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THE GOVERNMENT HAS launched a consultation process around a proposed automatic enrolment into a retirement pension for all Irish citizens.
The Department of Social Protection has launched the process and its proposals for the Automatic Enrolment Retirement Savings System.
The proposal is a StrawMan endeavour – the idea being one side comes up with a proposal which is then refined in order to make it as effective as possible.
Social Protection Minister Regina Doherty described the move as “perhaps the most fundamental policy reform in a generation in terms of retirement savings provision”.
Under automatic enrolment anyone without a private pension plan would be automatically signed into a retirement savings scheme, one they could then leave if they wished.
The government says it is introducing the measure in order to alleviate the current situation, in which it says roughly two-thirds of all Irish employees are not setting aside savings for their retirement.
Rather than forcing people to save, the proposal is rather designed to encourage people to plan for their future.
State pension
It bears no relation to the State pension, and will not affect it in any way as the proposal currently stands.
The Irish Congress of Trade Unions said that it will accept the opportunity to respond to the proposal via the consultation process, stating that the government’s proposal follows “international best practice”.
“Generous tax relief on pension savings has failed as an approach for encouraging low and middle income earners to save enough for their retirement,” said ICTU’s social policy officer Laura Bambrick regarding the news.
Added to this, employers are not legally required to establish or contribute to an occupational pension scheme, and fewer and fewer are doing so voluntarily.
“As the State pension is not earnings-related, workers without a workplace or private pension are at risk of a significant drop in their living standards in old age,” she added.
The proposed scheme would see workers contributing up to 6% of their salary, with that amount then matched by their employers. Under the scheme the State would contribute €1 for every €3 saved by workers.
Just 35% of Irish workers in private employment, as opposed to public sector workers say, have a private pension plan.
The launch of an automatic enrolment system has been mooted for the last 20 years, but has never been acted upon.
Ireland is one of only two OECD countries which operates without any form of mandatory retirement saving plan.
The consultation period remains open until 4 November. Submissions can be made via email to autoenrolment@welfare.ie. Further details regarding the scheme are available at Welfare.ie
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I’ll be long dead before then. They will prob increase retirement age to 80. No thanks. I’ll invest in my own future. Not some fund that won’t exist or be pilfered in the next downturn
@Simon F: absolutely agree with your sentiment. When people’s private pension pots were raided they crossed a line that destroyed any glimmer of faith I might have had in a pension. This is the first move towards eroding the state pension, those that engage will be punished come retirement, in Ireland you’re rarely rewarded for being self sufficient. I think they will find the majority opt out for the simple fact people cannot afford to relinquish 6% of their salary.
Thanks but no thanks
@Tim Pot: It is probably the furthest from smart that you can possibly get, particularly when we have corrupt idiots in charge.
@Tim Pot: not really the smartest of you die beforehand and let’s face it the old grim reaper is always just behind you from 50 onwards.
@JesusMoreBullshit: Your pension goes to a spouse/dependent/other nominee if you die before you use it.
It’s also extremely tax efficient as a savings mechanism if you pay at the marginal rate.
Since my employer matches to a point, if I put in 50 euro my employer puts in 50 euro. If I take that 50 euro as pay, I pay marginal rate of tax + PRSI + USC on it and take home about half, 25 euro. If I put it in my pension I pay just the PRSI and USC (about 5 euro) and I pay PRSI and USC on the 50 euro from my employer.
So the effective cost in net pay to me is 30 euro, for 100 euro being added to my pension pot. I then have professionals making investment decisions instead of myself, for a small fee. As I have to work for a living, I don’t have time to manage my money full time, so this is a good deal.
If I wanted to, and my employer didn’t have a scheme, I could use a personal retirement savings account (PRSA) to put money in before tax. This wouldn’t have an employer match, but it would still be infinitely better than making casual investments out of my net pay, as I’d keep 40% more of the income invested.
Sure, I have to pay tax on my pension when I retire, but there’ll be more in the pot by virtue of the tax relief on the way in, and I’ll have tax credits as an OAP.
Pensions are a no-brainer, but by all means manage it yourself *as an approved PRSA*
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin: And what happens if you are retiring during a ‘Banking Crisis’ as the last time and your pension is wiped out as happened alot of people.. Pension Funds invest in other Funds/Investmenst that may not work out either ..
That being said I do have a pension as it has been part of my salary many years but I wont be sure if it was the right thing to do untill I retire
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin:
Professionals making investments decisions on your behalf.
You mean coke snorting hedgefund cowboys gambling it in between playing on their yachts down around the Cayman Islands.
You could always just pop down to Paddy Powers and have a bash yourself.
@Tweed Cap: You definitely watch too many Hollywood movies :D
@Tweed Cap: think you’re talking about weekend at bernies
@Tim Pot: employers match the contribution? Well, that won’t happen in the vast majority of cases. See, here’s the thing. I’m over 40 years in the workforce. When i started there was what we called, the stamp. Now it’s called PRSI. The stamp covered health insurance and your pension when you retired, paid sick leave and dole if you lost your job. Over the years, they kept moving the goal posts. The health benefits (dental, optical, hospital) have all but disappeared and the pension fund has been bled dry. So excuse me for being sceptical about this new plan, where I’m pretty sure a huge chunk of the money paid in will go on top class salaries and working conditions for staff in the new quango that will need to be established.
@Simon F: I thought that is why we paid the”3″ taxes all ready taken from our pay?
@Dermot Lane: you still get a free dental check up and clean every year. And eye-test and glasses every two years
@Tweed Cap: I’ve been in a pension fund for over 10 years which is ~50% ahead of the money paid in currently, even with a recent downward correction. And when you take tax relief and employer contributions into account, it’s about 500% more than I would have taken in net pay over that period.
If it halves in the morning I’m still quids in, and that same mix of assets can rise on the next uptick.
They can have all the coke they like. How people choose to spend their bonus is no concern of mine. I don’t judge my car mechanic for having a few pints our of his salary.
@Irish Bob most people select a lifestyle option in their pension, which automatically begins to de-risk your investments 3-5 years before you retire. You can control the mix to suit your investment desires if you choose. You can always take money out of an investment fund yourself if you want to bank gains – you usually can’t put it back in though under normal circumstances as they don’t want people trying to beat the fund itself.
The only person I’ve heard of losing their pension to the banking ciris was an ex bank employee who took their pension in shares in said bank and planned to live off the dividends. Diversification is important. The real issue in recent years has been low rates offered on annuities, this is a different matter, and certainly doesn’t put you in a worse position than if you had been saving money in the bank up to retirement.
@Sam Harms: Who gets these ? are you saying we should get these from PRSI ?
@Simon F: the next downturn will be here in two years, max.
@Ronan Sexton:
How do the ‘corrupt idiots’ affect a private pension exactly?
@JesusMoreBullshit:
a) save and die at 50, or
b) don’t save, and live past 50 with no savings
Which is worse?
@Irish Bob:
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.
A good pension fund will have a diverse portfolio to reduce the risk of a market crash.
If you are at the stage of retiring you should have already moved your investments into areas that are low risk.
@Tim Pot: tell that to those that have no retirement income because of the downturn. We seem to have this impression we want to live like kings/queens in retirement, I live a modest life and will continue to do so if I make it to retirement.
@Dermot Lane:
Employers would legally have to match contributions up to 6%.
Public pension is not affected by this.
@Simon F: It’s signing you up to a pension, there’s no fund involved other than the proposed state contribution. Presume you’re thinking of the NPRF?
@Tim Pot: yet
@Tim Pot: how do ‘corrupt idiots’ affect a pension ? If I could find the guys that lost mine I’d ask them…..
@Sam Harms: Free dental check is a tax sponsored marketting ploy for dentists and I havent seen specsavers dishing out freebiez.
Simple truth is that if you want to make money, or save up money for your future, Ireland is not the place to do it…lots of great things about the country but financial gain would not be one of them
@Benny: Not true. Ireland has a huge number of wealthy individuals. A lot of who are self made, look around you there’s a reason we are becoming so diverse, they arent here for the sunshine.
@John Murphy: I do look around me, and for every wealthy person I see a hell of a lot more people struggling to pay rent, bills, school costs etc. Finding money to also put aside at the end of the month for savings or even to pursue a business idea like you’ve suggested is a huge challenge for most
@Benny: 100% agree but that’s worldwide &the distribution of wealth. I just wouldn’t dismiss that it’s impossible to save and have a good standard of life in Ireland at retirement age.
Or perhaps do what im considering just get your state pension €10/€12k a year and go to somewhere like Portugal where that income is close to the average working salary.
@Benny: You can take control of your pension investment to ensure it’s not invested in Ireland, if you’re that worried about it.
There’s money to be made here, but you have to have business or professional skills, and be willing to work for yourself, and probably work in Dublin in most instances.
Read this for exactly what it is: first steps in getting rid of the state pension. Not saying that this is a good thing or a bad thing, as that’s another conversation.
@danny: They probably won’t get rid of it but they will increase the pension age. With increasing rents and lowering standards of living and decreasing workers’ rights- life expectancy will follow the downward trend of trendsetter USA in most of the West and they will set it so most people don’t ever retire.
@Tim Pot: I bet the Irish Water Pensions are super !!
This is just another attempt to minimise the social welfare burden on the private PAYE worker. The politicians and public service have their cushy defined benefit schemes whereby they are guaranteed a pension at retirement…but guess where that pension comes from??? Current expenditure…or taxation in other words. But the public sector doesnt generate any real wealth…the private sector does and ultimately the private sector generates the wealth in the economy and the public sector spends it…and here it spends it on itself. All while the rest of us are forced into defined contribution pensions whose value may rise or fall…and I know lots of people whose pensions were completely wiped out during the recession. One guy seriously considered topping himself because he didnt see the point anymore. He was a hard worker, conscientious…set up a pension, paid into it over 25 years and in the space of a few weeks it was reduced to practically nothing. Thousands every year that he could have spent on himself, having holidays, a nice car, doing up things around the house…even just bringing his wife out to dinner…but no…he sacrificed all that to provide for his future, and then the worldwide banking system eliminated all its worth. Why do that??? Why take all the risk and have zero recourse if you get shafted? All while public and civil servants have a guaranteed pension with no risk…which they pay themselves out of the wealth that the private sector generates. A Universal State pension is the only fair and equitable pension system…we all pay into it and we all get a guaranteed pay out at the end. Either that or scrap the public pensions and let them all go to the pension providers like the rest of us and take their chances. You cant have one cushy pension for the public sector and a free for all at your own risk in the private. That is the huge elephant in the room that this lot is completely avoiding looking at. We in the private sector want a government backed defined benefit scheme. We should bloody well have one. If the government are going to force this on us, they should be damn well making sure we arent left to the wolves in the financial system because they want to reduce the state pension in years to come. Bunch of conniving sharks is all they are and you can guarantee the pension companies are loving this….funneling all the citizens of the state into their offices to buy their non guaranteed risky investments which of course they will say are great things…until their value is wiped out in the next cycle of boom / bust economics. If you are forcing us into this…the provide us with DEFINED BENEFIT, STATE GUARANTEED PENSIONS…OR GET LOST!!!
@Kevin Tyrrell: well said and correct to the point
@Kevin Tyrrell: well said
@Kevin Tyrrell: Well said and fact ..
@Kevin Tyrrell: Research Superannuation, works very well here in Oz.
Regarding your man conscientiously topping up hid pension, unfortunately bad luck. If those investments were rightly tied to shares or ETFs, he’d have been back up by 2011 and well ahead today! Warren Buffett 101. The market always wins in the long term. Day traders get hung out, the patient will prevail. If the world is down maybe it means postponing drawing down, or working a bit longer if possible all better for the mind and wallet than a huge loss! if u want smooth sailing put your boat in a cave!
@Kevin Tyrrell:
um, there is a defined benefit state guaranteed ‘pension’. It’s called the contributory old age pension and its distributed universally to people who have paid PRSI, whatever the amount. It’s even backed by a means tested non-contributory pension for those who find themselves unable to work for various reasons.
What’s demonstrable is that the state can’t afford to pay much more than it currently does to OAPs, and they would like people to have a better quality of life, hence encouraging this scheme.
At that point, people will have a hybrid of their “defined benefit, state guaranteed pension” (no need to shout it) and a defined contribution pension which they themselves have paid something into. I’ll bet a lot of existing OAPs would love to have an extra 50-60 quid per week that they’d paid a small amount to fund while they were working.
@Kevin Tyrrell: One thing to consider about the public sector worker is that the majority of them are in clerical roles that earn much less than the average industrial wage and have no way of increasing that other than annual increments. A private sector worker has the opportunity to earn much more and can contribute to their own pension if they choose but that’s part of the trade off. More job security and a pension for standardised pay across the board. There is obviously massive wasting of resources in the public sector but that is mainly due to the strength of the unions and it is quite unfair to tar everyone with the same brush.
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin: Rónán, stop talking sense, Kevin is entitled to everything free!
@Kevin Tyrrell: My wife works for an American fund company and she gets free vhi, dental, gym membership, travel expenses, clothing expenses, free parking and a nice bonus every year. Nice cushy private sector jobs getting all the perks. The public sector gets the perk of job security. You know, the sector that is open to all if you chose to go down that route. Money is automatically deducted every fortnight from our pay for our pensions. I laugh the way you go on about the money making sector, if all the foreign companies that employ Irish workers left in the morning, where would the wealth be then? We rely on multinationals like Intel, HP, Facebook, google, Citibank (practically the entire IFSC) etc to pay Irish people to work. You’d swear you were out employing hundreds of people.
@Kevin Tyrrell: you are aware that the public sector pay significant sums into their pensions through superannuation and the public sector levy (tax)?
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin: Ummm…thats not a defined benefit pension scheme. The government can raise the OAP payment, lower it, or scrap it altogether. I can not opt in or out of paying PRSI. Its mandatory. If I die in the morning my spouse or estate cant claim the PRSI I have paid into the system. So…that isnt a defined anything pension. Its my social contribution towards paying for the current state provided old age pension that everyone gets. That is entirely different and please dont be conflating the two. A defined benefits pension is a contract where I pay an agreed percentage amount of my salary every month and upon reaching a retirement age I get an agreed upon pension from it. Yet the government could at any time begin to lower and eventually erase the OAP. They dont ask me if I am okay with getting a higher or lower amount. The terms of the pension are not defined when I first pay my PRSI are they??? So there is no defined benefit then is there? In fact the retired person on the state OAP doesnt know what they will get from one year to the next, it is at the discretion of the department of social welfare. No contract exists, only the liability to pay PRSI. And to state for the record, I would be willing to pay 6% or 10% or 15% or whatever of my salary every month to get a cast iron pension at the end of it…what I dont like is being told by the government that I need a defined contributions pension (which all of these will be), that they are enrolling me in without my consent and I have to opt out of this scheme…and they will essentially be leaving me and my future pension at the mercy of the sharks in the financial industry. Why if the government are so worried about my future dont they simply open the public sector pension to everyone??? I will pay into it gladly on the same basis as any public sector employee if I was guaranteed a certain amount at retirement. The thing I dont like is that they are practically forcing people into private pensions which have the possibility of losing their money, and they think its in everyone best interest. Its not, especially when they have a risk free defined benefit pension themselves. How much of an outcry would there be if everyone in the public sector lost their defined benefit pensions and were all moved into a defined contribution one??? There have been massive strikes in companies before over this…major industrial action by unions over the loss of defined benefit pensions…so why oh why shouldnt I push for one from the government if they happily provide one for themselves??? And I dont want something for free…I will happily pay for it. I just dont want to wake up some morning and discover the pension I have paid into for 25 years is worthless because the markets took a nose dive. Why shouldnt I want protection against that??? Why shouldnt the state provide it??? They happily provide it for themselves and their employees.
@Gary: can I ask you then Gary…would you give up your defined benefits public pension for a defined contributions private one??? Which would you deem more secure and better to have??? I can bet you wouldnt…and I can bet 99% of the public sector would have a fit like you have never seen if their defined benefits pensions were wound up by the state and the monies transferred to defined contribution ones. And for the record…its nice your wife gets all those perks…good for her. I however am just an average PAYE worker…an engineer…in a small company…if my workplace is warm and the kettle in the canteen boils water…and there are tea bags…then Im getting all the benefits that 99% of us in the private sector have.
@Anto Curran: yes I have…have you heard of turning 60 and discovering that you have f**k all in your pension fund because the financial markets took a hit, or the pension fund was careless with your money??? I know which I would prefer.
Look at this article below about Irish Life winding up their own defined benefits pension and transferring all their employees onto a defined contributions one…not a very happy bunch of employees at Irish Life…and I would wonder why??? It wouldnt be because they are terrified of waking up one day with nothing in their pension pot!!! Would it???
Wages coming down all the time..
Just a precursor to taking state pension.
Do people actually believe FFG won’t take it again come inevitable boom and bust collapse..
@Willy Malone: What wages are coming down?
@Hugh Jass: Most, well, not technically coming down, but not rising in line with inflation.
@Anto Curran: So are you trying to say that the Pension Pot was not raided ?
@Anto Curran: OK Anto, forget their past form. Trust them this time……
@Irish Bob: What pension pot are you referring to? No one with a private pension and that includes the state pension had a ‘pot’ raided.
People with investments in banks etc lost alot as they put all their eggs in the one basket. The government used up reserves which mainly go to pension/welfare in the crisis.
@Darren In 2001, the National Pension Reserve Fund was brought into existence for the purpose of supporting pensions of the Irish people in the years 2025-2050. The scheme was also supposed to provide for the pensions of some public sector employees (mainly university staff). However, in March 2009, the Irish government earmarked €4bn from this fund for rescuing banks. In November 2010, the remaining savings of €2.5bn was seized to support the bailout of the rest of the country.
@Darren Norris: Check out National Pensions Reserve Funds!
Article:”Pension pot is almost empty after huge bank bailouts”Indo 10/11/11 Charlie Weston stated that NPRFs ” could have been €70B by 2025!
(remainder of NPRF put into ISIF funds)
@Nuala Mc Namara:
This won’t be a government fund. It’ll be a privately managed fund. The money will never be in the government’s hands, but will be paid directly by employers out of payroll and straight into a pension provider.
It is not comparable to the National Pension Reserve Fund.
However, Darren is incorrect. Michael Noonan lopped a chunk of private pensions between 2013 and 2016, which went 0.6%, 0.75%, then 0.15%.
It wasn’t exactly a raid, but they certainly skimmed a bit off the top.
@Darren Norris: THOUSANDS of working people who are lucky enough to have a pension have had their funds raided in the past two weeks.And the raider, who has pocketed €670m, is acting within the law.
The Government has dipped its hands into the funds of around 750,000 working people in the private sector following a decision made in the last Budget by Finance Minister Michael Noonan, pictured.
And no, there has been no press release from the Department of Finance marking this.
Calculations by Samantha McConnell of IFG show that someone on the average industrial wage who starts savings at 35 will end up with a pension pot of €200,000. The impact of the levy means that this person will have their pension reduced by €1,000 every year for the rest of their life.
@Willy Malone: What’s the alternative?
The other groups have zero experience, their shadow budgets never balance, some of them think money grows on trees, others want to increase taxes on companies resulting in the companies leaving altogether.
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin: The employees,the employer and the STATE will be contributing to the funds.Ive read some of ‘A Roadmap for Pensions Reform 2018-2025′ which also states that “Any contributions from the State will REPLACE rather than augment existing tax reliefs”
The Pensions Without will get new powers eg pension schemes will need to get “authorized status” from Pensions Authority ,etc
Also a new Interdepartmental Pensions Reform and Taxation Group to be set up in conjunction with Dept of Employment Affairs,Dept of Public Expenditure & Reform and Dept of Finance re ‘Reducing the number of pension schemes/rationalisation pensions products’
The NPRF was managed by the NTMA &I was to be used as social welfare and public service pensions in the future.It is relevant to include this in discussion as the NPRF no longer had those funds for pensions after been raised for banks!
Sound of another Quango in the making !
@Johnny Mason:
There already is one. They will just have to provide details to employers and approve the pension providers that will take part in the scheme.
https://www.pensionsauthority.ie/en/
Employers already have to provide, at a minimum, PRSA facilitation through payroll. As such, the authority is already engaged with employers not providing an occupational pension.
There’ll be a roll-out cost for sure though.
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin: Roll our Fourtune more like .. Brown Envelopes, Cronyism etc etc and based on other roll-outs will cost more to run than what is taken in
@Irish Bob: It won’t be designed to take in anything. The government won’t run it. Neither will the pensions authority. The cost will be setup the cost of contracting with the pension scheme operators.
Regina’s assumption of a 0.5% management fee is ambitious though, for what will be small contributions. The annual investment per member will likely be lower than existing averages, due to lower salaries going in, and it may be more like 1% per annum.
I see from the item that the funds will be managed by a private company, how come this is not the case with public sector, because is state guaranteed , so why not the same for the private sector, ????
To be fair to all workers, a pension should be given based on your earnings over your working life, currently the private sector with or without a pension is contributing to the pensions of public sectors workers , and that’s not fair or correct,
@conriel: Wrong, wrong and wrong again. The public sector pension scheme is paid for by existing public servants contributions. This is if course based on the assumption that public sector employment numbers remain the same.
@conriel: public pensions aren’t pensions at all. They’re a ponzi scheme that assumes there will be enough government tax income to pay retirees out of current expenditure, just as they do current public sector employers.
There’ll be a big fight in the next 10-20 years, but I believe you’ll start to see a hybrid approach in the public sector soon, with a slow slide to private defined contribution pensions for public workers. They just need the right economic conditions and pressures to get older pensioned union members to throw new entrants under the bus.
@An bhearna:
Let me answer you this way, The public service gets it money from the private sector to give a required service to all, so please explain how the public service pay for its own pension?
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin: Shouldn’t be too hard, enfranchised union members were happy to throw new entrants under the bus on wages during the crash as long as they weren’t subjected to wage cuts themselves.
@An bhearna: no it isn’t. Public sector pensions are basically a pyramid scheme funded by all taxpayer’s. PS workers contributions don’t come close to covering the costs of them…
The reason I don’t have a pension plan is that I can’t afford one. What is the point of automatically signing people up if they can then just leave. It’s typical of this government to come up with hare brain ideas. If people want & can afford a pension plan they will sign up for one themselves.
@Tim Pot: How do you that? I don’t know if I will live til tomorrow. It’s the present I’m concerned with, not 20 years time. People’s pensions were wiped out or drastically reduced in the recession. What’s to stop that happening again & the government using pension savings to prevent bond holders from taking a hit? I will definitely leave, if I’m still alive.
@Slim Shady: Sorry, how do you know that?
@Slim Shady: When you get older then…you will expect a generous pension provided for by those who did work/plan/save…
seem fair?
Which is why its not and doesn’t happen, but wont stop you complaining later in life
@Darren Norris: I work. I do not sit in my ass doing nothing. I do not expect to get a generous pension but for all the years that I have worked & not been a burden on the State I do expect to get a pension. While I will not have the same income as now, which is not great as I’m a low income earner, my outgoings will not be as much, as I plan to live in a town & not have all the expenses that having a car entails.
@Slim Shady: On my ass.
Interesting to see how this will work for zero-hour contract people, the kind of people who will need a pension to avoid poverty in old age. Government to put in money proportionately with workers input means state paying more to those who are better off.
@Squiddley Diddley: Those who are better off are already enrolled in schemes, I can assure you. The tax saving is a no-brainer.
I haven’t seen anything to suggest the government will be providing the 1 in 3 euro match for existing occupational schemes, but I’d certainly appreciate them adding 2% to my annual contributions if they’d like.
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin: Of course, but the proposed scheme would likely have wide application across various income levels, and be taken up by people who would otherwise have looked after themselves. Government input o such a scheme should perhaps be capped and boosted at the lower end to avoid exacerbating wealth disparity? Just thinking out loud, nobody wants a situation like the states where many old people have to work till they drop.
could ye do an investigation into how much we are currently paying former politicians multiple pensions? it should be 1 state pension per state worker but it ain’t, and they’re going down the line in which ordinary people will be means tested for an old age pension in the future.
And strangely enough I have no confidence in what will probably be another unnecessary, inefficient, over staffed quango trying/failing to manage the situation.
With 800,000 workers not even earning €16,000 a year and rents running at an average of €1,300 it makes no sense to compel workers to make even more deductions from their merge take home. This is ok if you are a government worker in fact it’s precisely to protect their own pensions that this is being foisted on workers.
@Robert Browne: 800,000 people dont earn 16k?
Can you send a link to this please
We are still paying the “temporary” USC, yet they want people to pay into another state quango, you didn’t get my money via Irish Water, your not getting it this way either.
Has Regina paid those debts she owes yet?
@Adam Johnson: Hey you have just reminded me of Regina’s past, with the Guards stopping the journalist/blogger at the airport and making her sign a declaration that she wouldn’t write about Regina again before letting her board a plane. Total misuse of anti-stalker legislation and both she and the Guards got away with it.
They raided other people’s pensions when they broke the country. This is just another money pot they will see as a form of rainy day fund that they can raid the next time they bankrupt the country. This bunch are a joke, can’t touch their political pensions but they will freely take ours when they eff up.
Idiotic bunch, the same bunch that are inflating house prices so the gov can function on the international markets but are doing nothing to protect the people that are going homeless as a result. It’s simply a means for the gov to hoard more money for when the need it to save themselves and cover up their own incompetence and massive mistakes.
This almost sounds like some sort of social insurance, related to ones pay perhaps…
@Philip Cullen: in short, gradually transferring the Contributory Pension to private funds. ‘Thanks for all the years of work, but you’re not our problem anymore’
@Philip Cullen: Your right, they could call it Pay Related Social Insurance of sorts, that sounds vaguely familiar though,,,,
800,000 people in workforce are earning less than €16,000 per annum, rents are well over a thousand how are these people supposed to save at all never mind “save more”?
Will the self employed be included?
No of course not .
Will social welfare recipients be included? I’m not talking about the ones who genuinely can’t work or the ones who are really trying to get a job or are taxpayers going to fund their pension too?
@: I read somewhere a while back that self employed people and anyone earning under the threshold for automatic enrollment can opt in if they wish
Electioneering this will be a dead duck shortly
Mandatory or Compulsory ?
@Hello DAVE!: Lol
So exactly how is employer “share” recuped or is this just another tax on employers . Seems like the only way is this economy is the welfare route.
Not much good for those of us on carers allowance. I’m 52 and a full time carer for my husband who has severe dementia and i do it all on my own as i cant get anyone to help. But i love my husband
Just copy and paste the Australian system. Works a treat.
@The Guru: Please tell us more.
@Squiddley Diddley: all employers obliged to pay 9.5% of your salary into your pension account every pay. Think it started at 2.5% in the 80′s. Importantly you get to choose your own provider and not your employer as is the case in Ireland. You can easily find funds with low fees and plenty of investment options. You get tax relief on the contributions and pay no tax when you take it out after age 60. Another crucial difference is you’re trusted to spend your money how you wish so can take it all as a lump sum, keep it invested or buy an annual pension. In Ireland you have very limited options on retirement.
@The Guru: the no tax on withdrawal is the important part there. Here the snake oil merchants will look you in the face and say you don’t pay tax, when what actually happens is you just defer it on the amount you put in. When you take it out during retirement you are taxed on it, so very little incentive.
@Derek Power: The first €200,000 is tax free
@Sam Harms: Indeed, and the next 300k is at the 20% rate. Only amounts over 500k are taxed at the marginal 40% rate.
If you have a pension pot above 500k (in today’s terms) you are doing very well indeed, and in today’s term can buy a pension which (along with the contributory OAP) would give you about 35K/annum in today’s terms. It’s unlikely too many private sector workers will have that amount put away.
Furthermore, if your combined pension (OAP + private) is less than 17k you’ll probably pay next to zero tax.
As an illustration, if a 25 year old earning 20K starts putting in 6%, and their employer matches 6%, and they stay on the same salary in real terms (rises with inflation), their final pension would be:
- 17155 total
- 12695 state pension + 4460 private pension
So someone who is a low income earner would have about 320/week instead of 244/week. What pensioner couldn’t use an extra 76 quid per week?
(https://www.pensionsauthority.ie/en/LifeCycle/Useful-Resources/Pension-Calculator/)
A fund for the government to raid when they mess up again in the future,unless legislation is passed that government cannot touch it,its a government fund for mess ups.
@@mdmak33: it won’t be a government fund. It will be a private pension that you’re auto-enrolled into.
No public hands will touch your money.
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin: that didn’t stop Michael Noonan writing a law allowing him to rob funds out of my Canada Life one, so you’re talking BS.
We f *** k it law all the big companies get these subsidizes get bail out etc.. force things on us then where the ones to be taxed. After 2008 hundreds where told they could not afford a loan yet where told they where to repay billions of debit that was not theirs. Same with hundreds who bought homes years ago now must pay a tax based on its value that’s wrong that could be going towards their pension or into the economy.
So why not just print the money for services with strict Ts and C’s that they can’t inflate costs.
Life is short we should foucsing on enjoying it when we able to.
@Life is short enjoy it: What ?
Another quango on the way
Regina not person I would enter into a business proposition with given business CV she’s not exactly a wolf of wall Street ether
@Gerard Heery: Don’t worry, all she’s going to do is introduce you to a pension provider, who will invest in funds provided by fund managers, who in turn will likely have been in business for 150 odd years and who has weathered two world wars and half a dozen major stock market crashes.
@Rónán O’Suilleabháin: you wouldnt happen to be a pension provider or work for one would you?? You seem to think defined contribution pensions are such benign and wonderful things with no risk and amazing benefits. You sure sound like every financial consultant I have talked to…all bright skies and rainbows…but avoid all talk of the ugly realities that people can and have lost everything in their pensions in the past.
@Kevin Tyrrell: You don’t really understand Defined Contribution pensions do you? YOU are in control in this case.
@now-now-now: no you’re not: you’re only in control of how much you put in, not get out, nor how to guarantee or protect it.
@now-now-now: nope…I am told I can pick an investment choice…low…medium or high risk. That’s all. The fund managers do the rest…if Im in control then why do they charge fees??? And just for further information the bank stocks were seen as extremely low risk grade investments before the crash. And they all ended up at fractions of a percent of their buy in value…and entire low risk pensions were worthless afterwards. A workmate of mine had his pension with a large majority in bank stocks…safe as houses he was told. Only when the recession hit he not only lost his job at 56 years of age due to redundency…he lost almost his entire pension too. And only got a…sorry but you agreed to the terms and conditions from them. So excuse me if I dont trust these snake oil salesmen!!!
@now-now-now: and yes of course I control how much I put into the pension as John Moylan says…but I have no guarantee or control after that once I have picked my investment risk grade…its all in the hands of the people rolling the dice with our money. And the risk of it all disappearing is still always there. And my main point is that the Defined Benefits schemes guarantee me a set pension pot at the end…just like the public service gets. Why cant we buy into that?? If politicians are sooooo worried about my retirement fund…well open that much more beneficial scheme to the general public.
Just stop taxing people, it is that simple
If USC is abolished I’d have no problem paying this, will there be a promise that the pension pot won’t be raided again.
Is this just a purposal from FG, if they are not in government after the next election will it happen, 2022 is long time away why can this not happen sooner?
@John the baptism: adopt the Australian approach ? Pensions are untouchable in aus
They must think people are thick lol
I think Regina and FG are doing a fine job of forcing us to pay bankers to ruin our “there to be raided” fund…
Please take more….I could afford a few beers at the weekend so I.must have too much and cant be trusted…
the money that you would put in is not even guaranteed to be still there if youre lucky enough to be still alive.if another bad recession came most of it could be wiped out by the greedy men in suits (ya know the ones)….why would ya bother.it’s really another tax and monopoly money for said men in suits to play with…no thanks ffg….
@mark: Australia already has quite an enviable pension scheme getvamonst it it worth it
@Keith Murray: yes i know as i payed into it…but we live in ireland…it’s a little corrupt country in the middle of the atlantic ocean
They need to address regulations around private pension at the same time.
From my limited understanding, they are not beneficial through current regulations and the companies that operate in this market have high fees and only want “high end” clients with lots of money.
If the average worker could organize their own private pension more easily, this could alleviate future reliance on the State pension system – the downside is it may see a fall in tax receipts for the current and near future governments
Fantastic news, the state pension is in no way sustainable in its current form due to the ratio of workers to retirees exploding over the next 20 years from 5:1 down to 2:1 making it basically unfundable.
Nope. soon as Im no good or not wanted, Im going out to field.
This is for employees, not all citizens
How are people in precarious employment expected to pay this?and what about the plan for 3rd level loans to fund college. If this to is introduced you’ll just be working for these item’s and you’re never going to get on a property. We’re getting more like the States and Australia everyday.
Irish Times had an article about this in Feb this year:” Universal Scheme looms as pension time bomb’ ticks”.
@Nuala Mc Namara: That’s right. Irish Life and been looking to run the scheme at the same time as their staff had been out on strike because they were closing down their staffs DB scheme. There is no accountability for any decisions made in this country by large corporate entities, politicians and if course the banks. all the pressurising for private pensions so they can bang Levies on them and make a mint. They are parasites the lot of them.
This is fantastic . Let people become even more uncomfortable and they might start to do some thinking and look into the rabbit hole. The Irish government work for the ECB and their masters at Bank of international settlements in Basel Switzerland. Their job is to continue enforcing enslavement and control all in line with the new world order. Are people out there still no brain-dead and stupid to still believe the fairytale that these politicians work for our benefit ?
Anyone care to do some research into the global banking system and the fraud that it is should look at the following video. This post will probably be deleted as it has too much truth and exposure in it .
https://youtu.be/VzoaxTudJks
Dumb c:&@‘sts
@Keith Murray: how are they dumb ? Do u really think that this is a stupid mistake ? This is purposely done to serve the bankers and take your freedoms away more and more
And there we were thinking that’s why stamps are paid another drain on people there needs too be clarity on where all such payments are held
Govt is broke. They simply need to enroll more people in a future pension scheme to be able to pay current pensions.
have your say