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Public pension plans in the U.S. are seriously underfunded, especially following the financial market crisis of 2008-2009 which resulted in large investment losses. However, funding levels vary widely across plans. Pension boards of trustees make key management decisions in pension systems and these decisions have significant effects on funded levels, yet our empirical knowledge of board management is limited. This study explores the effect of board composition on pension funding levels. Existing theoretical debates lead to differing expectations, and previous studies have mixed results. Our research uses a panel data set of large public pension plans from 2001-2009. We also collect data for pension board composition from this time period. We find that increasing political appointees and employee members on the board increases the funding performance of the pension system.

This study aims to examine whether and how the experience of specialized external governance mechanisms mandated by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 – the actuary and auditor – affect pension plan funding.

This study uses data from annual pension plan regulatory reports (Form 5500), Form 10-K filings, Form DEF 14A filings (company proxy statements) and publicly available data sources. The hand-collected data include information related to the pension plan’s actuary and auditor and various pension plan data disclosed in the company’s financial statement footnotes.

The author finds that more experienced actuaries and auditors are associated with better funded pension plans, especially when the company has higher financial risk or lower board independence. Additional analyses indicate that companies with more experienced actuaries and pension plan auditors are more likely to make higher annual pension plan contributions and hold fewer Level 3 fair value assets.

The dearth of pension plan governance research generally focuses on whether and how internal governance mechanisms affect pension plan funding. To the best of the author’s knowledge, this is the first empirical study of the relationship between external pension plan governance mechanisms and pension plan funding.

Hospices are undergoing changes in the way they are funded by health boards as a result of the change to a contract‐setting regime in the NHS. This may have implications for the overall funding position of the hospices; particularly there is a concern as to whether charitable giving to these bodies will decrease as a result. Analyses the accounts of Scottish voluntary sector hospices over the transition period as a means of identifying any such changes. Finds no immediate threat to the continued functioning of the hospices, on a financial basis.

The process of developing a computer based resource‐sharing program for Massachusetts is described. Activities include the development and linking of bibliographic databases, the establishment of document request and delivery procedures, and the provision of computer literacy/training for librarians. Standards, funding, governance, egislation and public information components of the plan are also reviewed.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the change in pension fund board diversity after self-regulation was introduced, and investigate which pension fund characteristics influence compliance with self-regulation. In addition, the authors analyze whether compliance might be achieved by tokenism.

The authors hand-collect pension fund and pension fund board data of the largest (by assets) 200 pension funds in the Netherlands. The authors compare descriptive statistics on board diversity, perform statistical tests on these, and perform non-linear regression techniques to investigate which pension fund characteristics influence compliance.

The findings are fourfold. First, over the past three years, pension fund boards have only marginally improved on gender and age diversity. In April 2014, still more than 35 percent of the funds had no women on the board, and an overwhelming 60 percent had no members below 40 years of age. This indicates that self-regulation in the pension fund industry so far has not been effective for the industry as a whole. Second, the authors find that pension funds that have larger boards are more likely to have at least one woman on the board or at least one member below 40 years of age. Third, boards of pension funds with more assets are less likely to have young board members. Fourth, boards with at least one female have a higher probability of also having at least one member below 40 years, which is suggestive of tokenism.

Based on Hirschman’s (1970) theory of voice and exit, the authors expect that pension fund boards would be more diverse than corporate boards. However, the authors find that this is not the case. Second, given the importance of generational value transfers in pension fund policy decisions, the authors expect that age is a more important diversity characteristic than gender for pension fund boards in the Netherlands. Again, the data does not support this prediction.

Consistent with the literature on diversity in corporate boards, the authors find that diverse boards are on average larger. This suggests that, all other things equal, small boards might want to reconsider whether increasing their size would lead to more diversity and hence to more voice for participants that cannot exit the pension scheme. If larger funds hesitate to include young members because of their lack of relevant skills, then the authors would recommend setting up a platform to educate young candidates and prepare them for board membership. Forced independent auditor verification, as in the UK, might be a fruitful action the regulator could enforce on pension funds going forward. However, if that also does not lead to a significant improvement, compulsory diversity quota might be the only option left for policy makers.

This paper contributes to the literature in at least three ways. First, the authors analyze whether self-regulation on diversity in pension fund boards has been effective. Second, the authors determine which pension fund characteristics are associated with more board diversity. Third, the authors shed light on tokenism in pension fund board composition: Diversity might be obtained through installing diversity tokens, which are individuals who have multiple diversity characteristics.

This chapter focuses on Guided Entry into New Teaching and Learning Experiences (GENTLE), a reception centre designed to welcome student refugees and facilitate their early integration into schools in the Thames Valley District School Board in Ontario, Canada. Our examination focuses on the values and policies that guided leaders’ decision-making, the practices educators employed, as well as the allocation and use of resources to ensure Syrian refugee students were integrated successfully; each issue constitutes a noted gap in the related academic literature. This chapters draws from direct accounts of the eight education leaders, working at each level of Ontario’s educational governance structure, who played a role in the integration of Syrian student refugees in Ontario. The case underscores that fulfilling humanitarian visions, such as welcoming and integrating thousands of refugees, requires a nimble, well-coordinated, strategic and adequately resourced response; the response must be grounded in a wide range of evidence, including local/anecdotal insights, to achieve an inclusive vision for education. Aspirations to fulfil such a vision must be nurtured, learned, shared and collectively earned by educators operating at all levels of the system, which remains a perpetual work in progress. Implications for leader practitioners and researchers include the need to critically interrogate educational programming for refugees offered at all levels of the school system, inspire educators of varying perspectives to commit to a particular vision of inclusion for newcomers and manage resources morally, strategically, sustainably and flexibly.

To describe the broad range of reform initiatives that has been undertaken in response to a series of mutual fund scandals that have become apparent starting in 2003. This is the second of a two‐part article. The first part, in Volume 7, Number 1, is a chronology of developments related to the fund scandals since 1 January 2003.

Describes SEC reforms, including governance reforms; compliance reforms; SEC‐directed expanded disclosure regarding fund expenses and costs; reforms with respect to share distribution practices; reforms addressing market timing, selective disclosure, and fair value pricing; other reform initiatives including codes of ethics for investment advisers and a requirement that hedge fund advisers register with the SEC; an enhanced surveillance and inspection program for mutual funds; and enforcement activities. Describes private civil suits brought against fund companies, legislative proposals, the roles of NASD and New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, the development of “best practices” guides by industry groups, and measures being promoted by institutional investors.

A broad range of reform initiatives has been undertaken by the SEC; NASD; and the New York, Massachusetts, and California Attorneys General. Both the US House of Representatives and the Senate have held hearings and proposed legislation, which at the moment appears dormant. Independent directors of only one mutual fund have been implicated in the trading abuse scandals. Hundreds of private civil lawsuits have been brought by fund shareholders against fund groups but virtually none has resulted in substantial restitution to plaintiffs.

A detailed and comprehensive analysis of reform initiatives in response to mutual fund scandals since 2003.

This book is a policy proposal aimed at the democratic left. It is concerned with gradual but radical reform of the socio‐economic system. An integrated policy of industrial and economic democracy, which centres around the establishment of a new sector of employee‐controlled enterprises, is presented. The proposal would retain the mix‐ed economy, but transform it into a much better “mixture”, with increased employee‐power in all sectors. While there is much of enduring value in our liberal western way of life, gross inequalities of wealth and power persist in our society.

The Equal Pay Act 1970 (which came into operation on 29 December 1975) provides for an “equality clause” to be written into all contracts of employment. S.1(2) (a) of the 1970 Act (which has been amended by the Sex Discrimination Act 1975) provides:

This paper aims to examine the effect of Shariah Advisory Panel (SAP) on both the level of agency cost and fund performance against conventional corporate governance, within corporate and Shariah governance settings, between Shariah and conventional mutual fund (CMF), in an emerging economy of Malaysia during the period 2008-2015.

Panel data regression is appropriately used within corporate governance research because of empirical issues of unobserved heterogeneity effects to avoid spurious evidence. The secondary data of 172 CMFs and 80 Shariah mutual funds are gathered hand-collected from annual reports and master prospectuses for the purpose of analysis between the period 2008 and 2015, generating 2,016 fund-year observations.

SAP is found to have a positive effect on agency costs. Consequently, it leads to empirical evidence that substantiates a negative and marginally significant association with fund performance when designated by accounting measure. Thus, the Shariah monitoring proxy is not a good mechanism for controlling agency costs inconsistent with performance maximizing (agency cost minimizing) outcomes.

The unique data set of mutual funds used in this research may restrict the generalization of the findings unless mentioned and explained specifically the data characteristics. The single proxy for Shariah monitoring could be better off by having a list of different measures.

The paper highlights and suggests a consistent improvement in regulation that could be performed by policymakers pertaining to the non-trivial additional cost of implying Shariah governance.

This paper provides empirical evidence of the SAP effects from the view of a more complex monitoring structure in consequence of having an additional layer of governance, devoting on the trade-off between benefit and cost to shareholders.