What Happened to the Real World People?

Yesterday, the US Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee was scheduled to hold a hearing entitled, "What can be done to help Americans Save More for Retirement." Key speakers scheduled were these:

• Jean Chatzky, financial journalist, author, and financial editor at NBC's Today Show
• Lori Lucas, executive member of the Defined Contribution Institutional Investment Association
• Julie Agnew, Associate Professor of Economics and Finance at William and Mary Mason School of Business
• Jeffrey R. Brown, William G. Karnes Professor of Finance at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign College of Business

OK. Great. Where are the professionals? Where are the people who have spent their lives in this field. 

You can read the testimonies here: http://help.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Chatzky.pdf   http://help.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Lucas.pdf   http://help.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Agnew.pdf

http://help.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Brown6.pdf

And you can listen to the 2 hours of excitement here: http://help.senate.gov/hearings/hearing/?id=c8c1c5c7-5056-9502-5dd5-8b9f87d76457

As I listened to Senator Harkin's (D-IA) introduction, I nearly turned ill. He proves that the Senate still doesn't get it. He cites statistics out of context where he confuses the cause and effect. To his credit, he wants to schedule additional hearings on the pension system. Perhaps he will have some experts then.

We have a long way to go.