The Bristol Press - New retirement savings plan is portable for school workers
Ok, the Connecticut Association of School Business Officials has created a 457 plan - great. They say it is low in cost, however they have partnered with ING, a company that is not known for low cost plans. Furthermore, they fail to mention that the funding mechanism for the 457 plan is a Group Annuity Contract. Why would they adopt a variable annuity for their funding vehicle? If they were truly looking to offer a great product at a great price they would not have settled for a Group Annuity Contract. There was no disclosure of expenses and in fact I did not see any mention of fees in the motion passed by the CASBO board in November.
I am doubtful that is plan is what it is says it is - though I am willing to review it if CASBO would like to put out a press release disclosing all the costs and how to get a copy of the prospectus and state publicly that they don't recieve any money from ING.
The article cites the Ohio 457 plan, they are right, it is a good plan, and it has $6 billion in assets and low costs. It utlizes mutual funds, not an annuity contract (though the recordkeeper is an insurance company).
I'm not optimistic at this point as I have seen other endorsements by ASBO states of 457 plans that turned out to be turkeys.
ScottyD
