The research found that individuals with non-portfolio income, such as Social Security and annuity to supplement their portfolio income, will have higher optimal withdrawal rates.

While retirement specialists typically recommend a 4-percent withdrawal rate, experts in the Texas Tech Department of Personal Financial Planning (PFP) recently published award-winning research that questions whether a one-size-fits-all strategy makes sense for retirees.

They suggest that an optimal rate of between 3 and 7-percent, based on a client’s willingness to accept risk and how much income they receive from non-investment sources, might be the smarter strategy.

Michael Finke, doctoral program coordinator, said he and doctoral candidate Duncan Williams believe retirement income is among the most important topics in financial planning today.

Their article, titled “Determining Optimal Withdrawal Rates: An Economic Approach,” uses an innovative method to estimate how financial advisors can create an optimal income plan for retirees that balances spending needs with the risk of running out of savings.

“The key insight of the paper is that optimal retirement withdrawal rates depend on the individual,” Finke said, “and we provide specific recommendations about what is optimal for different types of retirees.”

Williams and Finke recommend financial advisors consider both the client’s risk tolerance and risk capacity when recommending how much they can optimally spend each year.

Their study found that individuals with non-portfolio income, such as Social Security and annuity to supplement their portfolio income, will have higher optimal withdrawal rates. Still, the higher a client’s risk aversion, the lower their optimal withdrawal rates.

Finke and Duncan received the Retirement Income Industry Association’s first Thought and Leadership Award to recognize the excellence of their original thinking and industry leadership in their research.

“I’m most proud that we had an opportunity to showcase the high-quality applied research of graduate students at Texas Tech,” Finke said. “It is our goal that PFP at Texas Tech be seen as the home of financial planning education and research.”

The Office of the Vice President for Research (OVPR), based on three listening sessions with faculty, staff and students, has developed a road map for improving how the division serves the campus community.

“During the listening session, we heard consistent themes of where we could improve,” said Taylor Eighmy, vice president for research, of the OVPR’s strategic action plan. “We have created a series of action items with responsibilities assigned for each item over the next few years.”

The OVPR supports research, scholarship and creative activity in every discipline on the TTU campus.

“For Texas Tech to meet its goal of becoming a national research university, our office must continually look for better ways to serve our faculty, staff and students,” Eighmy said.

The plan is meant to be a dynamic document and will be reviewed annually.

To read the plan, click here.

Related

Undergraduate Research Task Force Releases Report

First Transdisciplinary Research Academy Members Announced

Undergraduates Selected to Present Research at National Conference

In other words, these people, mostly baby boomers, are getting a tax break on both sides of the deal, according to Hyrum Smith, an assistant professor at Virginia Tech’s College of Agricultural and Applied Economics; Michael Finke, an associate professor at Texas Tech University; and Sandra Huston, who is also an associate professor at Texas Tech University.

…

Marilyn Montgomery and Gwendolyn Sorell, researchers at Texas Tech University, asked high school students about their experiences with love. In every grade, more boys than girls said they had been in love at least once. The boys also reported falling in love for the first time at a younger age than the girls, and were more likely to say they were in love with someone they were dating.

Dewey McMurrey, executive chef for Texas Tech’s Hospitality Services, has created a four-entree meal that is sure to impress. View his recipes and cooking videos below.

Good luck!

To the Texas Tech family,

In 2011, Provost Bob Smith and I established an Undergraduate Research Task Force to examine the state of undergraduate research at Texas Tech and make recommendations on how the university can become a premiere institution for undergraduate research. I have received the report and recommendations of the task force and am asking Provost Smith to implement the appropriate recommendations.

Undergraduate research has long been a staple of Texas Tech, and it is a key element of active learning on our campus along with study abroad opportunities, service learning and internships.

The task force did a commendable job of examining undergraduate research opportunities as they currently exist on the campus and gathering information on how we can improve those opportunities for both faculty and students.

I am excited that undergraduate research is a becoming a signature program at Texas Tech.

To view the task force report, click here.

Guy Bailey

President

Texas Tech University

…

“If I were going to be a moose,” said Robert Baker of Texas Tech University, “I would want to live in the exclusion zone.” Baker and a colleague, Ron Chesser, tracked the plants and animals around the wrecked nuclear plant in the decades after the accident.

…

“This is a huge percentage of his income,” said Russell James III, a professor who teaches charitable planning at Texas Tech. “But when you look at the number as a percentage of his total assets, it’s not that dramatic.”

Paul Bjerk, assistant professor in the Department of History, and Tibor Nagy, helped organize the African Symposium.

Tibor P. Nagy, vice provost for international affairs at Texas Tech and former ambassador to Ethiopia, said African policy has always been one of the lowest priorities in the U.S. Department of State’s foreign policy, resulting in low funding, small staffs and a lack of centralized control within the region.

Of the 10 fastest growing countries in the world, seven of them are in the African continent, and 11 African economies are worth more than 13 trillion, he said. So what can the U.S. do to help integrate Africa into the 21st century? Nagy provided the following solutions:

• partner with Africans to promote security and developmental needs
• view Africa as an opportunity and not a problem
• engage all interested partners, not just western allies
• make Somalia a state or several states
• define Africa as a partner, competitor or adversary
• focus on the rebuilding of infrastructure and the creation of a healthy business environment.

“The U.S. has always viewed Africa as a problem since day one, rather than an opportunity,” said Nagy, who spoke about American Policy in Africa on Feb. 6, as part of the Africa Symposium lecture series.

“There is an old African proverb that says ‘even the darkest night is followed by a bright dawn.’ The U.S. can be the one to bring Africa into the daylight.”

Nagy said the African policy has never been coherent, and no over-arching policy framework has ever been successfully implemented to unify the continent. For 50 years, Africa has been developing and none of the countries have reached developed status.

He said the issues affecting the African continent have always tended to be more complicated as compared to the issues in Europe or Asia. Thus, the approach toward African policy has differed throughout presidential leaderships since the early 1950s.

Initially, he said, the U.S. Department of State created a policy geared toward dealing with the newly independent African states; addressing economic development within the region, and imposing western intervention to combat soviet communist influences in the African states.

During the 1970s, Nagy said, countries such as Ethiopia and Angola came under the control of a Marxist government, resulting in a greater U.S. involvement within the region.

However, he said, with the fall of communism in Russia, the U.S. department’s African policy and intervention was downgraded to a low priority issue.

“As the U.S. took a step back,” he said, “many African countries experienced immense political turmoil through single party states, sham elections, massive corruption and the advancement of political principles rather than economic ones.”

Despite the massive failures in Rwanda and Somalia, he said, the U.S. has enjoyed temporary success in countries such as Mozambique and South Africa.

Nagy said the U.S. worked behind the scenes during the transitional phase in South Africa, from a ruling white minority to the election and presidency of Nelson Mandela. During the transition, the U.S. built domestic political pressure and appointed the first black ambassador to South Africa.

“We have had tremendous success through our phenomenal humanitarian efforts throughout the region and HIV awareness program,” he said.

However, Nagy said, problems still persist throughout the continent such as the continuing violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and the abandonment of Somalia, the only country in the world without central governmental control over most of the country’s territory.

“I still remain optimistic for the future of the African continent,” he said.

As America prepares for the 54^th Grammy Awards, a pair of Texas Tech University music experts can discuss how pop music has changed in recent decades and how the drive for hyper-crossover, the influence of globalization and talent shows such as “American Idol” give us the gospel-influenced, patchwork sound floating across today’s airwaves, and how high-volume sales dictate today’s compositions sold for mass appeal.

Expert

Christopher Smith, chairman of musicology/ethnomusicology, director of the Vernacular Music Center, Texas Tech University, (806) 438-5067 or Christopher.smith@ttu.edu;

Elissa Stroman, doctoral candidate in musicology,  (806) 742-3749 ext. 234, or elissa.stroman@ttu.edu.

Talking Points

• “American Idol” is partly responsible for the over-the-top pyrotechnics of vibrato in today’s music, featuring octave leaps, wide range and extensive ornamentation.
• Pop music is becoming less about actual composition and more about bites of sound with words composed around it.
• The lucrative goal of pop music has always been about grabbing the largest audience. That’s why many songs feature guest rappers and borrow or sample reworked melodies from previously popular songs to get the largest audience possible.
• Globalization continues to diversify pop music into many divergent styles.

Quotes

• “‘American Idol’ began during the end of a surge of bubblegum pop music popularity such as Britney Spears and boy bands. In 10 seasons, there has been much debate about ‘Idol’ being out of touch with the music industry because music genres and tastes have become so much more diversified. Beginning in about season six and seven, you start to see contestants making the songs ‘their own,’ whereby their ‘cover’ songs are more geared to their own musical aesthetic style, be it rock, country or whatever. So I think more than anything, ‘Idol’ has changed to the popular trends of the time, not the opposite.” – Elissa Stroman

• “Especially pronounced in the wake of the hip-hop revolution, DJs and rappers are able to remake or even ‘reinvent’ classic tracks – either whole songs, as Sean Combs did, or just short snippets of drum breaks or speech. Moreover, the presence of a guest, especially a rapper, means a single song can take on appeal to diverse audiences: fans of both pyrotechnic vocalizing and of rap/hip-hop can find something to like in a single track.” – Christopher Smith
• “I do see pop music continuing to be more and more structured, but not really composed, around bits and bites of symbolic sound: The ‘sound’ of gospel vocals, the ‘sound’ of ’80s drum machines or loops, the ‘sound’ of twangy country guitars, etc. Recordings are not really about compositions or songs anymore: they’re about stringing together bits and bites of sounds that remind consumers of other sounds they’ve previously liked and consumed.” – Christopher Smith
• “I think in an era of ubiquitous music consumption, record companies have to find some way for their music to reach the widest possible audience. The Internet has allowed music fans to become more niche-based, meaning today you don’t have to listen solely to the top 40 chart hits. But those top 40 charts are still important markers for record companies to ensure they make money. Thus, crossover songs are utilized to win over not only a Katy Perry fanbase but also Snoop Dogg fans with their mega hit ‘California Gurls,’” – Elissa Stroman
• “Look at the Grammy nominations for best pop vocal album. Three of the five (Cee Lo Green, Bruno Mars and Rihanna) utilize elements of hip-hop, R&B and various other styles of music to create their signature sound. I believe we’ll see more sampling, more incorporation of past styles and genres, and more melding of genres, such as Taylor Swift’s country/pop style.” – Elissa Stroman
• “‘Pop music’ is essentially now an advertising jingle. There is little or no distinction between the compositions, sounds or intentions between a Madonna half-time show or a Chevy truck commercial. It’s about selling a lifestyle. But then, so were the Beach Boys.” – Christopher Smith
• “The advent of the Internet and of digital downloads has essentially killed the record company as a mediator between artists and consumers. Artists simply do not require the budgets, technology or distribution networks that record companies formerly monopolized. Almost anybody can make a good-sounding record in her or his spare room. This is the ‘Long Tail’ approach to marketing music, and ironically it takes pop music back to the DIY ethos of early hip-hop, of punk rock before that, of folk music before that, and back and back to the days when music was a process to be shared, not an object to be manufactured and sold.” – Christopher Smith
• “We began the 2000s with boy bands, who quickly fell out of favor for rock stars such as U2, Blink 182 and Green Day. Later in the decade, we saw hip-hop and rap artists reach wider audiences, but in the end Katy Perry and Lady Gaga ended the 2000s with some of the biggest pop hits. Popular music goes in waves, pendulum swings of styles. It always goes somewhere.” – Elisa Stroman