Do you have a pension?

KomradeBishop

KomradeBishop wrote: »

A huge number of the companies you invest or are looking to invest in, have serious ethical issues though - most of them derive some of their profits by externalizing costs onto the public, either through pollution, delayed recalls of faulty/dangerous products (leading to deaths), falsified research, etc. - plus other things like anti-competitive behaviour.

Few of them can fit on an 'ethical investing' list - there are a handful of good pickings though.

As I said yesterday why would you let a companies ethics stop you investing if they were going to make you money. Its like people refusing to buy products from certain companies, who could be bothered avoiding products you want or need just as some sort of mini protest.

Sam Kade

etoughguy wrote: »

Alot of companies match it and the tax free element needs to be included also, may I ask what strategies you are using to beat these returns?
I checked mine and its rough 15% gain on whats invested (with half that coming from my employer so thats alot of "free" money).

It can be wrote off against tax when paying in but taxed when taken out. I'm self employed so income is different every year.

cowboyBuilder

Nope, don't have one, don't plan to either, these financial institutions are criminals in suits, paying people 400EUR after them investing 1000s ... disgusting.

Boots234

sebcity wrote: »

I have one of them

What is the issue with a Defined Benefit scheme? I have one of them through work, not that I understand a whole lot about it

Boots234

Boots234 wrote: »

What is the issue with a Defined Benefit scheme? I have one of them through work, not that I understand a whole lot about it

If it's fully funded, it's awesome
If it's not, you'll likely get a bare minimum transfer value or portion of fund if it's wound up

KomradeBishop

Graysen Helpless Spittoon wrote: »

As I said yesterday why would you let a companies ethics stop you investing if they were going to make you money. Its like people refusing to buy products from certain companies, who could be bothered avoiding products you want or need just as some sort of mini protest.

As I said in reply to you yesterday:

When you invest in something, backing it with your money, you are supporting the unethical practices of a company - it puts your own ethics into question.

People think the arms-length distance that financial investing provides them, makes them free from moral/ethical judgement, think that it gives them enough distance to disclaim any responsibility for investing in practices they know are unethical - it doesn't though; you want to profit from something, you are partially culpable ethically/morally, for any ethical violations leading to your profit (most especially, if they're violations that are easily discovered, which you have no excuse for not knowing).

I'd class investing in a company, as a whole level of involvement above simply buying from one - as there can be practical difficulties with tracking/managing who you buy from and their ethical choices (particularly if e.g. you are limited in where you shop for certain things), but when you're investing with a company you have absolutely no excuse for ignoring ethical issues, as investing is a much more deliberate and thought/planned out thing, without the same everyday practical issues buying can present.

KomradeBishop

For people in pension schemes: How many of you actually have any idea where specifically the pension money is invested?

I asked this way back when the thread was originally active I think - and I would bet that few people know what companies they are investing in, or if they have any ethical issues.
Some people did know, and linked e.g. the document outlining the pension fund investments, and IIRC, it wasn't hard to find companies with major ethical issues on the investment list.

KomradeBishop

KomradeBishop wrote: »

For people in pension schemes: How many of you actually have any idea where specifically the pension money is invested?

My pension is public service and I've no idea what happens with it nor do I really care to be honest once its there for me when I retire.

valoren

Take Phillip Morris International.
They produce, distribute, market and sell tobacco products outside of the US.
Is it ethical to invest in such a company knowing the damage that cigarette's do to people's health?

I would argue that people are free to smoke or not smoke. Those who do, and are aware of the health implications, demand a product and that particular company simply exists to provide that product. They meet a market demand. If no one smoked, there would be no demand and no Phillip Morris International.

Considering that they are a business and not a charity then in order to meet that demand they need to raise capital (by listing themselves on the open market) to do all those things they need to do to produce and distribute to meet the demand for a particular product. Should the investor not be rewarded for committing their capital to such a company? Otherwise they are essentially throwing their money away.

If everyone adopted a standpoint of refusing to fund such a company then it wouldn't exist.
That however will not magically make the demand for tobacco disappear.
The product would in all probability still be produced although in that case it would be completely unregulated and arguably more unethical as it would be blackmarket and all the implications that entails.

beach_walker

KomradeBishop wrote: »

For people in pension schemes: How many of you actually have any idea where specifically the pension money is invested?

Good question. I'm currently in the process of getting set up with a new one at work so will look into it but as for my old one, I have absolutely no idea where the money is. This isn't from a POV that we shouldn't invest in unethical companies etc, rather I just wasn't majorly interested at the time in pensions (and tbh still not 100% of what it all entails).

KomradeBishop

valoren wrote: »

Take Phillip Morris International.
They produce, distribute, market and sell tobacco products outside of the US.
Is it ethical to invest in such a company knowing the damage that cigarette's do to people's health?

I would argue that people are free to smoke or not smoke. Those who do, and are aware of the health implications, demand a product and that particular company simply exists to provide that product. They meet a market demand. If no one smoked, there would be no demand and no Phillip Morris International.

Considering that they are a business and not a charity then in order to meet that demand they need to raise capital (by listing themselves on the open market) to do all those things they need to do to produce and distribute to meet the demand for a particular product. Should the investor not be rewarded for committing their capital to such a company? Otherwise they are essentially throwing their money away.

If everyone adopted a standpoint of refusing to fund such a company then it wouldn't exist.
That however will not magically make the demand for tobacco disappear.
The product would in all probability still be produced although in that case it would be completely unregulated and arguably more unethical as it would be blackmarket and all the implications that entails.

With Philip Morris, you don't even have to look at the ethical issues of selling tobacco - you just have to look at Philip Morris's funding of denialism about tobacco causing cancer, and their influence on public health as a result.

They are scumbags of the highest order - their corruption of scientific research and of public discourse, led to the avoidable deaths of millions.
https://pando.com/2015/07/07/shillers-killers/

There is simply no excuse whatsoever for investing with them.

esforum

lawred2 wrote: »

only 1/3 salary per annum?

That's exceptionally good

lawred2 wrote: »

2/3 salary would not be normal

jimgoose wrote: »

2/3 salary p.a. would be more normal with a decent pension.

As Jim has said, anyone that takes a pension out from a competent financial advisor / company would not be accepting a pension at less than half salery.

My public pension is half salery, roughly, My private one was based on 2/3 on retirement.

The payments were cheap enough as I started it when I was 23 so as you can imagine they were basing the numbers on 40+ years of payments

eeguy

Can anyone recommend a person to talk to about pensions?

I have a public sector pension and know nothing about it, only that I pay 3.75% of my salary to it.

kazamo

eeguy wrote: »

Can anyone recommend a person to talk to about pensions?

I have a public sector pension and know nothing about it, only that I pay 3.75% of my salary to it.

Talk to your trade union rep, he\she will have all the answers

kazamo

esforum wrote: »

As Jim has said, anyone that takes a pension out from a competent financial advisor / company would not be accepting a pension at less than half salery.

My public pension is half salery, roughly, My private one was based on 2/3 on retirement.

The payments were cheap enough as I started it when I was 23 so as you can imagine they were basing the numbers on 40+ years of payments

But the majority of private sector pensions are taken out for less than half salary. Every pension calculator I have seen assumes the state old age pension will form part of the money available to every oap irrespective of circumstances.
With SW dividing out the bands re average weeks PRSI even further, the idea of people getting a full SW pension is becoming more unlikely.

esforum

kazamo wrote: »

But the majority of private sector pensions are taken out for less than half salary. Every pension calculator I have seen assumes the state old age pension will form part of the money available to every oap irrespective of circumstances.
With SW dividing out the bands re average weeks PRSI even further, the idea of people getting a full SW pension is becoming more unlikely.

well thats possible if you consider the group I refer to had no idea they even had a pension scheme but in the group of persons that actually arrange schemes themselves I would suggest not

Greenmachine

jimgoose wrote: »

Better by far I would have thought to have a pension if you need to pay the sodding rent! :pac:

Wouldn't be an issue if I own the place I am living in. Never mind the fact that if I ended up in a nursing home, my pension will just go them anyway.

Superhorse

Nope. Between stealth taxes, rent, social life, child care costs, insurance etc... I just can't afford it. Anyhow I know someone who saved all their life in a pension scheme only to get f u cked up the arse when the recession hit and have their money disappear. I'm going to live my life and enjoy it as much as I can. foolish or not that's the way it is.

Menas

Superhorse wrote: »

Nope. Between stealth taxes, rent, social life, child care costs, insurance etc... I just can't afford it. Anyhow I know someone who saved all their life in a pension scheme only to get f u cked up the arse when the recession hit and have their money disappear. I'm going to live my life and enjoy it as much as I can. foolish or not that's the way it is.

How did they lose their money? Just curious as my own pot only went down about 15% at worst during the recession and is now about 35% higher than at it's recession low..

Greenmachine

Now for a dumb question: none of my previous employer have offered pensions

If I start a job tomorrow and pay into a pension for a number of year and become unemployed, will the pension fund be assessed against me for JA/JB purposes before I can draw it.

RedXIV

Greenmachine wrote: »

Now for a dumb question: none of my previous employer have offered pensions

If I start a job tomorrow and pay into a pension for a number of year and become unemployed, will the pension fund be assessed against me for JA/JB purposes before I can draw it.

No, because you can't access the money, your pension shouldn't be included in the assessment

Greenmachine

RedXIV wrote: »

No, because you can't access the money, your pension shouldn't be included in the assessment

Well that's something I suppose. If the money is the bank, it's accessible.
Like I said never been offered a pension, so I have not been in the position to assess them.

Squall Leonhart

Greenmachine wrote: »

Well that's something I suppose. If the money is the bank, it's accessible.
Like I said never been offered a pension, so I have not been in the position to assess them.

I'd never been offered one either. Went about organising my own last year. I pay by direct debit into a PRSA every month now. It has nothing to do with my place of employment whatsoever and at the start of this year I contacted Revenue directly to claim a tax refund for 2015 pension payments. All went smoothly.

lawred2

esforum wrote: »

As Jim has said, anyone that takes a pension out from a competent financial advisor / company would not be accepting a pension at less than half salery.

My public pension is half salery, roughly, My private one was based on 2/3 on retirement.

The payments were cheap enough as I started it when I was 23 so as you can imagine they were basing the numbers on 40+ years of payments

he was talking about DB pensions

not DC

esforum

lawred2 wrote: »

he was talking about DB pensions

not DC

irelevent, you decide what you want your pension to pay out. You can have a pension that will pay the same as your wage if you are willing to pay for it, pay the minumum, get the minimum

lawred2

esforum wrote: »

irelevent, you decide what you want your pension to pay out. You can have a pension that will pay the same as your wage if you are willing to pay for it, pay the minumum, get the minimum

most people can't simply just decide such a thing

KomradeBishop

Good article on financial brokers (including pension brokers), and how they have very strong financial incentives to fúck you over with bad advice, to help the broker/finance-firms profit at your expense:
http://fortune.com/2016/03/07/the-most-horrendous-lie-on-wall-street/

I posted another article related to this a few pages ago - it is apparently widespread/prevalent throughout the financial industry.

A good reason for anyone with a pension, to start learning about and investigating what they are paying into - they may be getting screwed over without even knowing it, especially if relying on trusting what their (commission-paid/conflicted...) broker is telling them.


What's funny, is that some of the propaganda being put out by the financial industry - that increased US regulations, to reduce conflicts-of-interest, would "increase the costs for small investors, making it uneconomical for them" - is exactly the kind of lobbying/propaganda we saw here on Boards a while ago, when doing an AMA with a financial broker...

Have to say, that AMA - along with some of the past "you're mad not to have a pension!" discussion on threads like this - stinks badly of advertising/astroturfing.


The above article touches on Vanguard and ETF's (Exchange Traded Funds), which was mentioned in this thread as a method of investing, and I also came across this excellent article about the history of ETF's (including Vanguard):
http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-etf-files/

I'm still learning about them, that second article alludes to ETF's presenting a growing economic danger, but then fails to elaborate on this - so I'm skeptical of them (I know they can be bundled up with more dangerous financial instruments, such as over-complicated derivatives), and I'm not certain if the variety of ETF's Vanguard uses, has any of those dangers.


Anyone who isn't willing to do extensive research into the details of their pension fund and how it works financially (don't trust what your broker says...research yourself), and into the dangers of financial instruments like ETF's if investing in them - anyone who doesn't do extensive research before putting their money into these things, would have to be mad, given how much the industry is weighed towards screwing people over.

draiochtanois

This post has been deleted.

KomradeBishop

That's one of the issues with ETF's, but there's a whole slew of other potential issues as well - read all the way through the Criticism section too:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exchange-traded_fund#Risks

The problem is, there are so many types of ETF's, it's hard/complicated to determine what is/isn't risky - the financial industry thrives on this kind of complexity/opacity, for offloading/externalizing hidden risk onto other people, for profits (that's a fantastic way for the finance industry to loot pension funds, by loading them up with investments hiding a lot of risk, which only blows up way later on - and brokers conflicts of interest, leads a large number of brokers, to assist finance firms with this looting, by fooling people investing in pensions).

Squall Leonhart

Actually, can anybody explain something for me...

Say I retire at 65, my pension fund is worth 400,000 eur. How is this paid out?

I understand up to 200,000 euro can be paid out as a tax free sum, then 200-500 is @ 20%, and 500+ is at marginal rate.

Are all pensions fully paid out as a lump sum, or is some of it paid as a lump sum and the remainder paid as a set weekly amount (in which case how is this figure arrived at)?

If it's set weekly amounts, how is it decided whether I've 10 years or 30 years of life left in me for example, or is it possible to have a good pension, but live "too long" and run out of money in the twilight years because too much was paid out in weekly installments in the first 10 years of retirement??