KyussB wrote: » What's more - if a person opts-out of the auto-enrolment pension, and goes without - companies should be forced to put their contribution that what would have gone to the pension, to the persons wages instead.
Deleted User wrote: » there is such a thing as a zero-sum gain. encouraging individuals to ensure they have wealth amassed enough to cover retirement is such.
Robert_Beach wrote: » There's no such thing as a free lunch. The "relief" high earners get (i.e. a state handout to the rich) has to be made up for elsewhere. If we done away with it, we could have higher public spending or lower taxes on the vunerable.
GreeBo wrote: » You think the low paid workers subsidize the high earners?:D /thread
Varta wrote: » A very selective response. You know very well I was referring to the government hand out that contributes to your private pension. What you euphemistically refer to as tax relief.
Robert_Beach wrote: » It's a disgrace that workers subsidize this "relief" for the high earners in this country. It's the first thing I'd do away with were I in power.
KyussB wrote: » There's a whle bunch of them dismissing ethics, who've either directly or indirectly said they work in the industry, in the thread.
Deleted User wrote: » privately funded personal pension- a handout non contributory state pension- hard earned riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiggggghhhhhhtttttttt
Robert_Beach wrote: » Oh what's the saying, "Past performance does not indicate future returns" This is quite clearly a way for the government to offload state provided pensions entirely. In a few years, old people will be left to starve because "sorry you shouldn't have invested in that index, it lost it's arse" and the State will shrug its shoulders. It's going to a be a complete dog eat dog society, and I want no part of it. It'll be a nice juicy number though, whichever companies they pick to implement this cash grab from workers. I'm sure it's entirely transparent as to which companies and funds get picked. 100% sure.
Deleted User wrote: » wheres yr figures of ROI of pension investment over the last say forty years?
any decent figures at all to back that repetitive nonsense up?
GreeBo wrote: » I'll pay more tax but have more money, win-win. Do you really think the state offers tax relief just because of the pensions industry? You dont think its because the government *wants* people to have a private pensions as it actually saves the government money? Its not shutting down an argument, its trying to prevent childish nonsense from taking over an adult thread. There is no big bad bogeyman out to get people, people need to grow a pair and plan for their future themselves rather than bitch and moan at those who do, whilst also having their hand out to get a chunk of the tax those same people pay.I am paying for my private pension and I do pay my tax. The very reason I am able to get tax relief on up to 25% of my pension contributions is *because* I am paying 52% on the rest of it. I'm pretty sure I am putting in far more than I will ever take out.
Robert_Beach wrote: » Private pension tax breaks are there for the rich and powerful to squirrel money away tax free. They also enrich the financial snakes who run the pension companies. Now they want ordinary people to hand over hard earned money to these guys, to urinate up against a wall and your ordinary worker will be lucky to see a fraction of it back in 40 years. If at all. Of course that's after it fund climate change, war and all the other horribleness. I gaurauntee in 40 years, after the money is all gone ("opps, sorry the market crashed! Again..."), the poor people of Ireland will be told that they "should have invested better" and that there's no state pension for them. Disgusting.
Jim2007 wrote: » I could argue that there should be no state pension or health service on the basis that it would be a far better service to the public if both were run privately. Here in Switzerland we have no public health service, everyone is required to have private health insurance. And as a result, hospital waiting lists and people on trollies are unknown concepts. In fact they are closing hospitals at the moment due to over capacity... I've been to the A&E four times and in all cases I was with the doctor within 20 minutes of going there, in fact on one occasion I was not finished filling out the registration form when I was called into see the doctor! The Swiss health insurance rules are: - Everyone must have health insurance and if you can't afford it the state pays your premiums. - Everyone must be accepted for what we call basic insurance, which more or less covers everything but a private room in a hospital. - The state sets the standards for treatment, care and drugs etc that must be covered under the basic health insurance - The state conducts audits of hospitals, doctors, insurance companies etc... to ensure compliance and a complaints system for any citizen that feels standards where not met in their case. The federal department of health employs less that 500 people and none of the hundred or so insurance companies have every gone burst because they have to take on all comers. It will be a very long day before the Irish or UK public health service come even close to the level of care I have at the moment. A private pension fund (called the 2nd pillar) is mandatory in Switzerland, you start paying 7% for age 25 and it rises to 14% by the time you reach 55. It is at least matched by your employer, but in most cases they pay a few percent higher as a perk of the job. All through the height of the last recession my fund was returning between 4.77% and 6.1% and at worst all pension funds were returning the minimum state required rate of 3% at the time. The rules for the private pension funds are very strict: - The state provides a list of investment instruments (stocks, bonds etc...) that the funds may hold - The state sets the asset allocation ratios that the fund must meet based on the demographics of the fund members: so younger funds would be higher on equities and older ones on bonds and so on - Funds must meet a state set minimum return each year, failure to do so means that the fund manager must pay the shortfall into the fund. - Fund managers cannot charge entry/exit fees - Funds managers cannot charge transaction or holding fees - Funds managers cannot benefit from retro or trade routing fees. Now in the 30 years or so that I have been working in the area not one of the 94 funds managers in the industry have gone bust or left the market despite the restrictions. You don't have to run everything to provide a good service, you just have to regulate it properly.
Varta wrote: » A very long-winded way of defending a hand out from the state. And people in receipt of the state pension are not living of fthe state, they paid for that pension through their tax and prsi. By having a private pension you are improving your own financial position, not lessening the burden on the state. Why should the state give you money to improve your own financial position?
Varta wrote: » A very long-winded way of defending a hand out from the state. And people in receipt of the state pension are not living of fthe state, they paid for that pension through their tax and prsi.
bfa1509 wrote: » This thread has me baffled! I completely agree with the OP. I am in my 20s and I simply cannot understand why it it makes sense to pay into a pension at my age. I can understand if you are in your 50s or 40s or at a stretch late 30s but 20s! I can't understand it.
Varta wrote: » , they paid for that pension through their tax and prsi. ] No they didn't, they paid for the social welfare paid out when they paid their taxes.
Varta wrote: » they are still allowing you to put money into a pension pre-tax.
Varta wrote: » I think you are being very naive. The tax relief on private health care and private pensions was introduced as a result of lobbying by private healthcare and pension providers. The reason being that without tax relief their products would be unaffordable to most people. In the case of pensions, the products would also be so unattractive as to make them almost redundant. As for relieving the burden on the HSE: (a) If the tax forgone were spent on the HSE it could provide a better service to more people, and (b) Private healthcare regularly dumps its more difficult cases onto the HSE.
Varta wrote: » You will pay less tax than you save, you even get a tax-free lump sum. It's the main reason pensions are attractive. Nice attempt to shut down an argument with the bit in bold. The fact is pension tax relief was introduced at the behest of the pensions industry. Without it they would lose the bulk of their business. As I said, I have no issue with private pensions... as long as you pay for it yourself after you have paid your taxes.
Deleted User wrote: » tax relief on pension contributions is taxation policy as a modifier towards socially desirable behaviour prsi is taxation to fund social transfers/transactions theres a different case for each each is a valid function of government the idea that anyone can call any of it misappropriation or behave as if it's not some of the most basic policy and governance available to a government is embarrassing embarrassing. happy to live on the state pensions alone? sound. you're informed and responsible. happy to contribute to a private pension pot, knowing the risks and the returns profile? fine, you're informed and responsible. the idea that there's something unethical about either is, as kippy says, laughable. ethics, if it means anything at all, is a discussion space relevant to the intersection of two sets only- that which is legal and that which is personal. anyone talking about the behaviour of another party which is legal but unethical is a child and safely ignored. and to continuously drag a debate as workaday cut-and-dried as saving towards retirement into /ethics/ is both embarrassing *and* childish to then throw into the (invalid, remember) ethical discussion the opinion that contributing to a private pension pot whilst taking advantage of tax breaks to do so is unethical, but relying on the state to provide support to you in your later years as a preferential default is ethical- that's clearly utter rubbish earning low wages is not an ethical position. earning high wages is not an ethical position. but if they were, and the argument is centred of the ethics of the individual contributions or otherwise to the governing pot, one is clearly superior to the other and a given society not only can, but in fact should reward and encourage the behaviours that maximise the impetus for those able to maximise their own earnings and contributions (and thereby minimise their own draw on state resources) to do so. governance isnt theory, all the people people want all the stuff, idle demand is not real demand and if you think you deserve what the other fella has, that's nice. go get it.
Robert_Beach wrote: » There should be no private health insurance or private pensions. We can (and should) combine our national interests to ensure the State provides both of these, and does so in a manner which is ethically consistent with the health and future of the nation in mind.
S.M.B. wrote: » Varta, I do think the optics of the pension tax relief are not great at the moment, which is why I don't think they'll continue to exist in their current form, here in the UK and in Ireland. I do think it's one of those rare tax breaks that does favour someone in my position, currently a higher rate tax payer but likely to be a lower rate tax payer in retirement, a position that often gets pretty badly stung when it comes to policy. I wouldn't be surprised if the incentive moves from a postponement of income tax to a flat 30% top up for all. I also wouldn't be adverse to such a move but am going to continue to take advantage of how things operate right now.
GreeBo wrote: » Both can be true. Think of it as the state investing in my private pension. I get the benefit of their investment but they also get the benefit of me paying tax (albeit at a lower rate) on a much larger sum of money for a much longer period. Lets say Im earning 100k a year. The state can either take 50% of it until I retire and then basically get diddly squat (and also pay my state pension, health, etc, etc) OR You can allow me to take a controlled amount of my gross pay tax free and invest it in my pension. You still get 50% of whats left every month until I retire You now also get the benefit of tax from whatever of my pension I draw down until I die. The pot of money is much larger in the second scenario, hence why I have a private pension, but also the tax I am paying amounts to more than the state would get otherwise. Its basically deferred but they get more out of it. Long term it works out better for everyone as the fund value grows (its an investment afterall) and so I benefit from having an effective salary after I retire and the state benefits from taxing me on that salary, long after I retire. Serious question: Why do you think the state gives tax relief on pension contributions if the above isn't true? (Please, PLEASE dont reply with some nonsense about fat-cat bankers and unethical bogeymen lining their own pockets and stealing from the poor)
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