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Academy Calls Attention to Need for Improving PBGC Single-Employer Premium-Setting Process

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Currently Premiums Are Set by Congress

WASHINGTON, March 5, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — A new public policy issue brief from the American Academy of Actuaries calls attention to adverse consequences of the current premium structure of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation’s (PBGC) single-employer insurance program and possible approaches to addressing them.

“The PBGC’s single-employer program plays a vital role in protecting pension benefits in private-sector defined benefit plans, and while premiums have improved program funding, there are other ways in which the current premium structure is not supporting the PBGC’s mission as effectively as it could,” said Grace Lattyak, vice chairperson of the Academy’s Pension Committee, which developed Aligning the PBGC’s Single-Employer Premium Structure With Its Objectives. “Changes to the premium structure could better encourage the continuation of voluntary private pension plans and maintain premiums at the lowest level necessary, which are other parts of the PBGC’s mission.”

The issue brief details how the current fixed and variable rate components together may:

Contribute to employer decisions not to sponsor pension plans.

Create strong incentives for employers to i) discontinue coverage of participants with small benefits, and ii) refrain from plan coverage expansion.

Create incentives to freeze benefits or to exit the defined-benefit system entirely.

And in some instances, reduce incentives to fund plans.

A change in the premium structure would require congressional action because premiums are set by Congress. Congress could also address aspects of the current congressional budget scoring process that drive higher premiums. The issue brief outlines potential approaches to changing both the premium structure and premium-setting authority and parameters.

Learn more about the Academy’s work on this and other retirement issues at actuary.org.

The American Academy of Actuaries is a 20,000-member professional association whose mission is to serve the public and the U.S. actuarial profession. For more than 50 years, the Academy has assisted public policymakers on all levels by providing leadership, objective expertise, and actuarial advice on risk and financial security issues. The Academy also sets qualification, practice, and professionalism standards for actuaries in the United States.

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SOURCE American Academy of Actuaries

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Huawei Launches Over 20 All-New Xinghe Intelligent Network Offerings to Amplify Industrial Intelligence

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SHANGHAI, Sept. 21, 2024 /CNW/ — During HUAWEI CONNECT 2024, Leon Wang, President of Huawei’s Data Communication Product Line, announced more than 20 all-new Xinghe Intelligent Network offerings globally at the summit themed “Xinghe Intelligent Network, Amplify Industrial Intelligence”. These purpose-built offerings contribute to an AI network ecosystem and help customers seize opportunities for intelligent development and maximize intelligent productivity.

With the development of AI technologies, the world is advancing from digital transformation to intelligent transformation. All industries are quickly adopting AI technologies to create new use cases, for example, self-driving cars, intelligent diagnosis and treatment, and intelligent train inspection. All of these are significantly improving the efficiency and experience of our work and daily lives.

The advent of the intelligent era is driving networks into intelligent ones. Huawei has been making joint efforts with partners to lead research and practices of intelligent networks. That’s why Huawei constantly upgrades its Xinghe Intelligent Network offerings to help customers grasp opportunities for intelligent development, build new intelligent network infrastructure, and maximize intelligent productivity in the intelligent era. Key highlights include the following:

Xinghe Intelligent Campus focuses on AI-enabled, experience-centric campus network construction, ensuring zero freezing for audio and video applications, zero degradation on services, and zero waiting for interactions.Xinghe Intelligent WAN introduces a wide range of intelligent technologies to intelligently schedule millions of flows and precisely optimize service experience.Xinghe Intelligent Fabric adopts the AI Turbo engine to improve network throughput, enhancing foundation model training efficiency.Xinghe Intelligent Network Security integrates AI technologies into network security detection, accurately and rapidly identifying threats.

To support network solutions in various scenarios, Huawei released more than 20 featured offerings globally. Examples include the industry’s first 100 Tbps fixed-form Ethernet data center switch, the industry’s first 51.2 Tbps liquid-cooled fixed-form data center switch, the industry’s first AI router, high-quality 10 Gbps campus switches and Wi-Fi 7 APs, Intelligent SASE Branch Security Solution, and the industry’s first IP Autonomous Driving Network Solution. All these offerings are designed to help customers with greater business returns.

As the intelligent era calls for intelligent networks, Huawei will continue to drive the development of intelligent networks and upgrade its Xinghe Intelligent Network products and solutions, ultimately helping global customers to stride towards the intelligent era and reap more benefits.

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SOURCE Huawei

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HUAWEI CONNECT 2024 | Huawei Unveils the Brand-New Xinghe Intelligent Fabric Solution, Powering the AI Era

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SHANGHAI, Sept. 21, 2024 /PRNewswire/ — At HUAWEI CONNECT 2024, over 300 industry leaders, experts, and scholars gathered for the data center network session themed “Xinghe Intelligent Fabric, Powering the AI Era.” The event featured discussions on the evolution and technological advancements of data center networks. During the session, Arthur Wang, President of Data Center Network Domain at Huawei’s Data Communication Product Line, introduced the newly upgraded Xinghe Intelligent Fabric solution. This cutting-edge solution aims to establish a data center network characterized by one map for intelligent operations and maintenance (O&M), one network for diverse computing, and one platform for simplified deployment, providing a robust network infrastructure to support enterprises’ digital and intelligent transformations.

In his keynote speech, Arthur Wang outlined the emerging trends in data center network development. He emphasized that in the AI era, data center networks require both a “brilliant brain” and “resilient bones.” The newly launched Xinghe Intelligent Fabric solution is designed to deliver a powerful network infrastructure tailored for the AI era, featuring:

One Map for Intelligent O&M: Zero Management Concerns

Huawei’s exclusive network digital map enables rapid cross-data center and cross-vendor fault identification within minutes. Additionally, the NetMaster network large model facilitates AI-driven O&M, eliminating manual intervention and ensuring zero management concerns.

One Network for Diverse Computing: Zero Service Interruptions

The Xinghe Intelligent Fabric supports various application scenarios, including intelligent computing, general-purpose computing, and storage. The innovative Network Scale Load Balancing (NSLB) algorithm increases network throughput to 95% and boosts AI training efficiency by over 10%. With the exclusive iReliable three-level fast switchover capability, it achieves sub-millisecond switchover, guaranteeing zero service interruptions.

One Platform for Simplified Deployment: Zero Configuration Errors

By employing digital twins to simulate networks in advance and verify configurations post-deployment, the solution ensures 100% accuracy in network changes. By harnessing network-security convergence capabilities, AI creates an intelligent security matrix to analyze millions of security policies, achieving zero configuration errors.

Looking ahead, Huawei will continue to collaborate with industry partners to enhance research and innovation in data center networks, promote intelligent upgrades, and create greater value for the industry.

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SOURCE Huawei

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Cultivating a Culture of Peace: International Day of Peace Statement by Education Cannot Wait Executive Director Yasmine Sherif

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NEW YORK, Sept. 21, 2024 /CNW/ — The longing for peace transcends time, geography and religion. Based on justice, human rights and universal values outlined in the UN Charter, a culture of peace brings us all together in our common agenda for humanity. We can only co-exist by aligning ourselves with such a world order.

On today’s International Day of Peace, we call on world leaders to end conflict and embrace a culture of peace as enshrined in the UN Charter and related international law.

As the UN General Assembly outlined in the Declaration and Programme of Action on a Culture of Peace  a quarter of a century ago, this must include: “Respect for life, human rights and fundamental freedoms; the promotion of non-violence through education, dialogue and cooperation; commitment to peaceful settlement of conflicts; and adherence to freedom, justice, democracy, tolerance, solidarity, cooperation, pluralism, cultural diversity, dialogue and understanding at all levels of society and among nations.”

Educating for peace starts at home and continues in school through years of education. This takes place during the most formative years of a child learning about their identity, ethics, values, conscience, courage and compassion. Wherever there has been a failure in imparting on children the imperative for peace, the world is turned upside down. This is a global failure with no geographical boundaries.

Today, we live in a world of unprecedented violence, armed conflict and chaos. All the genuine and heartfelt commitments made in 1945 in the UN Charter seem to be fading away. Children and adolescents are the most vulnerable, the least protected, and the most impacted. They bear the brunt. 

Global conflicts killed three times as many children in 2023 than in the previous year, according to the United Nations. The number of forcibly displaced people reached an unprecedented 120 million in May 2024.

“In 2023, the United Nations verified a record 32,990 grave violations against 22,557 children in 26 conflict zones, a 35% increase from the previous year,” according to recent analysis by the UN.

We can end these violations and invest in a constructive co-existence globally. We can use our resources for education, rather than for wars. In classrooms around the world, girls and boys who have withstood the wrath of war can rebuild their hopes and their lives. Cultivating a culture of peace is possible. The financial resources exist. The choice as to how we use them is ours.

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SOURCE Education Cannot Wait

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