COUNTERCOLUMN: All Your Bias Are Belong to Us

Wednesday, December 22, 2004

A Modest Proposal for Social Security Reform

Critics are right: Individual investors make boneheaded investment decisions.

Data from Dalbar, Inc., and Watson Wyatt demonstrate that the ACTUAL returns experienced by 401(k) holders, after money flows in and out of stock funds, bond funds, and money market funds are taken into account, are just a fraction of the returns experienced by a buy and hold investor, or a participant in a professionally managed, asset-allocated, low-cost defined benefit plan.

Let's not simply mindlessly copy the TSP options and let investors freely choose between them. Social Security is not a pure investment vehicle, but a social insurance program.

Therefore, I propose the following:

• Keep the TSP options, but repackage them into a series of cohorts. Investors don't select indexes, then; they select their year of anticipated retirement. That's it.

• The account balances are then put into a pool of cohorts of people who plan to retire in or close to the same year. (Say, in 2,3, or 5 year increments. Whatever creates a manageable asset level in a cohort).

• These cohorts, optionally, could be further subdivided into "aggressive," "moderate," or "conservative" funds. This isn't a must, though. I can see arguments either way.

• Each cohort fund is professionally managed, risk budgeted, and asset allocated among large caps, internationals, corporate bonds, treasuries, and cash. We may be able to do small caps, maybe not. The sheer size of the Social Security program may wring all of the diversification benefit out of small caps. We'll see.

• At retirement, individuals select a desired income level. The SSA will tell them what their expected maximum annuitization rate will be, and they will tell them how much money they can expect to leave their children if they died immediately after annuitization. Investors can then adjust one number or the other to arrive at their desired income level. Benefits will be annuitized. Leftovers may be passed to heirs. But they have to decide what their annuitization benefit will be.

• The bulk of the Treasury exposure within the fund should be in TIPS. Benefits should be indexed to inflation. (Actually, even better, half the benefits could be indexed to inflation, and half to wage growth.)

• Keep a maximum benefit in place; use the proceeds to raise the minimum guaranteed benefit. Yeah, it's redistributionist. Deal with it. Like I said, this is a social insurance program.

• No, you don't get to call the manager. You don't get a statement in the mail more than once per year (with your tax refund). You can switch between aggressive and conservative portfolios once per year, MAYBE. But you can't switch out of your retirement age cohort unless you qualify for SSA or become terminally ill.

The idea: To maximize the risk-adjusted return on any given investor's portfolio while minimizing the variability of returns among those in a given age cohort. Variance among an age cohort only adds risk, for which the unsophisticated program participant, in the aggregate, will be uncompensated.

Splash, out

Jason

[CLICK HERE TO ENTER THE NET] posted by Jason : 08:25 EST, Wednesday, December 22, 2004 43 transmissions this net

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