Pensions are they worth the bother?

Question

Did anyone see the poor gentleman who had spent his whole working life saving for his pension, just to find out there's was nothing when he retired ? So whats the point in putting your money into a pension if the government are not going to secure your investments. This government taxed the profits on pensions and refuse's to take responsiblity or offer any compensation. But the government still want you to take out a pension. WILL YOU ?

Check the outcome of todays court hearing, and then tell me pensions are better protected, and still make a sound investment.

I've never sponged off the state and have no intention of doing so, i have invested my money into property. I also have a private pension, that i've paid in for over 25yrs, and they are worthless, now still tell me they are a safe investment

Answer 1

Yes I will take out a pension. Do you think you can live off of social security? A pension allows those gazillions of retirees in the warm states to live a nice life. You sure discourage easy don't you?

Answer 2

Pensions are protected better now than they were in the past, thnks to the government's new pensions insurance scheme (which we all pay for through a tax on our pension funds).

I agree that it is shocking that companies were allowed in the past to raid their employees' pension funds, leaving them short if the company got into financial difficulties. The problem is, if the government makes up loss to this kind of theft/fraud, where does it stop? Would you protect private pensions, or just employer-based ones? However, in this case I think that the fact the government has been so lax in setting the rules and auditing pension funds means they have to take some responsibility, and make at least partial reparations.

Pensions are good for high earners because when you pay them in you get tax relief (maybe at 40%) and when you draw them out you are only liable to tax based on your income as a pensioner, which will probably be at a lower rate. However, a lot of the profit which should go to the pensioners is swallowed up by pension companies, paying for marble-lined reception areas and big cars for their execs - not to mention what G Brown steals for the Treasury thanks to his changes in tax relief.

I have a small pension from employers, but I won't be relying on it: I have investments which should see me through retirement - investments that I control and can check on the value of any time I want.

Answer 3

You should all take out a pension, because sooner or later the state pension will either be scrapped, or reduced to the point of being worthless.Unless you want to live extremely poorly, get one.
It bloody annoys me that people still think that the taxpayers will continue to pay them a living through social security and "tax credits" in years to come.Well hear the wake up call now, you professional DSS scroungers, the pot will be empty when you retire.
I don't care what the government say, the plain cold economic facts say this: they will not be able to afford it in 30 years time!
Hell, they are robbing peter to pay paul now!
All i can say is that you should secure your pension now.buy into the best one you can find (Not a risky stock market only based
one), then if you can, shovel as much money into it as you can afford..Try to balance the investment, and as things stand property value over the long term never really goes down.
"invest in land - they aren't making it anymore"
Buy property if you can.
Go see an independant financial advisor.If you earn a fair amount and have a mortgage, there are good tax advantageous ways to get the chancellor to pay for a large chunk of your pension.

Answer 4

A lot of company pensions have collapsed in recent years. These were the type of pension usually called 'final salary pensions' which returned a high enough pension, sometimes as much as 80% of final salary. These were always very expensive to run and not only that, in many cases the companies who owned these funds often dipped into them when times were bad in the hope that they could pay off their loan later when things picked up. As often happened, things did not pick up and just went from bad to worse. In the end there was simply no money left in the pension fund with which to pay the company pensioners their pensions.

My company pension fund was with a mutual so that the company I worked for could not dip into it, no matter what. The money in it belonged to me, the single and only pension fund holder.

Any pension is worth having simply because the State Pension is never going to be enough to live on. At present the minimum amount for a pensioner to live on, according to the State, is about £114 per week. The basic state pension is about £87 per week and the difference can be made up with Pension Credits.

You can see from the above 'rough' figures, that if you retired today with a private pension of about £400 a month and got about £112 from the State Pen a week, you'd be reasonably well off - well you could at least go to the pub and buy your food. So if you are not in a pension fund right now, get into one. If you own a house, do not rely upon it to fund you in old age.

Let me explain the last remark in more detail. If all you do is buy a house to fund your old age and say you are now under 40, when it comes to 'pension time', you'll be part of a massive army of people all trying to sell houses at the same time. It will not work. You've got to have money invested elsewhere.

The only 'sitting pretty' pensioners are those, like myself, who belong to the World War II and after, baby boomer mob. We got houses when they were cheap and got pensions worth a great deal of wonga. We've also got lots of savings and many have holiday homes abroad too.

Answer 5

I have already taken one out purely because there will be no state provision when I get to retirement age thanks to the best efforts of our current Labour Government! It seems there is little or no point to paying NI anymore as the waiting lists for the NHS are ridiculous and I'm not going to get a state pensions in 40 years time.

Answer 6

The whole thing is a big con, the only people who are getting anything out pension schemes are the people running them. My husband has lost a hugh chunk of his personal pension as fees and other expenses, then in order to move it or do something with it in order to rescue the rest he will be charged another £1500 or so...

Answer 7

The Government will tax you as much as they can. You've got to weigh up is it worth saving just for the Government to tax you to the hilt. Those that have never worked, never paid in will continue to reap the benefits even in old age. I am fed up of paying for lazy scroungers. Save as much as you can in a high interset account and should you ever need to go into a home or require care assistance, spend it all on your loved ones!

Answer 8

The only safe pension to be in is the one the members of Parliament vote in for them selves, as its paid for by the tax payers and it is indexed linked,its about time the members think more about the public than there selves

Answer 9

I started my pension at 18 and retired at 48. Good move!

Answer 10

No I will not.......the bloke on the tele this morning lost a pension of 18K ..or about £300 per week after tax. Tax Creadit is £170. per week but with no council tax to pay..free prescriptions etc it works out more or less the same.....so why bother to save?