In the last post (The Mathematics of Security – How Underwriting Shaped the System) we talked about security – pensions, long-term promises, and a social contract built on reliability and funding.
But that model assumed something very specific – Employees would stay.
- Stay with one employer.
- Stay in one industry.
- Stay long enough for the math to work.
For a long time, that assumption held.
When Mobility Entered the Picture
Beginning in the late 1970s and accelerating through the 1980s and 1990s, work started to change.
Several forces converged:
- Globalization reshaped industries and careers
- Mergers, acquisitions, and restructurings became common
- Lifetime employment declined
- Dual-income households increased
- Geographic mobility rose as careers diversified
People didn’t just change jobs more often, they built careers across employers. The workforce became mobile. Benefits had to follow.
From Lifetime Employment to Portability
As work became more mobile, benefits began to adapt. The shift from defined benefit pensions to defined contribution like 401(k) plans wasn’t just a financial decision. It was a structural one. Benefits started to move with people, rather than tying people to employers.
Portability introduced:
- Individual ownership
- Flexibility across jobs
- Reduced long-term employer liability
- Benefits aligned with modern career paths
Security didn’t disappear. It changed form.
What Portability Changed in the System
Portability redistributed responsibility. Employers moved from guaranteeing outcomes to enabling access. Employees gained choice, and more decision-making responsibility. Risk shifted. It wasn’t eliminated. It was reassigned.
This made benefits:
- More adaptable
- More scalable
- More dependent on systems and processes
Benefits were no longer anchored to a single employer relationship. They became part of a broader ecosystem that followed the individual.
Why This Matters in the Bigger Story
Portability modernized benefits.
But it also increased the number of decisions, transitions, and handoffs that benefits systems must support – especially as people change jobs, move, form families, and reconfigure coverage over time.
That evolution sets the stage for what comes next in this series:
- Benefits as strategy
- Growing system complexity
- And eventually, where AI may, or may not, fit.
Question for You
What do you think we gained, and what did we lose, in the move toward portability?
Next Up
Next Up: What a Benefit Plan Actually Is.
Before we talk about cost, enrollment, or data, we need to slow down and look at the foundation. Next, we’ll break down what a benefit plan really is. The rules, decisions, and constraints that exist long before an employee ever enrolls. Because nothing in benefits works, or fails, without plan design.
