30 October 2018
Question: According to MSN: Money, if you are in your 60s without retirement savings, what three moves should you make today?
India social norms hit women’s fight to find work – Pg. 2
– India is being rocked by a #MeToo moment that has revealed sexual harassment in elite, white-collar workplaces, often perpetrated by the powerful men who run them. But the debate over workplace harassment comes as many Indian women are still fighting for the right to work at all
– India has one of the world’s lowest rates of female participation in the labour force, with just 27% of all working-age women holding paid jobs outside their home
– Part of the problem is that India has failed to create the large-scale manufacturing jobs that can absorb poorly educated rural women
– But India’s social norms – including entrenched beliefs about a woman’s place in the home and taboos on interactions with men outside the family – are also barrier to women entering the paid labour force
Business education – Pg. 7
– Many are opting instead for shorter courses that cost less money or decide not to study for an MBA at all
– The first MBA, devised at Harvard Business School as a generalist management degree, dates back to 1908. It combined classes in “quant” subjects, such as finance and accounting, with courses in soft skills, including leadership, entrepreneurship and communication
– The first curriculum was based on Frederic Winslow Taylor’s principles of scientific management and quickly gained traction…
– …for the past four years, interest in the full-time MBA course has been on the decline in the country of its birth
– This year 70% of US schools with full-time MBA degrees reported declines in applications for their two-year programmes…
– That was offset by growth of 8.9% in business school applications in the Asia Pacific region, a 7.7% rise in Canada and a 3.2% increase among institutions in Europe
– The deans of US business schools had blamed previous declines in MBA market overall on a “flight to quality”…
– …people now have many ways to gain these skills, either by taking online degrees or specialist business masters qualifications
Systemic risk fears intensify over leveraged loan boom – Pg. 19
– …the booming $1.3tn market for leveraged loans – or those extended to highly indebted companies that are then packaged up and sold to investors as bonds….
– Official fears are being amplified by the hollowing out of protections for investors who ultimately end up owning the loans but are attracted to them because their floating rate component offers protection against a Fed that is raising interest rates
– Issuance for US leveraged loans is now on pace to outstrip last year’s record high of $650bn….
– Based on the three-month Libor rate, which has rocketed this year to its highest level since 2008, leveraged loans have returned 4.3% to investors since January…
– Given these weakening standards, Moody’s rates 37% of leveraged loans B3 or lower, the lowest rating they say is typically acceptable to investors
Answer: (1) Start maxing out your retirement plan contributions; (2) Claim Social Security as late as possible; (3) Keep working into your 70s