AgeWage: Making your money work as hard as you do

Will it get it right this time?

We’ve heard too much from recent governments on new funds. We’ve not seen enough investment from pensions.

Standard Life insures its own staff pension scheme; did the trustee find Standard Life’s covenant weak?

PensionsOldie says: It is very simple really! Standard life is pinching the assets of its pension scheme through the profits on the buy-in policy without having to pay tax on surplus distributions. It is also not having to share those profits with the scheme members. A warning message for any other trustee boards thinking of purchasing bulk annuities – what is the profit margin you are losing to the Scheme!

Why can’t we ignore what Martin Wolf is saying?

We cannot of course ignore what Martin Wolf is saying because he has a habit of being right but many people have been right but ignored so the consequence of being right is deferred. The question we have to ask is “can we survive a downturn” both financially and in what the loss of theoretical capital does to our brains! So what is the cost of withdrawing from equities and moving into cash.

Time to end talk of contingent increases for the core DB scheme?

As an outsider I hope that the future of USS is progressive. The argument that the DB scheme should pay increases in retirement contingent on performance has been discussed and rejected in blogs I’ve published. The DB scheme is not moving towards CDC I suspect! Contingent increases on what the scheme has to release are complicated by the surplus.

But time to end the DC top up as a tax- loophole for the highest paid?

DC is being used by highest paid staff as tax-free cash from the DB scheme. This is a loophole that rewards the rich and isn’t available to lower paid staff. This is not progressive, it is simply an Exempt Exempt Exempt tax-break for the most wealthy – a loophole.