“I very simply ask, “What are you going to do for money during your retirement years?
... Employees will kick around a lot of different areas, but when it really comes down to it
they’re going to realize that they are going to have to save for themselves.”
Given his expertise, Robert describes some of the
changes to the retirement landscape, and does his best to
foresee potential changes in the future. Over the course
of conversation, he offers his advice and insights to
employees, employers, and government regulators trying
to make retirement in the US the best proposition it can be.
Confero Magazine: The US has a fiscal problem
and some have suggested changing the rules on how
retirement savings and income is taxed to make up for
the shortfall. How likely do you think this is? What
sort of changes might you predict?
Robert Kaplan: In the current environment that we’re
in, nobody quite knows what the folks in Washington
are going to do. If we had to take our best guess—and
this is from being experienced going up to Capitol
hill and being involved in some lobbying efforts and
industry organizations—where I think we are with all
the discussions about either limiting total deductions or
trimming some of the limits, probably every deduction is
going to feel the pain of tax reform. That being said, the
retirement plan industry, al