Attitudes Toward Immediate Annuities

Retirement security for Americans is one of the most critical public policy and personal financial issues and will be for decades in the future. Individuals that retire today can live an additional 30 or even 40 years with less secure income as corporations shift to defined contribution plans to fund retirement. Based on the life cycle savings hypothesis, immediate annuities should be appealing to retirees because they insure against the risks of outliving retirement assets by converting funds into a lifelong stream of income. However, research has found that retirees are reluctant to annuitize their wealth. This study examined the attitudes of Utah State University employees toward annuitization of retirement assets and explored the relationship between employee characteristics and their attitudes toward immediate annuities. Data for this study were collected through an online questionnaire emailed to Utah State University employees who participate in a defined contribution plan. The survey gathered information on retirement portfolio losses, expected longevity, financial confidence, familiarity with annuities, and attitudes toward immediate annuities. A total of 744 individuals answered the survey for a response rate of 43.2%. Based on the results of independent t tests, there were statistically significant differences between the attitudes of women and men toward immediate annuities. Women held more positive attitudes toward immediate annuities than men, and women who had taken a retirement planning class had more positive attitudes than women who had not attended a retirement class. In contrast, men who had attended a retirement class expressed less positive attitudes toward immediate annuities than men who had not. Male overconfidence in their investment knowledge and skills may explain this finding. A Pearson correlation coefficient revealed a negative correlation between risk aversion and attitudes toward annuities. As investment risk tolerance decreases, attitudes toward immediate annuities become more positive. An analysis of variance found that individuals with longer than average life expectancies had more positive attitudes toward immediate annuities than subjects with shorter than average life expectancies. Surprisingly, individuals who claimed to be most familiar with immediate annuities showed the least positive attitudes toward annuities. Income and assets, marital status, and financial confidence were not statistically significantly related to attitudes toward annuities. Implications for consumers, financial professionals, educators, and policymakers were drawn from the results of the study

The Relationship Between Sexually Coercive Experience Frequency, Coping, Social Support and Sexual and Mental Health in Adult Women

poster abstractIntroduction: Existing literature separately identifies social support and coping methods as mediating influences between sexual coercion and adverse health outcomes, yet few empirical studies actually evaluate their influence in the same model. The objective of this study was to analyze how adult women’s coping methods and social support jointly mediate the impact of sexually coercive experience on sexual and mental health. Methods: Data are drawn from a larger internet-based, cross-sectional survey examining adult men’s and women’s health and life experiences. For the current study, we retained all female participants (N=113). Structural equation modelling (SEM) (Stata, v. 22; all p<.05) analyzed the hypothesized structural relationships between coping (adaptive and maladaptive), social support (subjective and emotional), sexual coercion, sexual health (sexual openness, sexual anxiety, sexual esteem, and sexual entitlement) and mental health (depression, self-esteem, and anxiety). Results: More frequent sexual coercion predicted higher maladaptive coping (β = .364). Higher levels of maladaptive coping were associated with higher levels of depression (β = .199), anxiety (β = .393), sexual anxiety (β = .346), and sexual openness (β = .251). Additionally, higher levels of maladaptive coping were associated with lower self-esteem (β = -.226). Adaptive coping and social support were not associated with sexual coercion. Conclusion: Adult women’s sexually coercive experiences impact sexual and mental health indirectly through maladaptive coping, but not through adaptive coping or any social support. Our data raise the possibility that maladaptive coping could be an important catalyst for poor mental and sexual health outcomes following a sexually coercive experience. From an education and policy perspective, this means that a focus on reducing maladaptive coping methods may increase mental and sexual health and reduce the likelihood of accruing more sexually coercive experiences

Cross-validation aggregation for combining autoregressive neural network forecasts

This paper evaluates kk-fold and Monte Carlo cross-validation and aggregation (crogging) for combining neural network autoregressive forecasts. We introduce Monte Carlo crogging which combines bootstrapping and cross-validation (CV) in a single approach through repeated random splitting of the original time series into mutually exclusive datasets for training. As the training/validation split is independent of the number of folds, the algorithm offers more flexibility in the size, and number of training samples compared to kk-fold cross-validation. The study also provides for crogging and bagging: (1) the first systematic evaluation across time series length and combination size, (2) a bias and variance decomposition of the forecast errors to understand improvement gains, and (3) a comparison to established benchmarks of model averaging and selection. Crogging can easily be extended to other autoregressive models. Results on real and simulated series demonstrate significant improvements in forecasting accuracy especially for short time series and long forecast horizons

Demand forecasting by temporal aggregation:Using optimal or multiple aggregation levels?

Recent advances have demonstrated the benefits of temporal aggregation for demand forecasting, including increased accuracy, improved stock control and reduced modelling uncertainty. With temporal aggregation a series is transformed, strengthening or attenuating different elements and thereby enabling better identification of the time series structure. Two different schools of thought have emerged. The first focuses on identifying a single optimal temporal aggregation level at which a forecasting model maximises its accuracy. In contrast, the second approach fits multiple models at multiple levels, each capable of capturing different features of the data. Both approaches have their merits, but so far they have been investigated in isolation. We compare and contrast them from a theoretical and an empirical perspective, discussing the merits of each, comparing the realised accuracy gains under different experimental setups, as well as the implications for business practice. We provide suggestions when to use each for maximising demand forecasting gains

Early supportive medication use and end-of-life care among Medicare beneficiaries with advanced breast cancer

A randomized controlled trial of cancer patients has linked early supportive care with improved hospice use and less aggressive end-of-life care. In practice, the early use of supportive interventions and potential impact on end-of-life care are poorly understood. We sought to describe early use of medications to treat common breast cancer symptoms (pain, insomnia, anxiety, and depression) and to assess the relationship between early use of these treatments and end-of-life care