Private Sector Pensions

[Swan_Vesta]

We're all on gold plated pensions, we all retire at 50, none of us pay a penny into the pot and use public money to drive Lambo's and entertain whores .... Blah, blah, blah.

 

Don't worry about the fact that we do the jobs you lot can't or won't do, that it's apparently our job to be assaulted, sworn at & generally abused by the public or just to do a good job within the ever changing (and increasingly mental) roles of national and local government with no increase of resource or manpower. Better just to believe the Mail et al.

 

I've not seen a pay rise in 7 years. See if your maths works that out - Inflation has risen, my pay has stayed the same, 1/5 of my working life and my pensionable pay has been below the national average. How many Lambo's do you think that's going to buy?

[quisquose]

If you're a teacher then you wouldn't start working until finishing your degree at 21 so retiring at 55 would give you a recognable service of 34 years. If you worked the same amount of years (34) retiring at 66 you would recieve a risidual pension of 12,978 but this is significantly reduced if you retire early.

 

Here's a link to the calculator:

 

http://www.teacherspensions.co.uk/resources/calculators.htm

 

You mention 34 years service retiring at 55 in your 1st sentence, but oddly leave the years of service at 34 years when calculating the pension for somebody retiring at 66.

 

It makes much more sense to assume that a teacher retiring at 66 will receive the maximum pension, particularly when comparing with somebody retiring in the private sector.

 

You've also ignored the lump sum available.

 

Please could you tell me which link you followed to calculate the £12,978 pension, so that I can recalculate using a more realistic 40 years assumption.

[donkey]

Which part of the private sector are we talking about here?

 

Once you factor in the widespread cronyism - which allows executives with a poor track record to nonetheless draw massive bonuses and pension deals of six and seven figures - a more balanced picture begins to emerge than merely comparing the most lavish public sector pension deals with the appalling conditions suffered by the most ground down, exploited private sector workers.

[chem1st]

"I've paid into the system all my life" you often hear the elderly cry.

 

And look at the system. It is broken and more heavily in debt than any other country/empire in the world, perhaps even in history.

 

The debt burden is piled onto the younger, landless, working classes, and they can ill afford to pay. Back in the day in the generation previous to them, they 'dug for victory'. Today their children can not dig. Have you seen the allotment waiting lists?

 

In a country that is in debt and with high unemployment, we have people queuing for permission to use land to grow food. And they are denied the permission required to grow food upon their native lands. The same people who would be expected to go to war to fight for these lands. Whilst some of the landowners are paid millions to have their land sat idle. Land they do not even set foot upon!

 

And there are now masses of childless people, hogging land, expecting the landless peasants to keep them in retirement.

 

Now I'm not a genius, but I'm pretty sure you can't batter a tv with a sledgehammer and expect it to become a fully functioning cinema complex.

[quisquose]

Which part of the private sector are we talking about here?

 

Once you factor in the widespread cronyism - which allows executives with a poor track record to nonetheless draw massive bonuses and pension deals of six and seven figures - a more balanced picture begins to emerge than merely comparing the most lavish public sector pension deals with the appalling conditions suffered by the most ground down, exploited private sector workers.

 

It's widespread so I keep being told, but I've never actually met such a person. Have you?

 

I'm not denying that cronyism exists, it's just that this almost irrelevant demographic seems to be used to attack "them" and defend "us" irrespective of who "them" and "us" are.

[Guest sibon]

Assuming a pension of £14.25k and a retirement at age 65 still requires an annuity of £340k.

 

The average private sector employee has no chance of accruing anything near to this over his working life.

 

I'm not sure. Teaching is a graduate profession, so it seems fair to compare graduate salaries. The average graduate salary is £33K, or thereabouts. If 10% of that is paid into a pension fund, for 30 years and it earns 6% compound, that will result in a pension pot north of £250K.

 

That begs two questions. Firstly, do people pay that much into private pension pots? And then, do the fund managers achieve 6% per annum?

 

There are substantial questions that the private sector should be asking of pension fund managers. For all the justified hoo-ha about Brown's pension grab, the investment houses have cost private pensioners even more than he did.

[Guest sibon]

It's widespread so I keep being told, but I've never actually met such a person. Have you?

 

I'm not denying that cronyism exists, it's just that this almost irrelevant demographic seems to be used to attack "them" and defend "us" irrespective of who "them" and "us" are.

 

I come across cronyism frequently, in both the public and the private sector.

 

Once you get a critical mass of people in an organisation, they tend to appoint their own. You can see it as clearly in local government as you can in the city.

[quisquose]

But private sector pensions used to deliver this. Why not any more?

 

Sure there is a demographic element to but why aren't the pension funds being taken to task over extortionate fees, chronic fund mismanagement, appalling investment decisions etc... Why aren't employers being taken to task over pension fund abuse, neglect and mismanagement?

 

By deflecting attention onto public sector pensions you are doing the dirty work for the private funds and employers who have shafted the private pension funds.

 

In a nutshell we are living longer and healthier.

 

This is good news. However it does create problems, which are solvable.

 

It seems obvious to me that as we live longer and healthier we should also work longer. To a vote chasing politician, this doesn't seem quite so obvious.

 

In response the private sector has taken a "slash 'n burn" survival policy of divesting risk and therefore closing all pension schemes, the public sector has taken a "keep calm and carry on", the state can fund most of our lives not working, policy of defending what they have.

 

Both policies are wrong.

[donkey]

It's widespread so I keep being told, but I've never actually met such a person. Have you?

 

I'm not denying that cronyism exists, it's just that this almost irrelevant demographic seems to be used to attack "them" and defend "us" irrespective of who "them" and "us" are.

 

It is similar to holding up an ex head teacher with a £30 grand p.a. pension as an example of typical public sector pensions?

 

I get your point, because in the same way you don't know any loaded private sector cronies, I don't know any public sector pensioners getting £30 grand a year.

[quisquose]

I'm not sure. Teaching is a graduate profession, so it seems fair to compare graduate salaries. The average graduate salary is £33K, or thereabouts. If 10% of that is paid into a pension fund, for 30 years and it earns 6% compound, that will result in a pension pot north of £250K.

 

That begs two questions. Firstly, do people pay that much into private pension pots? And then, do the fund managers achieve 6% per annum?

 

There are substantial questions that the private sector should be asking of pension fund managers. For all the justified hoo-ha about Brown's pension grab, the investment houses have cost private pensioners even more than he did.

 

I'm approaching 50, and when I was a graduate starting in employment I recall that my salary was slightly higher than that of a teacher, but back then only 5% of school leavers were going to University to obtain degrees.

 

Nearly all the graduate in our employment now (a typical distribution business with a full mix of employment), are earning average salaries significantly less than teachers. I actually feel really sorry for many of them. About 1 in 10 might have a chance of a £40+ salary, but for most it's more about defending £20-£30k jobs for as long as possible. We don't have a contributory pension, but we are required to administer one if asked. Nobody has asked us in 5 years because nobody can afford to contribute 5%, never mind 10%.

 

Even if one of our graduates could put away £3000 (10-15%) a year (and they can't) over 35 years, my spreadsheet estimates an annuity pot of £200k. How do you suggest they make this up to the £340k required to match a teacher on an equivalent salary, not including the lump sum of course?