April 2022

Chile’s lower house votes on dueling pension withdrawal bills

Chile’s lower house will debate and vote on two proposals for early withdrawal of pensions on Monday, one by legislators and another by President Gabriel Boric, who is seeking to juggle inflation and populist demands. Leftist legislators are proposing a 10% withdrawal but Boric and Finance Minister Mario Marcel have said it would worsen spiraling inflation. In March, Chile reported its highest monthly inflation rate – 1.9% – since 1993. According to the government, Boric’s plan represents a fifth of the...

China may see negative population growth in 2022, 12 years earlier than UN prediction: experts

Experts said that population aging may lead China to count more deaths than births in 2022, 12 years earlier than the UN predicted. They suggested boosting commercial insurance to support the elderly given the current inadequate old age welfare system. Chinese people aged over 65 have surpassed 14% of the total population in 2021, which is an important indicator and means the country has formally become an aged society, said Zheng Bingwen, director of the Center for International Social Security...

UK. PensionBee publishes gender pay gap figures for 2021

PensionBee, a leading online pension provider, has revealed a median hourly pay gap of just 1.6%, and a median bonus pay gap of 0% among its staff, as at 31 December 2021. The gap is in line with PensionBee’s target of 0%, with a variance of +/- 5% owing to the overall size of the employee base. This is the second year that PensionBee has voluntarily reported on its pay gap, as part of its commitment to wage equality, in...

World Bank cuts 2022 global growth outlook on Russia invasion

The World Bank cut its forecast for global economic expansion this year on Russia's invasion of Ukraine and is planning to mobilize a funding package bigger than the COVID-19 response for nations to deal with various resulting and ongoing crises. The institution lowered its estimate for global growth in 2022 to 3.2% from a January prediction of 4.1%, President David Malpass told reporters on a call on Monday. The decline was spurred by a cut in the outlook for Europe...

México. Tope a las comisiones tira utilidad de las Afore

Durante el primer trimestre de 2022, el tope impuesto al cobro de comisiones de las Afore impactó en las ganancias de las 10 administradoras que operan en México, al registrar al cierre de marzo un total de 827 millones 748 mil pesos, una reducción de 74% en términos nominales respecto al mismo periodo de 2021. Se trata del peor arranque de año para las Afore desde que se tiene registro en la Comisión Nacional del Sistema de Ahorro para el...

Estudio de FMI concluye qué hay demasiados jubilados en Argentina

En las últimas horas trascendió que el staff del Fondo Monetario Internacional (FMI) ha apuntado contra las jubilaciones asegurando que muchos adultos mayores perciben haberes muy altos en el país. La afirmación figura en el informe que acompaña el acuerdo con Argentina, del pasado 25 de marzo. El informe sostiene que hay muchos jubilados con relación al total de adultos mayores y que el sistema previsional paga haberes muy altos con relación a los salarios en comparación con los países...

Chile. Doble Retiro AFP: ¿Podrían aprobar los dos proyectos en paralelo para ocupar los ahorros previsionales?

Por Ignacio Salinas Producto del complicado momento económico que atraviesa el país, el quinto retiro AFP es una de las iniciativas que mayor controversia ha generado en la población, y del cual hay dos proyectos en el Congreso a la espera de ser votados. Y es que ambos proyectos del quinto retiro AFP, tanto el que ingresaron los parlamentarios como la iniciativa que ingresó el Gobierno de Gabriel Boric, serán votados en la Cámara de Diputados y Diputadas el lunes 18...

Argentina has too many pensioners, according to an IMF report

A recent report by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has underlined the fact that Argentina has a larger proportion of citizens earning pensions when compared to other countries in the world. The IMF document also stressed many of those allowances were disproportionately high when compared to wages of active workers in OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries, which include the United States, Germany, Italy, Japan, and Spain. The report is dated March 25 and is attached to the understanding...

US. The age for required withdrawals from retirement accounts could go higher. Here’s who would benefit

Required minimum distributions, or RMDs, are amounts that must be withdrawn annually from qualified retirement savings accounts. If the RMD age is raised to 75 from 72, it would provide more time to move assets to a Roth individual retirement account, which comes with no RMDs during the owner’s lifetime. There are some instances when you may not want to convert money from a traditional 401(k) plan or IRA to a Roth. Some future retirees could end up getting...

Ireland. Pension bill will rise €7m a year by end of the decade

The government will be paying €7 billion a year more on pensions and healthcare for retired people by the end of the decade, the Department of Finance has warned, as it included Ireland’s ageing demographic on a list of risks to the economy released last week. John McCarthy, the department’s chief economist, said spending on older people would rise steadily over the coming years, while the cost of borrowing was also likely to rise and the economy would be vulnerable...