Chubb White Paper Finds Pre-Retirees Emphasize Legacy Building Over Wealth Accumulation

 November 30, 2016 -- Many Americans aged 51 to 69 have a unique outlook on life, particularly when it comes to financial management and insurance, according to a new white paper from Chubb. While sharing several of the same interests and passions as younger cohorts, pre-retirees are more focused on legacy building than on wealth accumulation.  

"The Pre-Retirees: Changing Minds, Changing Needs" white paper explores the implications this changing mindset may have for wealth advisors and insurance agents. It also outlines the property and personal liability issues impacting pre-retirees, including risks associated with home ownership, travel and passionate pursuits.  

"Pre-retirees hold about $8 trillion in assets but, unlike younger generations, the majority are not focused on accumulating more wealth or property—rather, the emphasis is on what they have accomplished and the legacy they want to leave," explains Alanna Johnson, Senior Vice President, Premier Practice Leader, Chubb Personal Risk Services. 

"This has implications for how pre-retirees and their advisors approach risk management. Wealth advisors and insurance agents can best serve this generation by understanding the client's changing risk profile and designing a holistic risk management program that fits their lifestyle."

According to the white paper, some of the most pressing legacy building-related risks pre-retirees and their advisors should be aware of include:

• Serving on non-profit boards that might not offer sufficient D&O liability coverage in the event of a lawsuit
• Emerging property risks as a result of relocation as more pre-retirees move or purchase property to be closer to their adult children and grandchildren
• Unforeseen gaps in protection when pursuing sophisticated wealth transfer strategies, such as the establishment of a trust or LLC
• Having sufficient medical evacuation coverage and travel insurance in the event of an accident or injury abroad

A copy of "The Pre-Retirees: Changing Minds, Changing Needs" is available here.

About Chubb
Chubb is the world's largest publicly traded property and casualty insurance company. With operations in 54 countries, Chubb provides commercial and personal property and casualty insurance, personal accident and supplemental health insurance, reinsurance and life insurance to a diverse group of clients. 

As an underwriting company, we assess, assume and manage risk with insight and discipline. We service and pay our claims fairly and promptly. The company is also defined by its extensive product and service offerings, broad distribution capabilities, exceptional financial strength and local operations globally. Parent company Chubb Limited is listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: CB) and is a component of the S&P 500 index. Chubb maintains executive offices in Zurich, New York, London and other locations, and employs approximately 31,000 people worldwide. Additional information can be found at: chubb.com.

MAYO CLINIC, COLLABORATORS WORKING TO ADVANCE AGING RESEARCH

 Newswise, August 22, 2016— Mayo Clinic, along with other members of the Geroscience Network, has published six manuscripts that map strategies for taking new drugs that target processes underlying aging into clinical trials. Researchers believe that these agents hold promise for treating multiple age-related diseases and disabilities.

The articles appear today in The Journals of Gerontology: Series A – Biological Sciences and Medical Sciences.

The Geroscience Network, formed by James Kirkland, M.D., Ph.D., director of the Mayo Clinic Robert and Arlene Kogod Center on Aging; Steve Austad, Ph.D., University of Alabama at Birmingham; and Nir Barzilai, M.D., Albert Einstein College of Medicine, consists of 18 academic aging centers, along with the participation of more than 100 investigators from across the U.S. and Europe.

The network is funded by the National Institutes of Health.

“Aging is the largest risk factor for most chronic diseases, including stroke, heart disease, cancer, dementias, osteoporosis, arthritis, diabetes, metabolic syndrome, blindness and frailty,” says Dr. Kirkland.

“Recent research suggests that aging may actually be a modifiable risk factor. The goal of our network’s collaborative efforts is to accelerate the pace of discovery in developing interventions to delay, prevent or treat these conditions as a group, instead of one at a time.”

Dr. Kirkland is senior author on manuscripts that explore the challenges of developing these interventions:

• “Barriers to the Preclinical Development of Therapeutics That Target Aging Mechanisms”
• “Frameworks for Proof-of-Concept Clinical Trials of Interventions That Target Fundamental Aging Processes”

The first manuscript summarizes discussions held at a 2014 Geroscience Network Retreat.

While research efforts have successfully identified new drugs that extend lifespan in animals, the authors discuss the need to develop a consistent preclinical pipeline for drug development that focuses on best practices for drug discovery, development of lead compounds, translational preclinical biomarkers, funding and support for preclinical studies, and integration between researchers and clinicians.

In the second manuscript, Dr. Kirkland and others acknowledge that aging therapies may hold “great promise” for enhancing the health of a wide population, with clinical trials being a critical step for translating therapies from animals into humans.

The manuscript is built on the outcomes of an international meeting funded through the National Institutes of Health R24 Geroscience Network.

The other manuscripts published are:

• “Strategies and Challenges in Clinical Trials Targeting Human Aging”
• “Resilience in Aging Mice”
• “Evaluating Health Span in Preclinical Models of Aging and Disease: Guidelines, Challenges, and Opportunities for Geroscience”
• “Moving Geroscience Into Uncharted Waters”

Felipe Sierra, Ph.D., of the National Institute on Aging and a member of the Geroscience Network, describes the potential impact of aging discoveries in his manuscript, “Moving Geroscience into Uncharted Waters.”

Dr. Sierra says, “In addition to the direct health issues, it has been calculated that care for the elderly currently accounts for 43 percent of the total health care spending in the US, or approximately 1 trillion dollars a year, and this number is expected to rise as baby boomers reach retirement age.

Reducing these costs is critical for the survival of society as we know it, and a 2013 paper by Dana Goldman and colleagues calculated that a modest increase in lifespan and healthspan (2.2 years) could reduce those expenses by 7 trillion dollars by 2050.”

“While significant work has already been accomplished, there is much more to be done as we focus on translating findings into practice,” says Dr. Kirkland.

“The Geroscience Network is a collaborative way to overcome barriers and move us closer to our shared goal of increasing healthspan – the healthy, independent years of life for the elderly.”

Other authors in the manuscripts published in the Journal of Gerontology’s special issue are Jordan Miller, Ph.D., Shahrukh Hashmi, M.D., and Michael Stout, Ph.D. of Mayo Clinic; Jamie Justice, Ph.D. of University of Colorado Boulder and Wake Forest School of Medicine; John Newman, Ph.D. of the University of California San Francisco; Jeffrey Halter, M.D. of the University of Michigan; Steve Austad, Ph.D. of the University of Alabama at Birmingham; Nir Barzilai, M.D., Derek Huffman, Ph.D., and Sofiya Milman, M.D. of Albert Einstein College of Medicine; Christin Burd, Ph.D. of The Ohio State University; Matthew Gill, Ph.D., Laura Niedernhofer, M.D., Ph.D., and Paul Robbins, Ph.D. of The Scripps Research Institute.

In addition to Mayo Clinic, members of the Geroscience Network are Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Buck Institute for Research on Aging, Harvard University, Johns Hopkins University, National Institute on Aging, the Scripps Research Institute, Stanford University, the University of Alabama at Birmingham, the University of Arkansas, the University of Connecticut, the University of Michigan, the University of Minnesota, the University of Oklahoma, the University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio, the University of Southern California, the University of Washington, and Wake Forest University as well as members from other institutions across the U.S. and Europe.

This work was supported by the National Institutes of Health, the Paul Glenn Foundation, Nathan Shock Centers of Excellence for the Biology of Aging, the Connor Group, and the Noaber and Ted Nash foundations. Additional acknowledgements include the contributions of the basic researchers and clinicians engaged in research on mechanisms of aging and care of the elderly in the five retreats supported by the R24 grant from the National Institute on Aging, as well as a workshop on resilience and aging supported by the National Institute on Aging.

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About Mayo Clinic
Mayo Clinic is a nonprofit organization committed to clinical practice, education and research, providing expert, whole-person care to everyone who needs healing. For more information, visit http://www.mayoclinic.org/about-mayo-clinic orhttp://www.newsnetwork.mayoclinic.org/.

Growing Old Can Be Risky Business

Elder abuse experts warn of age-associated financial vulnerability

Newswise, October 21, 2015 — Managing money can be difficult at any age. For older adults, changes in physical condition and life circumstances can lead to changes for the worse in financial behavior, putting their well-being in danger. Now those changes have been given a name: age-associated financial vulnerability.

Two experts in elder abuse coin the term and explain the concept in an opinion article published in the Oct. 13 issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine. They also call for research to identify and help older adults at risk from age-associated financial vulnerability, or AAFV for short.

They define the condition as “a pattern of financial behavior that places an older adult at substantial risk for a considerable loss of resources such that dramatic changes in quality of life would result.” To be considered AAFV, this behavior also must be a marked change from the kind of financial decisions a person made in younger years.

“For example, if an older adult gives his or her neighbor $10,000, this many be a sign of AAFV. However, if the older adult has given large sums of money to those in need throughout his or her adult lifetime, then the $10,000 gift in old age may not represent a change in behavior, and thus may not represent AAFV,” explains Duke Han, PhD, co-author of the study and associate professor of behavioral sciences at Rush University Medical Center

Not the same old problem

The authors note that AAFV is a condition different from age-related cognitive impairment, including dementia, which already is recognized as putting older adults at risk of causing themselves financial harm. Since recent studies have indicated that “cognitively intact older adults” may become financially vulnerable, they write, “cognitive impairment is not necessary for AAFV.”

Instead, the trouble can lie in the many ordinary changes brought about by aging. “Functional changes such as impaired mobility, vision and hearing loss, and the cost of multiple medications can directly influence vulnerability in older adults,” Han says.

Other potential contributing factors may include cognitive changes, such as a lessened ability to discern a person’s trustworthiness, and psychosocial problems, including loneliness or depression. 

In addition, the finance industry has identified older adults as an untapped market, which can lead to them being overwhelmed by the “dizzying array of financial products and services,” according to Han and co-author Mark Lachs, MD, MPH, professor of medicine and co-chief of geriatrics and gerontology at Weill Medical College in New York.

“In my discussions with Dr. Lachs about our experiences with the heart-breaking effects of financial vulnerability among our older patients, we decided that naming the problem may be a useful first step to addressing the issue,” Han says.

Protecting the vulnerable from the villainous.

Han and Lachs believe it’s important to understand AAFV as a condition in order to protect older adults who exhibit signs of it, distinct from behavior brought on by cognitive impairment or problems with financial judgement that preceded older age. In particular, AAFV can put a person at risk for financial exploitation: 

Han notes that financial abuse is one of the most common forms of elder abuse, and is the most frequent form of perpetrator-related elder abuse in Illinois.
“This is a growing problem since we have a large aging population with no ways to determine who is at risk and why,” Han warns. “We need more screening, and more interventional programs and strategies to address this issue. We also need to determine what the role and responsibility is of physicians in protecting their patients.”