The thing is though that your fund would still be getting investment returns after retirement. If you're taking 4% per year (24k) and it's getting a 5% investment return it'll be worth more than €600k when you die. Good for the kids though I suppose.
Pensions Council: "€33k a year pension needed for 'comfortable' retirement"
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Yeah, that's kind of the way I think, do you need a big pension pot if you've no dependants or not planning on leaving it to someone
My plan is to have fairly well depleted my funds by 80, that's if I live that long and all that will be left of value is the house
which I suppose one of my nieces on my wife's side will get
You might as well have nothing left when it's time to go into the old folks home or the state will have it
Gordon Gekko
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Or invest and manage one’s wealth to endure that you have enough to pay for it yourself.
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Agree with you here GG for the most part as in I don't agree with the idea of offloading your assets so as to avoid the cost
If you cant afford a nursing home, fair enough the state has a mechanism to help with this
But if you can, pay the bill and don't be expecting other people to
If you cant afford a nursing home, fair enough the state has a mechanism to help with this
But if you can, pay the bill and don't be expecting other people to
S
SquirrelChaser
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Or just stay at home instead? Most people in their 80s and beyond have no need to be in a nursing home.
Gordon Gekko
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It seems somewhat circular in that if you have a decent level of income and assets, you get tax relief at the 40% rate so the cost of nursing home care isn’t that bad relative to having to game the system or lose some of the value of your assets.
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Dr Strangelove
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I looked at the thread and enjoyed it! You saved 800 kWh electricity with the free Sunday but some of this would have been normal usage like fridge, TV, etc. Even if I generously assume 600 kWh was usage you shifted to Sunday from other times that's still only a saving of €150 per annum at a marginal unit of 25c.
That kind of saving is about four days of a state pension. It's might be worth it for someone on a low income but for the rest of us it sounds like a bit too much effort.
Thank you,
Hope you will enjoy the next update and how I got on with the EV plan without owning an EV, which will come as soon as I get the final bill from BG
I think you may need to go back and reread my post #44
I'm not sure what or even where the "marginal unit of 25c is coming from and how it is relevant in the scheme of things when I've quoted the exact rates that were available at the time
With regards to the 880Kw of "Free electricity" I had two choices of plans at the time, both had the exact same unit prices but one had free electricity of up to 100kw per month. So that's an instant saving no matter what your usage pattern is
What we did do is move as much electricity usage to maximise the potential savings which resulted in the saving of €607 for the 11 months compared to standard non smart meter plan
In addition to that had I not gone with the free electricity smart plan and charged it to myself at the peak rate I still would have saved €141.62 compared to the non smart plan thus proving in my mind that the smart meter plans do offer savings over the non smart meter plans
With regards to whether it was worth it or not, well I think I've answered that question
Note to the Mods
Is there any chance we could move this discussion from this thread to my thread as I feel its distracting from what the OP had intended the thread to be about
Think I've just worked out where your getting the "marginal unit of 25c" from
I'm thinking your using todays rate while I'm referencing the rates that were available to me in December '22
Oh absolutely, I've no desire to ever darken the doors of such a place.
There's more than one way to skin a cat.
The state pension scheme being unfunded relies on the taxpayers of today to provide the pensions and in some cases residential care to the taxpayers of yesteryear
It's simply a truism that the state relies to a disproportionate extent on people who do not take advantage of the likes of PRSAs to provide this funding. They pay more tax.
Furthermore those who consume instead of saving provide the demand that generates profits and investment returns for pension funds.
If an inter-generational social contract exists then people with a more live for today and let tomorrow take care of itself attitude contribute disproportionately to the care of others and to pension fund performance and in due course can reasonably expect the favour to be returned by the next generation.
Where no such social contract exists or has been deliberately broken by the likes of a Margaret Thatcher, it becomes every man for himself to the ultimate detriment of all bar the modern feudal lords, the neoliberal billionaire class and their satraps.
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What’s FTP?
Free travel pass?
Colm Fagan
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Preparing reports like this is hardly the main job of the Pensions Council.
According to its website, the Pensions Council's role is to advise the Minister for Social Protection on pensions policy. Yet, minutes of meeting for the last four years indicate no discussion of the most important pension policy decision in decades, viz., whether the auto-enrolment pension scheme which has now been enacted into law is right for the country.
For example, there seems to have been no discussion whatsoever of:
According to its website, the Pensions Council's role is to advise the Minister for Social Protection on pensions policy. Yet, minutes of meeting for the last four years indicate no discussion of the most important pension policy decision in decades, viz., whether the auto-enrolment pension scheme which has now been enacted into law is right for the country.
For example, there seems to have been no discussion whatsoever of:
- the decision to opt for a 1 for 3 government top-up to member contributions instead of "normal" tax relief
- the decision to structure AE pensions exactly the same as individual pensions, with exactly the same drawbacks.
- the charge under AE, and how it will be structured, e.g., % of AUM, % of contributions, fixed amount per member (active or frozen). The DSP seems to have opted for the latter to cover the cost of administering members' accounts. This discriminates against the low-paid and workers with frozen accounts, which the DSP prohibits commercial providers from doing. The Pensions Council apparently never considered it.
- the decision to default workers, even those with no knowledge of investments, into the highest risk fund until age 51 precisely, at which point they're moved into a lower-risk fund, even if the market tanked the week before they reached that age.
- Dropout rates. Dropouts under the NEST scheme, on which the Irish scheme is modelled, are 29% a year. A personal belief is that high dropout rates under AE are partly due to workers not having an adviser to reassure them when markets fall. If the Irish scheme has similar dropout rates, then less than 30,000 of the DSP's projected 800,000 starters will be still contributing after 10 years; the other 770,000 will have fallen by the wayside. That would be a disaster, yet the Pensions Council seems never to have discussed the risk.
An official from the DSP told the Joint Oireachtas Committee that it was hoped that the Irish scheme would have lower dropout rates. Research supporting this conclusion was mentioned at the meeting, but was never published nor discussed by the Pensions Council.
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confused87
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Slight tangent here, was talking to a prison officer, he reckoned he will have 800 a week pension and then at 67 will get state contributory pension so in essence over a grand a week. Now i thought i had decent db private sector pension but my pensionable salary is reduced 1.5times state pension. Is that correct that public sector also get state pension on top of initial pension where no subtractions from their pensionable salary taken into account for state pension?
For most PS hired post April 1995, the PS work pension is "integrated" or "co-ordinated" with the State Pension.
After 40 years service, the combined work + State Pension should be equal to 50% of final salary.
It is possible, under certain conditions (Gardai, maybe prison officers), hired before April 1995, with 30 years, not 40 years required, to manage to get a 50% PS work pension, AND a State Pension.
After 40 years service, the combined work + State Pension should be equal to 50% of final salary.
It is possible, under certain conditions (Gardai, maybe prison officers), hired before April 1995, with 30 years, not 40 years required, to manage to get a 50% PS work pension, AND a State Pension.