Understanding Employee Benefits Packages

Retirement Accumulation Strategies with Real Assets and Inflation Risk New publication from Amundi Investment Institute. With Benjamin Bruder, Camille Schittly, and Jiali Xu, we explore the optimal design of retirement solutions and glide paths. Over time, longevity has become a systemic risk for PAYG and DB pension plans, and an idiosyncratic risk for individuals. For example, life expectancy is projected to reach 82 years by 2100, up from 46 years in 1950. This increase has contributed to the growth of DC pension plans. Before individuals can effectively decumulate in retirement, they must first accumulate sufficient wealth, highlighting the central role of dynamic asset allocation in retirement planning. This paper provides both a theoretical framework, empirical insights and practical consideration. Here are the main key findings. First, the optimal allocation can be interpreted as a leveraged version of the constant-mix strategy, where human capital plays a key role in determining the leverage ratio. Understanding the human-to-financial capital ratio paves the way for personalized retirement solutions. Second, we solve a fundamental puzzle in retirement planning: Why do practitioners implement concave glide paths, even though theory predicts convex allocation patterns? Third, we identify the conditions under which the two-stage approach (combining Markowitz optimization with Merton leverage) produces the same solution as the multi-asset stochastic optimal control problem. Fourth, we compare glide path implementations using traditional assets with those that include real assets. Our results show that extending the investment universe to real assets adds value, even after accounting for transaction costs and liquidity risk management. Finally, we analyze retirement solutions under inflation risk, showing that the optimal dynamic solution consists of a performance portfolio and a liability-hedging portfolio. This aligns DC strategies with the liability-driven investment principles used by DB plans. Importantly, the hedging demand may be positive or negative depending on whether the objective function incorporates an inflation discounting component (reflecting the investor’s time horizon and myopia) and the correlation between assets and inflation. This analysis revisits the classic debate on inflation risk (expected vs. unexpected inflation, level vs. variability) and demonstrates how different inflation components influence dynamic asset allocation. While this paper is technical, we provide a 15-page non-technical introduction and conclusion that clearly summarize the main issues and key findings of the accumulation period. Here are the links to the paper: https://lnkd.in/ezvCAqSm https://lnkd.in/emPtHHTx https://lnkd.in/eSMSMSgD #retirement #assetallocation

India has 150 million+ people above the age 60 and there is a massive opportunity to keep them healthy & fit. But everyone’s focused on Gen Z and no one’s building for their parents. It’s a hard business but a big one. We’ve invested in two companies. Here’s why it’s tough and how one should crack it. Understand the reality first. 1. Elders don’t think of “health” as proactive. They’re conditioned to wait until something breaks before acting. You’re selling a solution to a problem they don’t know they have yet. 2. The 65-year-old needs it but their 35-year-old child pays for it. You're not selling to the elder. You’re selling to their guilt-driven kids in Gurgaon or US. The buyer ≠ the user. 3. Trust is everything and you don’t have it. Indian elders trust: Their doctor, astrologer & their neighbour Not apps. Not tech bros. Not AI. You can't growth hack trust. You earn it slowly, locally. 4. They don’t want new habits. They’ve had the same breakfast for 40 years. You’re not selling a product. You’re undoing decades of routine. 5. Distribution is hyperlocal. Elders don’t click Insta ads. They talk to the uncle in their colony. You scale building by building not by user cohorts. Yes, 150M+ elders. But it’s not one market. It’s a thousand tiny tribes. Different languages, cultures, food habits, family structures, and tech comfort levels. If it were easy, Tata or Reliance would’ve done it already. But it’s wide open now. The one who combines tech + trust + real care will win. So how do you crack it? 1. Think first principles & not trends Don’t build a “senior fitness app.” Ask: Why did they stop moving? What gives them joy? You’re selling independence, not health. 2. Design for peace, not features. One-click help, One daily routine, One trusted face. Great elder products feel like human care not software. 3. Human-first, tech-enable. Don’t replace the daughter. Support her. Train 100 amazing elder coaches. Build tools to help them scale. 4. Don't focus on CAC. Here, it’s about trust per acquisition. You’re not selling toothpaste. You’re asking to be let into their daily life. Start offline. Build trust then tech. 5. You’re in the business of habit change & not selling an app or a pill. Get them to walk 15 minutes a day. Add protein to breakfast. Laugh more. Sleep better. Small wins compound. Don’t build for scale first. Build for consistency. Be in the business of habit change. 6. This isn’t a hackable D2C play. It’s a decade-long trust business. Build for one community. Get to know 100 elders by name. Solve deep, boring problems with elegance. Everyone’s chasing the next billion youth users. But the hidden opportunity lies in serving the first 150 million elders. The elder care market in India isn’t just underserved. It’s misunderstood and needs long-term play. Founders who crack this will build generational companies.

Baby Priya's bill passed parliament this week and is now awaiting royal assent. It preserves employer-funded paid parental leave in situations of stillbirth or the death of a child. The bill is named after baby Priya, who tragically died at six weeks old. Her mum had been with her employer for 11 years and had three months of paid parental leave pre-approved. When she told her employer that Priya had died, they told her that her paid parental leave would be cancelled. Her husband was allowed to take his full leave entitlement. The new law is designed to prevent that situation from happening. It will apply if: 👉 a child is stillborn or dies; 👉 an employee would have been entitled to leave, under the terms and conditions of their employment, if the child had not been stillborn or died; 👉 the leave is paid for by their employer; and 👉 the leave is associated with the birth of a child of the employee or their spouse or de factor partner, or the placement of a child with the employee for adoption. So this could apply to paid parental leave schemes under an employment contract, policy or enterprise agreement. If there is a scheme in place, the employer would be prevented from refusing paid leave or canceling paid leave because of the stillbirth or death (unless the employee asks for it to be canceled). The law doesn't require employers to put a scheme in place if they don't already have one. There is no law requiring employers to have paid parental leave schemes. If a parental leave scheme includes terms that permit an employer to refuse or cancel leave because of a stillbirth or death, or provides that employees are not entitled to it in those circumstances, the employer will be allowed to refuse or cancel the leave. However, they can't now unilaterally change their parental leave scheme to allow for this. An employer may also refuse or cancel leave if, under the terms and conditions of the employee's employment, they are entitled to other leave that expressly addresses stillbirth or death of a child. However, this doesn't include unpaid parental leave or compassionate leave. Nothing in the new law affects employee's existing entitlements to 𝙪𝙣𝙥𝙖𝙞𝙙 parental leave and government funded paid parental leave in the event of a stillbirth or death. Employees will remain entitled to these. ♻️ Please repost this if it would help others.

She moved back to Detroit to care for her mom. She ended up managing a rotating team of home-health aides while running her own business. Theresa de la Osa is an executive recruiter, and she ended up using her skills to solve the problem. She hired nursing students directly from local schools at $20/hour, instead of paying agencies $33/hour for aides earning just $16. Most of your employees can't do that. And they're solving it alone. Between 10% and 20% of workers across every industry are managing elder care right now, per KPMG economist Matthew Nestler, PhD. Unlike child care, it rarely comes with warning: it arrives as a crisis. The cost to employers? Lost productivity, and higher turnover. As Matthew noted for those leaders concerned about the cost of supporting new programs, "You're already in the red whether you know it or not." In Part 1, I covered what costs nothing: starting with simply making elder care a conversation that's encouraged. Today's Charter Pro piece outlines seven more steps companies can take. Here are three: 🧭 Add #eldercare concierge services. For employees navigating sudden, complex needs, concierge services help them understand their options: booking appointments, explaining next steps, interpreting medical information. 🗓️ Provide real flexibility. For caregivers, schedule flexibility determines whether they can get a parent to a 10am appointment. RTO mandates aren't neutral here. For frontline workers, predictable schedules matter just as much. 📋 Extend paid family leave broadly. Tracy Layney led this at Levi Strauss & Co.: eight weeks, any family member, any circumstance for all benefits-eligible employees (i.e., store staff). As she puts it: "I would rather have an employee take eight weeks away and come back than have them quit." And advocate for change beyond your own four walls: As Matthew says, workers and their employers are "subsidizing the healthcare industry" through unpaid care. Employers have real leverage and a direct business interest in pushing for systemic change. Replacing a frontline worker costs 40% of their salary. An office worker? 80%. The math on doing nothing is worse than the math on doing something. The full piece has four more, linked in comments. What support does your organization currently offer caregivers?

Over the past months, I’ve joined 63 million other Americans as a caregiver, supporting my mom through some unanticipated health needs. Like many others, I’m navigating this role alongside life, work, and healthcare delivery systems that rarely make it easy. The experience has prompted a lot of reflection and gives me even more fuel to continue to make healthcare better. If we want better outcomes, we need to treat caregivers as partners in care delivery itself. Here are 4 policy shifts that can help: 1. Invite caregivers in care design EMRs, discharge plans, and care teams should recognize and support caregivers by default. Invite caregivers into decision-making, including policy and tech design. 2. Expand paid leave and workplace flexibility Caregiving shouldn’t mean risking your job or financial stability - especially for low-wage or shift-based workers. 3. Recognize caregiving as labor Through stipends, tax credits, and programs that compensate family caregivers. 4. Scale home-based support Technology, respite care, and home health that eases the burden - these are all investments in public health. We can't solve for quality and access without including caregivers. I feel lucky to hold her hand - hands that have supported and nurtured me my whole life. If you are so fortunate to have someone like that in your life, please ping them to tell them how much they mean to you.

Jeff retired at 60 with £500,000 but he had one big problem… Jeff had worked hard for 40 years and was finally ready to enjoy retirement. ✔️ £500,000 in pensions & savings ✔️ No mortgage ✔️ Plans to travel, play golf, and spend time with family But when he sat down to plan his finances, one big question loomed over him… Would his money last? Jeff planned to withdraw £30,000 per year from his pension. That seemed reasonable—until he looked at the impact of: ⚠️ Inflation – £30,000 today won’t buy the same lifestyle in 20 years ⚠️ Market downturns – A few bad years could reduce his pot faster than expected ⚠️ Living longer than planned – What if he lived to 90+? Would he still have enough? At that rate, his pension could run out in his mid-80s, just when he might need it most for care costs or extra support. How Jeff fixed it (using Cashflow Modelling) Instead of guessing, Jeff worked with a financial planner who used cashflow modelling to map out his retirement finances. Here’s what it showed him: 📊 If he withdrew £30,000 per year without a strategy, his money could run out by age 83 📊 If he adjusted withdrawals, invested wisely & minimised tax, he could have enough until 95+ With a clear picture of how long his money could last, Jeff made smart changes: ✅ Adjusted his withdrawal strategy – Taking a flexible approach rather than a fixed amount each year ✅ Maximised tax efficiency – Withdrawing from different pots to reduce unnecessary tax ✅ Kept part of his pension invested – Allowing his money to grow even in retirement ✅ Planned for later-life costs – Factoring in potential care expenses so he wouldn’t be caught off guard Now, instead of worrying about running out, Jeff has a long-term plan based on real numbers… giving him peace of mind and the freedom to enjoy retirement. Key lesson… A big pension pot doesn’t always mean financial security. Without a clear plan, it’s easy to: 🚨 Withdraw too much, too soon 🚨 Pay more tax than necessary 🚨 Run out of money later in life Cashflow modelling helps you see the bigger picture, so you can make confident financial decisions for retirement 🙌

Eldercare isn’t just about hospitals or old-age homes. It’s about continuum of care. Today, the new term for eldercare in India is: CCRC (Continuing Care Retirement Community). In my last post I had highlighted stats around the eldercare system in India that was discussed at the Healthcare Summit 2025 organized by VCCircle. In continuation to my post, one of the points of discussion was why we need an integrated healthcare ecosystem for our elders. An ecosystem where primary care, tertiary healthcare, pre and post-hospital rehabilitation are seamlessly connected. One of the most thought-provoking discussions was around who the real decision-makers are in providing elder care: Is it the elders themselves? Is it their children? Or is there a third category—someone influencing the decision? Adarsh from Primus shared a key insight: 95% of seniors in his facilities pay for their own care. Meanwhile, Rajagopal G from Kites introduced the UPI model (User, Payer, Influencer)—sometimes all three roles are taken on by the elder, while in other cases, the children pay, but the elder decides. It made me think - are we designing eldercare solutions with the right decision-makers in mind? Another eye-opening moment was when Dr. Karthik from Athulya Senior Care shared an unexpected finding of their facility - they assumed that eldercare homes with lake-facing views would be the most sought-after. They were wrong. The playground-facing homes had higher demand. Why? Because elders don’t just want a beautiful view—they want to see life happening around them. They want to feel connected. They want community. Loneliness is a bigger problem than we realize. So where does this leave us? → Post-hospital care is critical. Recovery doesn’t stop at discharge—it needs rehabilitation, assisted living, home care and engagement. → Financial independence matters. Seniors don’t want handouts, they want solutions. If we look closely, most elders don’t need hospitalisation but can’t be managed at home - that’s where assisted living facilities step in. This is one of the areas that TWC strongly addresses. Aging is inevitable. Isolation, financial insecurity, and lack of care shouldn’t be. The more I participate in such discussions, the more I learn about the gaps and how we all must collectively work together to bridge them. This isn’t just about eldercare homes—it’s about scalable, investment-worthy models that provide independence, healthcare, and community under one roof. I would like to ask you today - how do you wish to help your elders or parents to live better? What facilities would you want for them? ♻️Repost to spread the message. PS: Stay tuned for my upcoming posts where I will continue diving deep into the eldercare ecosystem.

Yesterday was my birthday! It got off to a slow start—my husband forgot (oops!) and my daughter was away at camp—but the day turned out to be wonderful, filled with meaningful family time. In the evening, we went out for dinner with amazing friends. The food was good, the company was even better—but the dining experience? A bit of a letdown. It reminded me of how a generous Parental Leave policy, without thoughtful user experience, can feel the same way. A restaurant may serve incredible food, but if ordering requires navigating a clunky QR code system with no human interaction, the experience feels transactional, not welcoming. The promise is there. The offering is great. But the experience? Cold, transactional, and frustrating. Without thoughtful design and a human touch, what should feel like care and generosity instead feels impersonal and disconnected. Policy and process alone isn’t enough. Experience matters. How is your company ensuring Parental Leave feels as supportive as it looks on paper? Here are some ideas gleaned from my experience of working with Parental Leavers over the past 8 years - many of which cost nothing (or next to nothing) to implement. No and Low Cost Parental Leave (PL) Recommendations: 📌 publish a clear and consistent PL policy 📌 ensure information is accessible and easy to find independently  📌 offer ‘how to’ fact sheets 📌 provide information to support financial decision-making  📌 share calculations of Annual Leave in advance 📌 send out regular organisational updates 📌 offer genuine flexibility in the lead up to PL 📌 provide support for managers to implement policy 📌 initiate conversations early and often (including return to work options) 📌 communicate during PL as agreed 📌 share information about peer support networks, mentoring, and coaching 📌 assign ownership of PL support to a designated person No and Low Cost Return To Work (RTW) Recommendations: 📌 consider offering additional sick leave 📌 consider paying Annual Leave at its full rate 📌 provide flexibility (i.e., graduated return, WFH, flexible hours, reduced hours) 📌 discuss and agree on a Return-To-Work Plan 📌 set up workspace and share news of the return 📌 organise a morning tea to celebrate return 📌 consider offering re-induction training 📌 discuss goals, expectations and career aspirations 📌 schedule regular check ins about transition and performance 📌 ask for feedback on PL and RTW process Let’s Talk! If you’re looking to create a truly supportive experience for Parental Leavers in your organisation—not just a policy on paper—let’s connect. I’d love to explore how we can make it work for your team. #parentalleave #parentalleaveexperience #userexperience #care #peoplematter

The release of the #agedcare Taskforce Report last week signals an important next step in discussing how we navigate the difficult funding and sustainability issues that aged care and older Australians face over the coming decades. The number of people over 80 is set to triple to more than 3.5 million over the next 40 years. For this generation and those that will follow, the #futureofcare is in the home. It is abundantly clear that most Australians want to stay at home for as long as possible, with access to relevant services and support from family and friends. The demand for home care has increased strongly: over the next twenty years, an average annual increase of 44,000 participants is forecast, totalling nearly two million older people using home care by 2042, compared with about one million now. In order to prioritise home-based care for the benefit of people, their families, and the system, we need to find new, novel, and sustainable ways to help people talk, plan, and care for each other as they age.  This can't be standardised or homogenous. Understandably, different people will always want different things, and those needs will change, due to increasing frailty and other health events. I experienced this first-hand with my own parents, and it highlighted the importance of honest, supported conversations, preparation and planning. Without this, too many older people end up in hospital or residential aged care when they want to be at home. The Violet Initiative is building a scaleable, sustainable, technology-enabled solution to help all Australians talk about and plan for the last stage of life. Violet helps with navigation, care coordination and connection to available services and supports. Violet’s mission is to improve the experience for people and their families, alleviate system pressures (including bed blockage and ramping), and reduce system costs. Of the 15,000 people Violet has supported, 8/10 people told us ‘I don’t know what I don’t know, and I don’t know where to start’. The last few years of life are often practically, and emotionally overwhelming, and few places provide personalised and scalable help. Violet meets people where they are, regardless of circumstance, emotional readiness, or cultural context, and helps them have conversations and plan to make sure that the last stage of life is the best it can be for everyone involved. Violet has an important role to play in supporting Australia’s #silvertsunami, ensuring more people have the experience they want and deserve. Over the last 20 years, we have normalised the way we talk about mental health, we now need to do the same with ageing, and the last stages of life so family and friends are confident to talk to their loved ones about what they want for the final stage of their lives and put in place a plan to make it happen! Go to Violet.org.au to find out more. #laststageoflife #conversationsthatmatter #innovationinhealthcare

This was a fun recording with WebMD and Neha P. combining two of my worlds: AI/technology and my prior work with The John A. Hartford Foundation and IHI on the #AgeFriendlyHealthSystem. #Agefriendly care is fundamentally about centering what matters to older adults - their goals, values, and priorities. It's asking "What does a good life look like for you?" rather than just treating diseases. AI becomes an incredible enabler of truly person-centered care. So, what does the #4Ms Framework of #AFHS look like when enabled by AI tools? ·      Knowing What Matters: AI can systematically capture individual preferences across care teams. No more repeating your story - the system learns what matters to you and keeps that front and center. ·      Avoiding Medication Errors: We're closing safety gaps that have existed for decades. AI-powered medication management can prevent the 125,000 annual deaths from medication errors through smart dispensers, interaction checking, and adherence monitoring. ·      Improving Mentation: Isolation kills. Virtual companions and AI-augmented/supported health tools aren't replacing human connection - they're providing answers & connection when it is needed. There will be more evidence on reducing loneliness in the near future. ·      Preserving Mobility: Smart homes become extensions of clinical care. Sensors detect gait changes before falls happen, wearables spot early decline signs. We're moving from reactive to predictive care - that's transformational. Real Applications: Motion sensors for fall prevention, voice-activated emergency systems, smart medication dispensers. Start simple with basic activity trackers monitoring heart rate and sleep patterns. Getting Started: My advice for older adults - try using voice assistants (alexa, siri) for basic health information or medication reminders. Don't share personal health data yet, but start building digital confidence. AI is becoming a true partner in aging well - understanding unique patterns, predicting needs, keeping people connected to care and community. The potential to extend not just lifespan but healthspan is extraordinary. Listen to the episode here: https://lnkd.in/eUp69Hdf #AgeFriendlyCare #HealthAI #HealthEquity