As the FT notes this morning: UK companies reporting annual results for the year to March are expected to report an increase of more than £100bn in their aggregate pension scheme deficits, according to actuarial forecasts. This year’s reporting season is likely to expose larger, not smaller, pension shortfalls than existed a year ago, despite
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In April 2008 I wrote a blog with the title ‘FTSE at 6,000 – is this madness‘. It was, of course. I was right. This is the FTSE since then from Yahoo this morning:  A crash was coming and my instincts were entirely right even though people did, of course, tell me I was wrong
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A magazine called New Start has featured the following statement this week: A housing scheme in Manchester is the latest development to fuel debate over the use of council pension schemes to invest in local projects. Austin Macauley assesses whether it’s likely to open the floodgates The case for using England’s council pension funds to benefit local economies just got stronger…
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I’m not involved in this, but it looks good, and so I thought I’d give it a mention. I like FairPensions as an organisation. TRAINING DAY: Saturday, 17th November 2012 (10am – 4.30pm) UNISON Centre, 130 Euston Road, London NW1 2AY FairPensions is running a day-long training for people who want to use the power of their pension
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I note there are those griping on this blog and elsewhere that any change in pension rules by the government will make pensions even less affordable than now and undermine the credibility of our pensions arrangements. Let me be clear: this is wrong. Our current pension arrangements do not and can never work for reasons I explained in ‘Making Pensions Work’. In that report I said:
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A commentator on this blog this morning has made an excellent point on pensions: It used to be the case that most employers’ pension schemes in the private sector were defined-benefit schemes. When that was the case, the pension beneficiaries didn’t get much of a say in the decisions made by the scheme’s trustees. Fair
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Ian Fraser is a journalist for whom I have a lot of time, and respect. I warmly endorse a blog he wrote this weekend on the subject of this week’d edition of The Economist in which he wrote: I was surprised and disappointed when I opened my copy of The Economist on Friday morning. The magazine
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As the FT notes today: Retirement planning is set to change irrevocably in 2012  as, later in the year, “auto enrolment” is expected to see millions of workers start saving in a company pension scheme for the first time. From October 1, all workers aged between 22 and the state pension age, and employed by
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The Observer noted yesterday that: Highly paid City traders are depriving pensioners and savers of thousands of pounds through high management fees that are often hidden, according to leaked advice provided by consultants to the Treasury. The charges are spreading and are so steep that savers may find they get less back in retirement than
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