July 2022
26Jul

US. ‘True Cost of Aging’ index shows many seniors can’t afford basic necessities

Each month, Seeley, a retired teacher, gets $925 from Social Security and a $287 disbursement from an individual retirement account. To make ends meet, she’s taken out a reverse mortgage on her Portland, Maine, home that yields $400 monthly. So far, Seeley has been able to live on this income—about $19,300 a year—by carefully monitoring her spending and drawing on limited savings. But should her excellent health worsen or she need assistance at home, Seeley doesn’t know how she’d pay...

July 26, 2022
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26Jul

German government invests pension assets in oil, gas firms despite ESG index switch

The German government continues to invest public pension and social security assets in oil, coal and gas companies on the equity market, despite announcing that it would switch to an ESG index by the end of the year. According to a report by investigative documentary series Panorama, the German government invests a total of €573.59m in oil, gas and coal companies on the equity market to finance the pensions of civil servants. The government has confirmed that it has invested more...

July 26, 2022
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26Jul

Shifting Our Aging Society From A Burden To An Asset

Each year the World Economic Forum publishes its Global Risks Report, which aims to outline the biggest threats facing society in the year ahead. The 2022 edition features many common sights, including climate action failure, extreme weather, and biodiversity loss. Such catastrophic events often succumb to the so-called availability heuristic, whereby we're naturally drawn to the things we're familiar with. In the case of the kind of threats posed in the Global Risks report, these are all risks that...

July 26, 2022
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26Jul

US. Milliman: Pension risk transfer premiums increase slightly in June

Estimated average pension risk transfer premiums rose slightly in June, but the average rate among the most competitive bidding processes fell by 30 basis points, a study by Milliman showed. The estimated buyout cost as a percentage of accounting liabilities, or accumulated benefit obligations, was 103% as of June 30, up from 102.5% as of May 1, according to the Milliman Pension Buyout index. However, the average of the most competitive annuity purchase rates fell by 30 basis points to 98.3%...

July 26, 2022
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25Jul

This Is the Average Retirement Age in the U.S. — and Why It’s a Problem

Americans may be retiring too early for their own good. Many people aim to retire in their mid- to late 60s. But the average retirement age in the U.S. is considerably younger than that. According to recent Gallup data, the average reported retirement age is 61. Now on the one hand, that's up from age 57 back in 1991. But it's also a pretty young age to retire at. And those who go that route could end up struggling financially because...

July 25, 2022
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25Jul

Italy. Pensions at the center of the electoral campaign, here are the parties’ proposals

The issue of pensions, like every electoral round, has forcefully entered the center of the campaign for the vote on 25 September. Silvio Berlusconi immediately launched the minimum pensions of one thousand euros, a proposal already in the past relaunched by the Brothers of Italy (to be financed with a cut in citizenship income). The League has already re-proposed Quota 41 (the possibility of going out with 41 years of contributions regardless of age, ed). In the center-left there...

July 25, 2022
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25Jul

China’s population to start to shrink before 2025: Global Times

China's population growth rate has slowed significantly and is expected to turn negative ahead of 2025, the state-backed Global Times reported, citing a senior health official. Birth data released late on Sunday showed that the number of new births in 2021 was the lowest in decades in several provinces. The number of births in the central Hunan Province fell below 500,000 for the first time in nearly 60 years, the Global Times said. Only China's southern Guangdong Province had more than...

July 25, 2022
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25Jul

The Growth In Responsible Investment Funds

The concept of socially responsible investing (SRI) has been around for hundreds of years. From the Quakers (aka, the Religious Society of Friends) prohibiting members from participating in the slave trade in 1758 to the exclusion of “sin stocks” in the 1920s to supporting the civil rights, environmental, social, and anti-war movements in the 1960s to the modern day focus on Environmental, Social, and Governance investing practices—which takes a holistic view that helps stakeholders understand how an organization manages...

July 25, 2022
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25Jul

UK. Govt urged to allow Nest to offer drawdown

The government has been told to amend legislation to allow Nest members to drawdown their pension pot, as well as extending investment pathways to trust-based schemes. The Investment and Saving Alliance made this suggestion in its response to a call for evidence on savers’ understanding of their pensions, which closed on July 25. The Department for Work and Pensions said that it wanted to understand what support and decumulation products are offered to members, along with what might be offered to...

July 25, 2022
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22Jul

UK. The effect of rising inflation and interest rates on pension schemes

The UK is currently seeing soaring inflation, with record drops in wages, and prices for goods and services sky-rocketing, resulting in a keenly-felt "cost of living" crisis. But what is the impact for UK occupational pension schemes? The consumer price index (CPI) measured inflation at 9.1% at the end of May 2022, the highest level seen since February 1982. Governments have traditionally sought to counter rising inflation by increasing interest rates, to encourage people to spend less and save more,...

July 22, 2022
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