to the Just
Released Modified Delphi Study |
|
The study's panel of
experts foresee some changes in retirement plan regulation and taxation,
but none that will affect the fundamental framework of the business. For
example, 63% of the experts agreed that legislation to create individually
managed after-tax retirement savings accounts will pass and change the
dynamics of the retirement plans market.
Click to read the full article
|
|
COMMENTARY: Five Trends to Watch in 2005 |
|
Over the past couple of weeks
the chief question we've been asked goes something like, "What trends do you see
in 2005 related to 401(k) plans?" Our usual off-handed response is "More of the
same." Still, there are some important trends to consider. Here are "five in
'05" for you to ponder.
Click to
read the full article
|
|
CASE STUDY:
Weyerhaeuser's Approach to Addressing Women's Retirement Needs |
|
Weyerhaeuser--a giant forest
product company with annual sales of $19.9 billion and 55,000 employees
worldwide--has offered financial literacy programs for more than 20 years.
"Special Considerations for Women in Planning for Their Financial Future" was
the latest. Sally Hass, benefits education manager, designed and leads it. She
has reached as many as 1,000 women annually for the past five years, spreading
her message to foresters, office managers, production workers and others in 40
locations in North America.
Click to read the full article
|
Top Ten
Issues Found In EPTA Audits
|
|
The Employee
Plans Team Audit (EPTA) Program is a program of broad-scope
examinations of large employer plans with a team of
specialists. The IRS has compiled this list of the most common
issues that have been identified during the planning and
initial stages of these Employee Plans Team Audits. This list
should prove useful in doing self reviews of your own plans.
Click to read the full article
|
American
Jobs Creation Act Has Broad Range
|
|
In addition to
the highly publicized new rules for non-qualified deferred
compensation plans, the American Jobs Creation Act includes
several other compensation and benefit provisions including
additional flexibility for some employers that use excess
assets in their qualified plans to help pay their retiree
health care costs.
Click to read the full article
|
Stressed Workers Want Elder-Care Benefits: Some Companies Give
Flex Time to Care for Aging Parents
|
|
Employees
are increasingly juggling their jobs and the draining demands
of caring for parents. While companies have long offered child
care benefits, a small but growing number are adding elder care
as employee benefits, as Compuware and the United Auto Workers
are doing. Half of working caregivers say they have had to
alter their work schedules to accommodate care-giving
responsibilities, research shows.
Click to read the full article
|
|
Consumer-Directed Health Plans: CEOs' Perspectives on Success
|
|
Top executives in the health
care industry believe employers' growing use of consumer-directed health (CDH)
plans and vastly improved medical information databases are the keys to
containing costs and improving the quality of U.S. health care, according to
CEOs addressing the second annual World Health Care Congress held in Washington,
D.C., Jan. 30–Feb. 1.
Click to read the full article
|
Long-Term
Care Insurance Policies Are a Hard Sell in the Workplace
|
|
Employers may be well versed
on long-term care issues and insurance, but employees do not appear to be
particularly knowledgeable or interested - a fact that makes boosting enrollment
in employer-sponsored LTC programs frustratingly difficult. 'Participation from
a worksite standpoint is a little over 4%,' says James Barrett, president of
American Worksite Insurance Marketing.
Click to read the full article
|
|
Be Careful
with Deferred Compensation -- New Rules May Cost You Money Now
|
|
Nonqualified deferred
compensation plans must have restrictions or 'substantial risks of forfeiture'
in place to qualify. .... For instance, one company's 'substantial risk of
forfeiture' might be that you need to stay with the company for five years to
qualify for your bonus, says Mark Luscombe, a principal federal tax analyst with
CCH, a provider of tax and business law information. Another risk could be that
you must meet certain performance goals to get the money."
Click to read the full article
|
|
New FASB
Rules Make Stock Options an Expense -- Companies Using Tactics
to Lighten the Costs
|
|
With the long-awaited
decision by the Financial Accounting Standards Board in December requiring U.S.
companies to expense their stock options, one of the great accounting debates of
all time has ended. Barring congressional intervention, by July most public
companies will begin treating stock options as an expense. But that doesn't mean
the battle is over. Instead, companies that use options are gearing up for the
next round: cutting their expense by any means legally possible.
Click to read the full article
|
|
|
| |
|
The articles have been carefully chosen from a variety of high-quality sources including government, research and academic institutions.
If you would like to publish your news, original articles, or best practices via
this e-Newsletter, please contact us at info@blueprairiegroup.com or call us toll free at
1-866-274-1899.
Please note: Blue Prairie Group checked each
of these links before sending you this e-Newsletter. However, some links
are only available for a limited period of time, so, you may occasionally
find that a link has expired. If this happens, we apologize for any
inconvenience.
Disclosure Statement:
Blue Prairie Group, L.L.C. does not endorse and disclaims any and all responsibility or liability for the accuracy, content, completeness, legality, or reliability of the material. All articles are copyrighted to their publishers.
|
