In the past two years, the government decreed the new availability of retirement products that promised to pave the way to post-career happiness by answering the direst needs of savers everywhere. Both the MyRA and the Longevity Annuity came out with such fanfare you’d think regulators had parted the Red Sea.

It turned out not to be the Red Sea, but merely a faded red can of New Coke. Sure, the wizards down in research and development could design anything based on any specs. And the policy wonks thought they had a winner with these particular specs. Regulators thought the MyRA and the QLAC offered the answers to what academic research insisted were the most pressing wants of the working class. So the financial engineers built it, only they didn’t come.

We’ll set aside MyRAs as a fait accompli, and, instead, focus on the much heralded longevity annuity.

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Christopher Carosa

Chris Carosa has been writing a weekly article and monthly column for BenefitsPRO online and BenefitsPRO Magazine since 2011 and is a nationally recognized award-winning writer, researcher and speaker. He’s written seven books, including From Cradle to Retire: The Child IRA; Hey! What’s My Number? – How to Increase the Odds You Will Retire in Comfort; A Pizza The Action: Everything I Ever Learned About Business I Learned By Working in a Pizza Stand at the Erie County Fair; and the widely acclaimed 401(k) Fiduciary Solutions. Carosa is also Chief Contributing Editor of the authoritative trade journal FiduciaryNews.com and publisher of the Mendon-Honeoye Falls-Lima Sentinel, a weekly community newspaper he founded in 1989. Currently serving as President of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists and with more than 1,000 articles published in various publications, he appears regularly in the national media. A “parallel” entrepreneur, he actively runs a handful of businesses, including a small boutique investment adviser, providing hands-on experience for his writing. A trained astrophysicist, he also holds an MBA and has been designated a Certified Trust and Financial Advisor. Share your thoughts and story ideas with him through Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/christophercarosa/)and Twitter (https://twitter.com/ChrisCarosa).