By Chris Taylor

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Don't look now, but your retirement savings plan may not be as ironclad as you think. It may even include some magical thinking.

That's because every retirement calculator features an "annual rate of return" that savers typically are asked to plug in for themselves. And the hard truth is, no one really knows how well their investments will perform in the future -- and that makes all our detailed retirement calculations seem kind of futile.

But here's something we do know: The good old days, when savers blithely counted on their retirement savings growing 7 percent or 8 percent or even 10 percent, year after year after year, are likely gone. In the New Normal, cautious investors are learning to revise their expectations downward.

People like Louis Berlin, for example. The Miami insurance salesman was one of those who piled into risky assets in the late 1990s, and thought he could rely on hefty annual stock gains.

"I thought those 90s rates of return were going to carry us all through, and then we had a Lost Decade," he says.

After losing hundreds of thousands of dollars in the dot-com bust, he settled on a new rate of return for the future: 3 percent. Or, when he's feeling a little devil-may-care, 4 percent.

"When people start expecting 8 or 10 percent a year, that's when they get into real trouble," says the 58-year-old, who currently keeps about half of his portfolio in equities. "People get carried away on the high side, and when reality hits they're unprepared. Then you have a whole decade of missed returns you have to make up."

REALISTIC OR MAGICAL?

So what's realistic when it comes to portfolio returns, and what's essentially magical thinking? After all, you have to put some number into those retirement calculators, even if it's just a back-of-the-napkin approximation.

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Dangerous magic in your retirement plan

CHICAGO, March 28, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --Today the BMO Retirement Institute issued a report, Complementary Paths to Retirement: How men and women can learn from one another that finds that, when it comes to retirement, gender strongly influences the path men and women take to plan for that important life stage.

The report explores the different approaches men and women take to retirement, identifies additional challenges women must address, and suggests ways in which they can learn from each other.

"Despite the challenges that women face, we are seeing that they are actually more likely than men to enjoy their retirement," said Tina Di Vito, Head, BMO Retirement Institute. "Men and women have noticeable differences in how they respond to both financial and non-financial changes brought on by retirement, and women are proving that they have adapted the necessary skill set to help them cope with this transition."

Women Face Unique Challenges

The report notes that, for many women, retirement is often lived alone, whether by choice, or as the result of divorce or the death of a spouse.

Women must address unique challenges when planning for retirement such as longer life spans than men, and more intermittent work histories (women are more likely to interrupt their employment to act as family caregiver). These factors may result in lower earnings which, in turn, equate to lower pension benefits or 401(k) balances. Widowhood or divorce can also reduce women's retirement income. Moreover, women are statistically less likely than men to find a new partner if they find themselves alone in retirement.

What the Genders Can Teach Each Other

The behavioral differences exhibited by women and men can have a critical impact on their retirement planning. However, by capitalizing on each other's positive behaviors, which are very complementary, both sexes can better position themselves to have a more successful and fulfilling retirement.

The report found that women, in general, are less confident in their knowledge of finances and financial product/services than men. They also tend to be more risk averse than men, trade less frequently, hold less volatile portfolios and expect lower returns than men do.

Men's willingness to assume a reasonable level of risk allows them to achieve relatively higher growth in their retirement savings. Women could benefit from employing some of these behaviours in their retirement planning efforts.

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BMO Retirement Institute Report: How Men and Women Can Learn From One Another When Planning for Retirement

Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JQ297fgC7bg

27-03-2012 10:52 A retirement community in Florida caters to retired mail carriers with the US Postal Service. WSJ's Jennifer Levitz finds many prefer mail to email, and no dogs are allowed.

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No More Mail, Dogs: Retired Postal Workers Rest - Video

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Companies that serve 401(k) plans are asking the Labor Department to reconsider its stance on mailed notification, so that they can save costs by using email instead of regular mail to send information to plan participants.

If the agency does not change its position, employees in 401 (k) plans will have to bear the additional mailing costs that can be substantial for plan participants, according to the March 27 letter from 15 industry trade groups.

"Presently, the increased costs attendant to paper disclosure in 401(k) plans could reduce participants' retirement savings, the very savings we are working to increase with enhanced transparency," the groups wrote in the letter.

Some record keepers estimate that the costs of paper-based statements could be $2 to $3 per employee, which would mean tens of thousands of dollars in added expenses for large employers, said Samuel Brandwein, a Morgan Stanley Smith Barney adviser who works with retirement plans.

"The purpose of the fee disclosure rules was to drive down costs for 401(k) plan participants," Brandwein said. "This could have the unintended consequence of driving up those costs."

Under Labor Department rules, employers who send materials through regular mail are safe from reprimand from the agency. But those who use email do not have such protection and could face potential lawsuits without a paper trail record.

This issue has been a thorn in the side of the retirement plan industry for years. It will become a much bigger issue this summer, when 401(k) plan providers will have to start disclosing the fees they charge to employees in these plans.

"With the new fee disclosure regulations, plan participants are going to get a lot more volume of materials," said Judy Miller, director of retirement policy for the American Society of Pension Professionals and Actuaries, one of the 15 groups that sent the letter to the Labor Department.

"This issue has really taken on new importance."

Other groups that joined with ASPPA in the letter include the Investment Company Institute, the American Bankers Association and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

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Retirement providers push for email for cost savings

We're taught our retirement years will be a period of unalloyed pleasure, a placid, decades-long stretch seldom roiled by the kinds of concerns, worries, and sleepless nights we face all too often over the course of our work lives.

In truth, the retirement years can be fraught with nervousness and fear. We may see our fixed incomes eroded by inflation, our pensions eliminated by corporate bankruptcy, our nest eggs decimated by stock market downturns, and the value of our homes cut dramatically by the vagaries of the housing market.

Far from being peaches and cream, retirement can sometimes be the pits. That's the lot of those who don't plan well for retirement. But - surprise! - it can also be true for folks who planned meticulously for their Golden Years.

If it takes a bit of the survivor mentality to navigate the years up to age 65, it's equally true that that mindset can come in very handy after retirement.

Retirement poster children

That's why I'd like you to meet a couple who managed to roll with the punches in their early retirement years, only to come out the other side a bit bruised but otherwise unbowed. That couple is Carol and Phil White.

After finding retirement can be a tad thorny, they made the proper adjustments and came out smelling like a rose. The proof? When I caught up with Carol this week for the first time in a year, she and Phil were soaking up some sun on the beach in Kauai while visiting family in Hawaii.

As they approached the idea of retirement, the Whites felt they were well positioned to take the plunge while still in their 50s. Carol had spent her work life in the corporate world, earning a traditional pension and accumulating retirement assets in a 401k, as well as investing in a stock purchase plan. Phil, by contrast, had been an independent businessman. He owned a couple IRAs, and knew he could reap substantial income from the sale of his upscale men's clothing store.

The icing on top of this cake of retirement assets was a pair of single-family homes the Whites had purchased for the rental income they generated.

Retire like it's 1999

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Roll With the Retirement Punches

WHITE PLAINS, N.Y., March 28, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --Pete Swisher, CFP, CPC, TGPC has joined Pentegra Retirement Services as Senior Vice President, National Sales, announced Robert C. Albanese, Pentegra Retirement Services President and CEO.

Mr. Swisher brings more than 15 years of industry expertise to Pentegrawith a background that not only includes in-depth knowledge of retirement plan operations and business models but also vast expertise working with financial advisors to build successful retirement practices.

Stated Mr. Albanese, "Pete is well-known nationally as one of the industry's top retirement plan experts, and is a well-respected speaker and thought leader within the retirement community. With extensive experience in all facets of the business, we believe he will play a key role in helping us take this organization to a new levelparticularly in terms of his ability to help position Pentegra for accelerated growth and expanded presence in the advisor-sold space. We are delighted to have him join our team, and I believe the entire organization will benefit greatly from Pete's knowledge and experience."

Prior to joining Pentegra, Mr. Swisher was with Unified Trust, where he was Vice President of Advisor Services and Senior Institutional Consultant, instrumental in taking the organization from a $600 million provider to a $2.8 billion brand. He is the author of 401(k) Fiduciary Governance: An Advisor's Guide, the textbook for ASPPA's Qualified Plan Financial Consultant credential (QPFC). Through his ERISA Boot Camp Workshop Series, he has helped advisors throughout the United States build successful pension practices based on a transparent fiduciary service model.

As a passionate advocate for the private pension system and national retirement income security, he is actively involved with the National Association of Plan Advisors (NAPA), ASPPA, and ASPPA's Political Action Committee. Pete is the Chair of the NAPA Government Affairs Committee.

Mr. Swisher graduated from the University of Virginia in 1988, where he was selected for the prestigious Echols Scholar Program. He accepted a commission in the U.S. Marine Corps and served in the first Gulf War as Executive Officer of an infantry company. He left the Marines as a Captain in 1993.

He lives with his wife, Shannon, and three children in the horse country of Central Kentucky.

Mr. Swisher may be contacted at 800-872-3473, or by email pswisher@pentegra.com.

Pentegra Retirement Services is a leading provider of retirement plan solutions to organizations nationwide. Founded by the Federal Home Loan Bank System in 1943, Pentegra offers a full range of retirement programs, including 401(k) plans, Defined Benefit Pension plans, Cash Balance plans, 412(e)(3) Fully Insured Defined Benefit plans, Split Funded Defined Benefit plans, KSOPs, ESOPs, Profit Sharing plans, Age-Weighted plans, New Comparability plans, 457(b) and 457(f) plans, 403(b) plans, 401(a) plans, Nonqualified Executive Benefit and Director plans and a broad array of TPA services.

For more information, go to http://www.pentegra.com.

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Pete Swisher Joins Pentegra Retirement Services

Gymnast Paul Hamm announced his retirement on March 27, 2012, because his body was struggling to complete the necessary training, he said. Hamm's retirement effectively ends an era in American gymnastics.

Who can forget the Hamm twins, who burst onto the international Olympic scene at such a young age, and consistently defied the odds to perform well at big gymnastic meets?

Paul Hamm helped to usher in a new era for men's gymnastics in the United States -- an era in which the American men vaulted from obscurity to prominence on the world scene. With his performances at the 2003 World Championships and the 2004 Olympic Games, Hamm became the first American male gymnast to ever win a world or Olympic all-around title -- and he did both.

In addition, he helped to lead the U.S. team to its first Olympic silver medal in 20 years in 2004, and Hamm was an integral part of the 2001 and 2003 American world championship teams that also won silver.

"Becoming the first world and Olympic all-around champion from the U.S. is a huge statement about his talent," Steve Penny, the director of USA Gymnastics, said in a statement. "It's also made a difference in USA gymnastics emerging from a team that struggled to make the podium to a team that's consistently on the podium. Paul Hamm raised the bar in men's gymnastics in this country and worldwide, and we're continuing to benefit from the role he played."

Hamm's Olympic career is a storied and turbulent one, which includes a judging controversy in 2004 and an injury that kept him from competing in 2008. Hamm hoped that a comeback in 2012 would allow him a strong performance to cap off his Olympic career, but his retirement announcement, just four months before the London Olympic Games, proved that the comeback wouldn't happen.

Hamm returned to the sport in 2010, and by January of 2011, the gymnast had to undergo surgery to heal a torn labrum and rotator cuff. In the end, the injuries simply became too much to handle, Hamm said.

"It's come to that time," Hamm told The Associated Press on March 27, 2012 "Your mind wants an outcome a certain way, and it used to be a certain way, but you can't get your body to perform that certain way. And I can see it."

Hamm added: "I'm able to just look back at the gymnastics and the performance and remember it for a great thing. I understand the things that happened in my life, it's just a part of the whole story. But overall, I feel the journey I had in the sport of gymnastics was a tremendous journey and very productive for me and my life, and the person I've become."

Sandra Johnson is an avid Olympic fan. While working for the United States Olympic Committee and living in the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo., Johnson had the opportunity to immerse herself in the Olympic Movement. Follow her on Twitter: @SandraJohnson46

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Paul Hamm Announces His Retirement from Gymnastics

3/26/2012 6:16 PM ET

By Robert Powell, MarketWatch.com

With many Americans short of the savings they'll need to retire comfortably, the forecast looks grim. These are some of the areas were action is clearly needed.

President Barack Obama, in his State of the Union speech back in January, didn't really touch on the subject near and dear to the hearts of millions of Americans -- the state of retirement in the U.S.

No doubt he had other pressing matters to address. So allow us the pleasure of issuing -- thanks in large part to many experts on the topic -- our state of retirement column.

In short: Things are bad and, in the absence of action or in the presence of ill-advised action, they could get much worse.

"I think the state of retirement in America is endangered, as the Great Recession has taken a toll on the financial status of many and as retirement savings were not adequate for many prior to the Great Recession," said Matthew Greenwald, the president of Matthew Greenwald & Associates, a leading retirement-research firm.

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Retirement rescue needed

The average income that workers can expect from their pensions has fallen by 13,000 a year since the Millennium (Sao Paolo: TIBR3.SA - news) , actuaries say.

While a 30-year-old in 2000 could have expected a pension of two thirds of final salary, he or she is now in line for just 39pc of salary. Assuming that the average salary on retirement is 48,450, this equates to a fall of 13,000, according to the Alexander Forbes National Pension Index.

Even a year ago the worker could have expected 45pc of final salary. The figures are for someone saving 12pc of salary into a defined-contribution pension scheme. The pattern of pension income expectations is similar for other age groups, the company added.

Pension savers have been hit by a toxic combination of turmoil in the financial markets, rising longevity and falling annuity rates. Workers who don't belong to generous final salary schemes which are dying out in the private sector must build up a pension pot, which is used to buy an annuity or income for life at retirement.

The value of their pots has been hit by falls in the stock market, while annuity rates have fallen sharply as a result of declining yields on government gilts.

Alan Carey of Alexander Forbes Consultants & Actuaries said: The Governments quantitative easing programme has adversely impacted annuity rates, which in turn has seriously hurt peoples retirement income expectations. Hopefully gilt yields, which influence annuity rates, will recover to some extent when QE stops, improving annuity rates and reversing the worst of the serious deterioration over the last year.

The latest figures make difficult reading for people saving for their retirement, but the news is not all bad. Pensions remain one of the most tax-efficient ways for people to make long term savings; many employers make generous contributions to DC pension savings, which is in effect additional deferred pay for workers and by taking advantage of workplace salary sacrifice people can boost their pension savings further.

"The real message of this years National Pension Index is that people need to understand and take control of their own pension savings as soon as possible, as a few low cost changes made early can make all the difference to peoples financial security in retirement.

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Retirement incomes fall by £13,000 since Millennium

SANTA MONICA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

National Planning Holdings, Inc. (NPH), one of the nations largest independent broker-dealer networks, today named Frank Hayn to the position of vice president of retirement plans. Mr. Hayn, 37, fills a new position for the NPH network and will be tasked with supporting existing retirement plan business on the NPH platform, as well as helping NPH representatives grow their practices in the qualified plan space.

Hayn will report to John C. Johnson, first vice president of sponsor relations for NPH, and will be based in the networks Santa Monica headquarters. Under Hayns direction, the NPH network will expand its service offerings for advisers seeking to develop retirement plan and 401(k) business. He will also oversee new support programs that help NPH representatives address evolving compliance regulations as they work with plan sponsors on their retirement plan offerings.

Frank brings a wealth of experience in the qualified plan market to NPH and will be a valuable resource to our representatives as they seek to engage small to mid-size businesses in the 401(k) arena, said Mr. Johnson. The retirement plan space represents a significant opportunity for advisers to expand their practices by working as a consultant to companies that are looking to enhance their benefit plans.

Mr. Hayn comes to NPH from SunAmerica, Inc., where he served as director of 401(k) sales since 2005 and 401(k) sales manager from 2000 to 2005. Prior to SunAmerica, Hayn was a retirement plans marketing specialist for New York Life Investment Management LLC from 1997 to 2000. He holds FINRA Series 7 and 63 registrations and is a Chartered Retirement Plans Specialist. Hayn received an M.B.A. from Pepperdine University and a B.A. from the University of Rochester.

National Planning Holdings, Inc. is an affiliate of Lansing, Mich.-based Jackson National Life Insurance Company (Jackson). For more information about the four independent broker-dealers in the National Planning Holdings network, please visit:

About National Planning Holdings, Inc.

National Planning Holdings, Inc. (NPH) is a broker-dealer holding company and an affiliate of Lansing, Mich.-based Jackson National Life Insurance Company. NPH serves as the holding company for the independent broker-dealers INVEST Financial Corporation, Investment Centers of America, National Planning Corporation, and SII Investments, Inc. Collectively, the NPH broker-dealer network currently has 3,636 registered representatives as of 12/31/11. NPH and Jackson are wholly owned by Prudential plc (NYSE: PUK - News), a company incorporated and with its principal place of business in the United Kingdom. Prudential plc is not affiliated in any manner with Prudential Financial, Inc., a company whose principal place of business is in the United States of America.

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National Planning Holdings®, Inc. Names Frank Hayn Vice President of Retirement Plans