For many, January comes with a focus on making resolutions for the new year. Most often, these resolutions are about health. Statista reports that the top three resolutions for 2023 are about physical well-being, with people wanting to exercise more, eat healthier and lose weight.
The fourth most popular resolution is also about health, although it’s a different kind of health—it surrounds financial health. People want to save more money in 2023.
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This is the first in a series of blogs from SS&C about Financial Wellness and how to provide supportive, targeted tools that meet an individual's evolving needs over their financial life.
Financial wellness is a popular term these days. There are plenty of articles or perspectives about what it means and it’s the subject of many conference sessions. But defining the term is the easy part.
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So many industries are seeing a revolution brought on by intelligent automation, artificial intelligence (AI) and robotic process automation (RPA). These technologies can automate manual processes, like sending customer emails, performing compliance checks, or digitally inputting data. By identifying opportunities for intelligent automation, businesses can increase efficiency, improve the member experience, and reduce the risk of human error.
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Consumer confidence is certainly in the headlines as inflation causes people to adjust or reduce their spending. But, perhaps intuitively, the volatile economic environment is also adversely impacting how much individuals are saving. According to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, the U.S. personal savings rate was as high as 33.8% in April 2020, but it shrank to 5.1% in June 2022. While the 5.1% level is much closer to the ten-year U.S. average savings rate of 6.0%-8.0%, it is a dramatic decline from April 2020.
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You probably saw digital transformation in the title and thought, “I've seen this and heard this before.” Automation, efficiency, cost-savings, digital, digital engagement, digital-first—you get it, right? Maybe not entirely. Too frequently, the term digital transformation is misused or mislabeled. What’s usually discussed is digital at the margins—gradually integrating new capabilities into legacy platforms and phasing out any dated capabilities.
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Continuous improvement is a concept that has taken hold in many manufacturing and service-oriented industries. It involves regularly measuring and then adapting processes in order to realize either incremental or breakthrough improvements.
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We’ve discussed previously how pension funds in the UK and superannuation funds in Australia face many of the same challenges. One particular challenge lies in the generational considerations of the demographics participating in these funds. For example, as people live longer, they may find their accumulations at retirement are insufficient to reach the duration of their lives. Premature depletion, or accessing retirement funds earlier than expected, only exacerbates this problem.
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As UK defined contribution pensions and Australia superannuation markets seek to improve member outcomes, they each have much to learn from the way the other addresses the common challenges of aging populations, longer lifespans and reduced savings. As a service provider in both countries, SS&C is uniquely positioned to offer a global perspective, identify best practices and share lessons learned from our experience.
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