< The 2015 Pension 40: The Long Climb

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Teresa Ghilarducci
Labor Economist / New School for Social Research
Last year’s rank: 39

A longtime advocate of adequate retirement benefits for American workers, author and economics professor Teresa Ghilarducci serves on committees and study groups hoping to solve the U.S. retirement-income-security crisis. For example, she’s a member of the Washington-based Bipartisan Policy Center’s Commission on Retirement Security and Personal Savings, which is looking to improve Social Security, defined benefit pensions and defined contribution plans. “We’re on the road to what everyone expects has to happen,” says the ever-upbeat Ghilarducci, 58, who taught at the University of Notre Dame for 25 years before moving to New York’s New School for Social Research, where she heads the Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis. She argues for the creation of a system “with adequate accumulation, investment and payout structure. It’s not rocket science. It’s the elements of very good pension design.” Ghilarducci finds she can present her ideas about pension design in an ever-growing number of forums. Currently Ghilarducci is an unpaid adviser to the Hillary Clinton campaign and a longtime member of the Government Accountability Office’s retirement policy advisory panel. In February she was tapped by New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer to serve with five other academics to help design a retirement plan for full-time workers without access to workplace plans.

 

 
The 2015 Pension 40

1. Bruce Rauner Illinois 2. John & Laura Arnold Laura and John Arnold Foundation Finding, Applying for, and Winning Grant Funding: Tips for Nonprofits Sponsored by Fidelity Investments April 29, 2025 3. Chris Christie New Jersey 4. Randi Weingarten AmericanFederation of Teachers 5. Phyllis Borzi U.S. Department of Labor

6. Kevin de León California 7. Alejandro García Padilla Commonwealth ofPuerto Rico 8. Laurence Fink BlackRock 9. Rahm Emanuel Chicago 10. Sean McGarvey North AmericanBuilding Trades Unions

11. John Kline Minnesota 12. J. Mark Iwry U.S. TreasuryDepartment 13. Damon Silvers AFL-CIO 14. Jeffrey Immelt General Electric Co. 15. Joshua Gotbaum Brookings Institution

16. Robin Diamonte United Technologies Corp. 17. Mark Mullet Washington 18. Terry O'Sullivan Laborers' International Union of North America 19. Raymond Dalio Bridgewater Associates 20. Ted Wheeler Oregon

21. Thomas Nyhan Central States Southeast and Southwest Areas Pension Fund 22. Karen Ferguson & Karen Friedman Pensions Rights Center 23. Randy DeFrehn National Coordinating Committee forMultiemployer Plans 24. Robert O'Keef Motorola Solutions 25. Caitlin Long Morgan Stanley

26. Kenneth Feinberg The Law Offices of Kenneth R. Feinberg 27. Orrin Hatch Utah 28. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend Center for Retirement Initiatives, Georgetown University 29. Ian Lanoff Groom Law Group 30. Joshua Rauh Stanford Graduate School of Business

31. Ted Eliopoulos California Public Employees' Retirement System 32. Edward (Ted) Siedle Benchmark Financial Services 33. Teresa Ghilarducci New School for Social Research 34. Denise Nappier Connecticut 35. W. Thomas Reeder Jr. Pension BenefitGuaranty Corp.

36. Hank Kim National Conference on Public Employee Retirement Systems 37. Paul Singer Elliott Management Corp. 38. Bailey Childers National PublicPension Coalition 39. Amy Kessler Prudential Financial 40. Judy Mares U.S. Labor Department