I really enjoyed writing this week’s Five Favorites for Friday post. It brought me down the nostalgia trail all the way back to my days defending insurance companies against LTD claims and then routed me back to the future with stories about the latest class action theories against plan fiduciaries and the future of benefit
It’s hard to prevent AI from becoming the theme of any end of the week roundup of the news, and that is true here as well to some extent, particularly with regard to the potential risks that AI poses for employers who offer benefit plans. However, I have managed to sneak in some stories about
Last week’s Five Favorites for Friday post ran a little heavy, with a focus on five different issues and articles concerning the Department of Labor’s new proposed regulation intended to somehow reduce class action litigation and increase participants’ exposure to alternative investments all at the same time. That seems like a trick worthy of Penn
I found myself feeling very zen and mellow when writing this week’s Five Favorites for Friday post. That’s not always the case, as often the post covers topics that get me quite agitated, such as articles about poorly reasoned court decisions or about unnecessary risks to plan participants. That wasn’t the case this week and
I have written before that plan sponsors should try more ERISA breach of fiduciary duty cases to verdict if they, and their insurers, really want to dissuade class action lawyers from filing ERISA breach of fiduciary duty class action cases with weak liability theories or worse, as simply a strike suit targeted at getting a
Some weeks the Five Favorites write themselves and this week was one of them. I think it’s because so many of the articles hit right dead center on issues I have litigated or counseled on over the years, including disputes between excess and primary insurers, whether forfeiture under a 401(k) plan is appropriate, withdrawal liability
We are having a blizzard in Boston today. It started around 3 in the morning and is expected to continue for much of the day. I thought I would take a break from snowblowing to finally finish my top ten countdown of my blog and LinkedIn posts of 2025. I had originally targeted the end
This is a really educational week on Five Favorites for Friday. There is no hidden message or implicit critique buried in that point. It’s just that a number of comprehensive stories providing a detailed overview of key areas of development in ERISA litigation were published this past week and, solely because of their quality, make
This was a fun week if, like me, you enjoy reading about ERISA and insurance issues. There was a lot to pay attention to, but for purposes of this weekly post, I narrowed it down to articles on nuclear verdicts, cyber insurance, regulatory initiatives targeted at PBMs and drug pricing, the continued boom in ERISA
In some ways, the second most popular post on my blog in 2025 was my favorite – and objectively likely my “best” – post of the year, in any venue. It hit early and accurately, and provided actionable advice to an at-risk population, namely employers who sponsor 401(k) plans and the fiduciaries who operate them.