Back in February the 'The Workplace Retirement Income Commission', spearheaded by Lord McFall, started to investigate why the British pensions system was failing so many working people. The facts are that Britain is :
* facing a growing retirement crisis as people live longer but continue to save too little.
* is a country where 43% of young men and women who aren’t retired say they cannot afford to save for retirement and 55% are not confident they will have enough money in their old age.
Lord McFall said at the time :
" Half the workforce is on a collision course with a long retirement spent in poverty. It’s unacceptable that so many will head into old age worried about how they are going to get by."
“The Commission aims to shine a bright light on these issues. To understand the problems we will be reaching out very widely – not just to those in business and the pensions industry, but especially to people trying to save for their retirement.”
Now, in August, McFall's Commission has delivered its 'bright light' :
His pensions warning a wake-up call :
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-14364498
The conclusions are that :
* 14 million 'future' old men and women of the are not saving into a workplace pension scheme at all and those who are in a scheme often get charged too much for a service which is complicated and inefficient and so face a bleak old age.
Lord McFall said:
"Sadly, millions of people are being left to navigate a pensions minefield that would puzzle Einstein. We’re seeing less saving and lower trust in pensions, and that’s a vicious cycle that cannot continue."
Change, however, is on the way and in 2012, workers will automatically enrolled into a pension scheme, unless they earn a very low wage or opt out themselves.
Michelle Mitchell, Director of Age UK "warmly welcomed" the report and said that "Government action is critical now to ensure those with small pension pots do not lose out any longer."
No comments:
Post a Comment