THOUGHTS OF CHAIRMAN MAC

  Most of us dutifully work at a job for most of our adult lives, all the while dreaming of the time when we can retire. Retirement is envisioned as a laid-back period of life with discarded alarm clocks, loose schedules, leisure travel and the freedom to do what you want to do, when you want to do it. Such a vision is achievable, but it doesn't just happen; it requires hard work. You work hard during your career to support your family and have a good life, but you also need to work hard at retirement to make sure retirement will work for you. To enjoy a comfortable retirement, think of retirement as your last job. The good thing about this job is that you are like an entrepreneur as a direct beneficiary of your effort. The time to begin to work for retirement is the first time you think about retirement. The longer you wait to begin to work on it, the more difficult it will be to achieve your vision for retirement. Just like other jobs, the objective of retirement is a liva...

  Recently John Hilton of Insurance News Net posted an articulate summary of sessions at the Annuity Distribution Summit hosted by the National Association for Fixed Annuities. While not specifically mentioned, it was clear from the remarks of the participants that “change” was the elephant in the room. Hilton wrote, “The panel promised an inside look at the future of (annuity) distribution and covered a variety of threats and disruptions to the industry.” Various panelists offered their strategy to resist the changes that are challenging the tenets of the primary annuity distribution system; the Independent Marketing Organization working with independent agents. The problem with this approach – as the life insurance industry learned in the late 20 th century – is that any strategy intended to resist change will fail. Change is a constant and the only workable strategy to deal with it is to recognize, accept and leverage it. THE LIFE INSURANCE INDUSTRY LEARNED THE HARD WAY...