MassMutual Retirement Services’ 2011 campaign to prompt 401(k) participants to save more has succeeded in boosting deferral rates by 4.34%. It also was aimed at getting those who were not saving into the game, and helping those with portfolios to revisit their allocations.

New York Life Retirement Plan Services has reorganized into four industry-focused service teams serving: Taft-Hartley, technology, finance and professional services, and manufacturing, materials and retail. Each of these teams will have its own relationship managers, communications consultants, investment specialists and ERISA consultants.

Eighty-four percent of 401(k) sponsors surveyed by Mercer and the U.S. SIF Foundation (formerly known as the Social Investment Forum Foundation) believe that sustainable and socially responsible investing (SRI) funds will either hold steady or grow in the next five years.

Investors who relied on professional help in the form of target-date funds, managed accounts and advice earned nearly three percentage points more than those that did not, according to an analysis of eight large defined contribution plans between 2006 and 2010 by Aon Hewitt and Financial Engines. The plans covered 400,000 participants with $25 billion in assets.

Fidelity Investments announced Wednesday it has received commitments for an additional $17 billion in 401(k) assets under management from 269 plans representing 315,000 participants. More than $15 billion of those assets are due to new sales, with the remaining $2 billion the result of mergers and acquisitions by existing clients.

GuidedChoice has created a retirement plan “reality check” for participants to see how well prepared they are for retirement and how much income their savings will produce. The program also guides them to save more and offers access to professional advice.

Invesco has launched the PlanForward Consulting Series, aimed at helping 401(k) advisers and consultants “build a compelling value proposition and enhance their brand recognition.”

Our discussion boards have been pretty heated over the past week, as readers have debated whether or not moving up the Wall Street corporate ladder is harder for women than for men.

Vanguard has announced it will pursue the small 401(k) market, i.e. plans with less than $20 million in assets and fewer than 1,000 employees, with low-cost, bundled plans administered by Ascensus.

The Financial Planning Association, anxious to build its cache of student chapters at colleges across the country, set aside time at the organization’s annual conference in San Diego this week to instruct young attendees how to start their own chapters.

“It’s hard to approach someone" — a prospective employer, for example — and say, ‘I want to be an owner,’” confessed Brett Spencer, a 23-year-old masters student in financial planning from Texas Tech University.

A recent survey of 3,300 working Americans conducted by Putnam Investments disclosed that American households are on track to replace only about 64% of their current income in retirement -- significantly less than the 75% of income that most financial professionals recommend.

At a time when jobs are hard to find and raises are paltry, employers are looking to their 401(k) plans to better serve their workers.

There are so many career options today that it can be overwhelming—and far fewer sources of credible information.

401(k) investors and sponsors are likely to stand up and take notice of the fees that will be clearly presented to them in April, particularly the fact that investors pay most of the administration fees. These administration fees, or expense ratios, cover not just fund management but also recordkeeping, auditing and broker commissions.

As the cost of college soars and many state institutions are charging as much as $36,000 a year for out-of-state students and private college costs approaching more than $50,000 a year, the percent of total costs families say they are able to cover themselves has fallen. Yet most advisors aren't recommending 529 college savings plans to their clients.

Parents are on track to cover only 16% of their children’s college education, Fidelity Investments’ 5th Annual College Savings Indicator study shows. In the study’s five-year history, this is the first year that the indicator’s steady decline has come to a halt, at 16%.

In light of the recent market volatility, a new report from Fidelity Investments analyzing the performance of 401(k) balances between Oct. 1, 2008 and June 30, 2011 is quite telling—giving a testimonial to the value of sticking with the stock market even amid the worst declines.

Forty-two percent of workers are living paycheck to paycheck, down slightly from the 43% who were in this financial state in 2010, CareerBuilder found in a survey of 5,200 workers. This 42% level is at pre-recession levels, indicating that while incremental, household finances are improving.

Rather than offer the complete lineup of a target-date series in their 401(k) plan, sponsors are selecting only those funds that fit the age and demographics of their employees. This could result in under-funded target-date funds that could put the entire lineup in jeopardy, according to a new report, “Trends in Date-Date Portfolios on Recordkeeper Platforms,” from Financial Research Corp.