2018 - Page 5 of 18 - Best Money Moves

Which Basic Need Are Your Employees Struggling to Afford?

by LizStevens | Sep 11, 2018 | Blog

Millions of Americans faced financial hardships in 2017 and are likely still struggling to afford basic needs, so which one are your employees struggling with?

Nearly 40 percent of Americans had trouble meeting at least one basic need (food, healthcare, housing, or utilities) last year, according to a recent study from the Urban Institute. This echoes an earlier report from the Federal Reserve that showed more than 25 percent of Americans skipped needed medical care in 2017 because they couldn’t afford it.

Urban Institute’s study found more than 20 percent of respondents experienced two or more financial hardships in 2017 and close to 15 percent experienced at least three. It’s not just families below the federal poverty level experiencing financial hardships either. Roughly 20 percent of people whose household income was four times the federal poverty level still struggled to meet the basics.

Almost 20 percent of Americans had trouble getting medical care or paying medical bills in 2017. More than 10 percent missed a utility bill, rent or mortgage payments. Over 20 percent did not have reliable access to a sufficient amount of affordable and nutritious food, making food insecurity the top financial hardship Americans faced.

Food insecurity is an issue that reaches outside of Urban Institute’s scope. Their “Well-Being and Basic Needs Survey” extends to adults aged 18-64 but older Americans struggle with food insecurity as well. It’s estimated that there are 8 to 10 million people over age 65 lacking consistent access to enough food for an active healthy life.

“Older adults who are chronically food insecure suffer other health problems such as low muscle mass, increased fatigue, impaired cognition and increased hypertension. In turn, this can lead to increased risk for falls, limit mobility, reduce ability for self-care, and ultimately force a move into institutional care,” says Liz Seegert, Association of Health Care Journalists’ topic editor on aging.

Employers should be concerned that some of their employees deal with food insecurity on a day-to-day basis. Hunger affects their ability to focus and can cause drastic shifts in mood. There’s also a host of health issues linked to food insecurity that can cause employees to miss more days at work or develop a chronic health issue. Something as simple as providing healthy snacks or occasional staff lunches for employees can make a huge difference in their performance.

What Does Financial Wellness Look Like for Women?

by LizStevens | Sep 7, 2018 | Blog

Pay equity is a huge barrier to women’s financial wellness in the workplace, but it isn’t the only one. Most women haven’t used retirement calculators and don’t have backup plans if forced into retirement. They’re not going to ask for help, but employers who provide the right tools can help them help themselves.

Everyone knows: Women make up 46.8 percent of the American labor market, but they still earn an average of 20 percent less than men in the same position. Pay isn’t equitable by any stretch of the imagination.

Even in situations where women and men are offered the same job, women are initially offered salaries up to 45 percent less than what men are offered, according to research from Hired. Hired’s research underscores how critical it is for women to advocate for themselves in negotiations until legislation and corporate policies better support pay equity.

Pay equity isn’t the only issue women face when it comes to financial wellness. Research from Transamerica Center found that less than 10 percent of women have used a retirement calculator and barely 20 percent had a backup plan if they were forced into retirement sooner than expected, either because of job loss, health issues or family obligations.

Why? An argument posed in a MarketWatch article claims that “societal norms and cultural messages undermine [women’s] ability to gain financial literacy and investment expertise.” Research shows that for women, finances, especially issues with personal finances, are generally associated with emotions of embarrassment, shame and fear. Even if women know they need to be more financially literate, they might not ask for help in gaining the knowledge.

Companies know they have a serious problem when it comes to women, pay equity and financial wellness. While both men and women feel financial stress, women feel higher levels of it. And, it causes more complications in their work lives.

That’s where there’s an opportunity for employers to help. Employer-sponsored financial wellness programs like Best Money Moves can bypass cultural barriers and social norms to give women access to the tools they need to measure their financial stress, learn how to manage their money around issues ranging from student loans to mortgages, elder care to relationship issues, and get on track with saving for retirement. The best part about employer-sponsored financial wellness programs is that it takes away any shame or embarrassment associated with asking for help and simply provides the best tools for employees to help themselves.

Employers might also consider adding policies that pledge equal pay for equal work, especially if they’re in the process of recruiting more women. And with unemployment at 3.9 percent (nearly an all-time low), it doesn’t hurt to work on policies that will attract a demographic that makes up nearly half of the workforce.

Best Money Moves Founder/CEO Ilyce Glink will be giving her expert insight on this topic at the “Women, Pay Equity and Financial Wellness” panel at the 2018 HR Technology Conference in Las Vegas on Tuesday, September 11 at 10:30 AM.

Best Money Moves will be at the 2018 HR Technology Conference in Las Vegas this September 11-14. Stop by booth #753 to learn how you can improve your company and your employees’ financial health.

Why I Started Best Money Moves

by Ilyce Glink | Sep 6, 2018 | Blog

Updated September 19th, 2019: The Best Money Moves Team is heading to HR Tech and SAP’s SuccessConnect in Las Vegas. Will you be attending either of these events? If so, please stop by and say hello. We’d love to show you our Best Money Moves financial wellness solution and explain why we’re winning awards, closing deals and making employees everywhere smarter about money.

The Best Money Moves team is headed to HR Tech and SAP’s SuccessConnect. While we’re en route to Las Vegas, I’d like to share with you why I started Best Money Moves, a mobile-first, cloud-based technology + coaching platform designed to help people measure their level of financial stress and dial it down in order to get control of their financial lives.

I’m a longtime financial journalist, syndicated columnist, book author and radio talk show host. I’ve been helping people make smarter decisions with their money for more years than I care to count! Five years ago, I was hired by three different companies to design financial wellness programs. Their intent was to create an opportunity to sell their own services by giving a veneer of financial education to employees.

Given that we were in the aftermath of the Great Recession, I didn’t think that would work. And, it didn’t. None of the companies wound up creating a successful product because the truth was – and is – that the majority of employees are broke.

How broke? Forty percent don’t even have $400 in cash for emergencies, and less than 75% don’t have $15,000 saved in a 401k. In my book, that’s pretty broke.

One day, I had an insight that would change the trajectory of my career – which up until then had been spent as a financial journalist and the owner of a content production company specializing in financial information.

I realized that financial wellness companies fall into a couple of categories:

1. Niche products. These try to solve student loan problems for Millennials, or they claim to help you save for retirement by taking the change from a cup of coffee (which you shouldn’t be buying) and socking it away somewhere or helping you earn a little more interest on your savings, or they help you get paid faster, sometimes by the end of the day so you don’t have to get a payday loan.
2. Products that try to sell you things. Like the products I was asked to design, these push credit cards, loans, different types of insurance and other things that most employees don’t need and can’t afford.
3. Financial education products. These are typically course-based and require employees to do a lot of general learning about money before they can figure out how to solve their problems.
4. Products that try to get assets under management. These tell you all about saving for retirement, and encourage you to get into their robo-investing platforms with whatever cash you have available.

Here’s my insight: No one was attacking the problem from the perspective of the employee: They’re extremely stressed about money and have pain points they want to solve now. And, they need help.

So, what if we designed a program that would help the employee understand the root cause of their financial stressors (because, there’s always more than one), use algorithms and machine learning (you know, the cool stuff) to push relevant, personalized information and solutions? What if we helped employees solve the financial problems they have today, across a wide spectrum of issues? Everything from student loans and credit card debt to identity theft, marital issues and elder care?

And, what if we let employees drive it?

Best Money Moves is my answer to the problem of employee financial stress. I know it has a huge ROI for employers, whether you’re trying to measure the effect of financial stress on healthcare costs and outcomes or retention or workplace accidents or unexplained absences. (Our technology can be used to measure all of these issues, and more. Just ask us how.)

Having spent a long career helping people make smarter decisions with their money, I knew there was a better way to help. So, we created a mobile-first platform that is simple to use, easy to understand, yet provides a great depth of knowledge across a wide spectrum of issues. And, we used the latest tech tools so the product would be smart enough to be personalized and relevant. And, we offered employers real-time metrics so they would have the same wonderful experience that they were providing to their employees.

Best Money Moves came out of beta in 2017 and has been winning awards, customers and accolades ever since.

Financial wellness is getting a lot of attention these days, but wherever we go, CEOs, CHROs, and CFOs are fascinated by the Best Money Moves Stressometer™, which is our primary financial stress assessment tool. We break down financial stress into 14 categories and use interactive algorithms to delve deeper and identify the root causes of someone’s financial stress.

The Stressometer™ is just one tool that differentiates Best Money Moves from other financial wellness services. We also have 540 original pieces of objective, custom-created content: video, written articles, calculators and other tools. We’re gamified, with contests that carry cash prizes. We allow our customers to customize Best Money Moves to an incredible degree – because each company is different, and we want to support their company culture.

And, it’s working. Financial stress levels are starting to go down for our customer’s employees. It’s not a magical overnight experience: Financial stress is real, and does more than keep your employees up at night so they’re less productive during the day. But for those employees using our product, they’re finding relief. And, that’s just the beginning of the ROI that companies enjoy.

As Founder/CEO of Best Money Moves, I’m proud that we’re helping people reduce their level of financial stress. We’ve figured out how to help your employees understand their finances better, dig their way out of debt, and feel more empowered to handle the everyday money issues they face.

So, if you’re at SAP SuccessConnect or if you’re attending the 2019 HR Technology Conference in Las Vegas stop by the Best Money Moves at booth #2550 to say hello and learn how you can bring financial wellness to your company in 2020.

First Look at the Future of Financial Wellness

by LizStevens | Sep 5, 2018 | Blog

Financial wellness has generated a lot of buzz recently and with millions of dollars pouring into FinTech development it’s time to take the first look at the future of financial wellness through the lens of a recent Senate hearing.

On August 21st the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Subcommittee (HELP) held a hearing on Primary Health and Retirement Security. It featured a roundtable discussion on “Financial Literacy: The Starting Point for a Secure Retirement” that focused on the effectiveness and future of employer-sponsored financial wellness programs.

“Although we are in the early stages of assessing the impact of these programs, we are seeing encouraging results in terms of both engagement and the actions individuals take to improve their financial wellness after engaging with digital and/or on-site financial wellness services,” Vishal Jain, a VP in Prudential Financial’s Workplace Solutions Group, testified.

Lynn Dudley, SVO, Global Retirement & Compensation Policy at the American Benefits Council noted the areas in which companies are seeking to help their employees. In addition to helping employees deal with student debt and setup education savings programs for their children, like Section 529 plans, employers are also helping employees develop emergency saving funds (since roughly half of Americans can’t afford an unexpected expense like an emergency transmission repair). Dudley also mentioned the recent IRS private letter ruling that might make it easier for more companies to help their employees with student debt.

Scott Astrada, Federal Advocacy Director at the Center for Responsible Lending, was critical of payday lending programs because consumers can easily become trapped in a cycle of debt that affects their retirement savings efforts. Interest rates on payday loans can be as high as 400 percent on an annual basis. Astrada believes state interest rate caps could offer some relief to those who utilize payday loan services.

Future financial wellness programs will take advantage of technology to streamline communications. Specifically, the electronic delivery of retirement plan documents could enhance benefits communications.

“In particular, legislation that further encourages and facilitates the use of auto-enrollment and auto-escalation can enhance both retirement plan participation and savings rates. And, provisions that remove impediments to the inclusion of guaranteed lifetime income solutions as part of a retirement plan can better ensure employees have access to the products they need to effectively manage investment and longevity risks during their retirement years,” Jain testified in support of the Retirement Enhancement and Savings Act (RESA) and further legislation.

Do You Know How Unprepared Employees Really Are?

by LizStevens | Aug 28, 2018 | Blog

Long-term healthcare is expensive and although most Americans will need it, it’s surprising to know how unprepared employees really are.

Long-term healthcare is a tough topic to discuss because it forces people to confront their mortality, but new research from Moll Law Group underscores the importance of saving for the costs of long-term care, like a nursing home or assisted living.

More than 60 percent of Americans have nothing saved for long-term care. Why? Less than half of Americans think they’ll need it. Unfortunately, 70 percent of Americans will.

That means there are millions of people that are seriously unprepared for future healthcare expenses and some of them are your employees.

Housing costs for long-term care are astronomical. Average costs for assisted living are $45,000, semi-private nursing homes are $87,775, and private nursing homes are $97,455. These housing costs are a far stretch from the $25,000 in savings Americans thought would be enough to cover long-term care.

This isn’t just a crisis for the future, it’s a concern many face presently. A new survey from Bankrate found that “For younger baby boomers (ages 54 to 63), money is the top concern keeping them up at night. Thirty-nine percent say financial worries occasionally keep them from falling asleep.” Younger baby boomers are wrestling with high costs for education, housing, and they have aging parents to worry about. All of these factors pull them further from their retirement goals and increase their financial stress.

The process and associated costs of aging don’t need to be unexpected, but often (at least for half of those surveyed by Moll Law Group) the decision to place a loved one in long-term care is unexpected. Although there’s no knowing if or when it will happen, by understanding the likelihood and estimated expenses families can make the right decision without as much financial strain

It’s time to stop avoiding the inevitable and start preparing for unfortunate events that are likely to happen later in life. Employers should encourage employees to contribute to their 401(k) program and offer an employee match. It’s worthwhile to re-approach healthcare and retirement plans to see where employers can better help employees tackle the incredible cost burdens they, or a close family member, will most likely encounter.