Helping Individuals Into and Through Retirement with Confidence

TIAA-CREF Institute Fellows Symposium
TIAA-CREF Headquarters
New York, New York

October 2007 |

The TIAA-CREF Institute hosted two Fellows Symposiums in the fall of 2007 focusing on helping employers help their employees "to and through retirement." The symposiums were intended to engage TIAA-CREF leadership in meaningful dialogue with leading academics and researchers in the fields of retirement and financial security.

The second in the series of symposia, held on October 5, 2007, focused on understanding and influencing the retirement decision and exploring strategies to ensure financial security throughout retirement ("through retirement"). Co-organized with Alicia Munnell and the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, the symposium covered the following topics:

• Helping individuals address the psychological, emotional, social and other non-financial aspects of the retirement decision/process;
• Providing guidance on how to live in retirement;
• The impact of phased-retirement incentives on individuals’ retirement decisions;
• The behavioral finance aspects of asset decumulation;
• Providing financial advice for individuals throughout retirement;
• New structures for payout annuity products;
• Products allowing individuals to utilize their housing wealth in retirement.

The symposium featured presentations by:

Julie Agnew, Professor of Economics and Finance, The College of William & Mary
Jeffrey Brown, Professor of Finance and Julian Simon Memorial Faculty Fellow, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Conrad Ciccotello, Director, Personal Financial Planning Program, Georgia State University
Neal Cutler, Associate Director, Gerontology Program, University of North Carolina, Greensboro
Tay McNamara, The Center on Aging and Workplace Flexibility, Boston College
Alicia H. Munnell, Director, Center for Retirement Research at Boston College; Peter F. Drucker Professor of Management Sciences, Boston College (Moderator)
David Richardson, Principal Research Fellow, TIAA-CREF Institute (Moderator)
Anthony Webb, Research Economist, Center for Retirement Research, Boston College

The first symposium in this series,held in September, focused on topics related to helping plan sponsors ensure that their employees are financially prepared for retirement (“to retirement”).