Meet The Team

Larry Sher is a member of the actuarial consulting team and part of the senior leadership for October Three. Larry also is head of our dispute resolution practice, which provides support to clients in disputes related to their retirement plans, both in litigation and otherwise. Larry’s experience in this area is extensive, having served as an arbitrator outside of litigation and as an expert in many lawsuits, including prominent cases involving cash balance pension plans. Larry is a highly sought after expert and advisor and, in August 2014, was appointed to the New Jersey Pension and health Benefits Commission by Governor Chris Christie.

Larry has been an actuary for over 35 years, specializing in defined benefit plans issues. Larry has focused on cash balance and other hybrid defined benefit plans ever since his firm (at the time), Kwasha Lipton, developed the first cash balance plan in 1985. Larry has long believed, and continues to believe, that cash balance plans offer the best hope to salvage the U.S. private sector defined benefit system. He strongly feels that the consequences of continuing on the path toward a defined contribution only private retirement system will be bad for employees, their employers and the government. While many practitioners and firms seem to have thrown in the towel, Larry sees October Three as an environment where creativity can once again thrive.

Larry is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries (FSA), a Fellow of the Conference of Consulting Actuaries (FCA), a Member of the American Academy of Actuaries (MAAA) and an Enrolled Actuary (EA). Larry received a B.A. in Mathematics from Rutgers University. He has been a Board Member and Vice-Chair of the Actuarial Standards Board, the group that establishes actuarial standards of practice for all US actuaries. Larry has also been on the Boards of the American Academy of Actuaries and the Conference of Consulting Actuaries, and was recently President of the Conference.

Larry has written several articles on cash balance and other defined benefit plan issues and is a frequent speaker at industry and professional seminars.