CHICAGO (Reuters) – (The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a columnist for Reuters.)

If you work for a company with a pension plan, don’t be surprised if you get an offer soon for a lump sum buyout – a deal where you accept a pile of cash in exchange for the promise of lifetime income when you retire.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – (The writer is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.)

Medicare turned 49 years old last week, and the program celebrated with some good financial news for seniors: Premiums will not rise in 2015 for the third consecutive year.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – (The opinions expressed here are those of the author, a columnist for Reuters.)

It may be true that money can’t buy you love, but can it buy happiness in retirement? Most people would say it can, but financial planner Wes Moss wanted the details: Just how much money does it take to retire happily – and is there a point of diminishing happiness return on the size of a nest egg?  

CHICAGO (Reuters) – The window is closing on our last best chance to protect the pensions of 10 million American workers and retirees.

These workers are in multi-employer plans – traditional defined benefit pension plans jointly funded by groups of employers in industries like construction, trucking, mining and food retailing. Although many of the country’s 1,400 multi-employer plans are healthy, 1.5 million workers are in plans that are failing. And that threatens the broader system.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – If you worry about the future of Social Security and Medicare, this is the week to get answers to your questions. The most authoritative annual reports on the long-term health of both programs were issued on Monday, and while the news was mixed, there are reasons to be encouraged about our two most important retirement programs.

Under the Social Security Act, a board of trustees reports annually to Congress on the status and long-term financial prospects of Social Security and Medicare. The reports are prepared by the professional actuaries who have made careers out of managing the numbers and are signed by three cabinet secretaries, the commissioner of Social Security and two publicly appointed trustees – one Republican, one Democrat.

CHICAGO, July 24 (Reuters) – Individual Retirement Account
contributions are getting larger – an encouraging sign of a
recovering economy and improved habits among retirement savers.

But there is an “I” in IRA for a reason: investors are in
charge of managing their accounts. And recent research by
Vanguard finds that many of us are leaving returns on the table
due to an all-too-human fault: procrastination in the timing of
our contributions.

CHICAGO, July 22 (Reuters) – Longevity risk – that is, the
risk of outliving your retirement savings – is among retirees’
biggest worries these days. The Obama administration is trying
to nudge employers to add a special type of annuity to their
investment menus that addresses that risk. But here’s the
response they’re likely to get: “Meh.”

The U.S. Treasury released rules earlier this month aimed at
encouraging 401(k) plans to offer “longevity annuities” – a form
of income annuity in which payouts start only after you reach an
advanced age, typically 85.

CHICAGO, July 17 (Reuters) – The Twitterverse has questions
about retirement. What’s the best way for young people to get
started saving? Are target date funds good or bad? Should we
expand Social Security to help low-wage workers?

Those are just a few of the great questions I fielded during
a retirement Tweet-up convened this week by my colleagues at
Reuters. Since my column allows for responses beyond Twitter’s
140-character limit, today I’m expanding on answers to five
questions I found especially interesting. You can view the
entire chat – which included advice from personal finance gurus
from Reuters and Charles Schwab – on Twitter at #ReutersRetire.

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Getting low-risk yield has been one of the toughest challenges for retirees ever since the financial meltdown of 2008-2009. Interest rates are near zero, and many retirees are nervous about bonds out of fear that rates might jump.

All of which leaves a simple question: How about a good old-fashioned certificate of deposit?

CHICAGO (Reuters) – Should seniors pay more for Medicare? Republicans think so; they have repeatedly called for replacing the current program with vouchers that would shift cost and risk to seniors.

There’s no doubt this is where Republicans will take us if they capture control of Congress this year, and the White House in 2016. Representative Paul Ryan, the Wisconsin Republican who chairs the House Budget Committee, advocates “premium support” reforms that would give seniors vouchers to buy private Medicare insurance policies in lieu of traditional fee-for-service Medicare.