February 2021
25Feb

Is COVID-19 a preview of what retirement will be like?

The pandemic has given many folks a taste of what retirement could be like. An abrupt end to work. A loss of social connection. Trying to make ends meet on a much lower income. Many haven’t been happy with the experience. Worried that your retirement could be similar? Here are eight lessons we can learn from the pandemic, all drawn from my new book. 1. Retirement can be a shock. In fact, it’s quite similar to what people experienced during the...

February 25, 2021
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24Feb

Take-home pay in South Africa falls due to COVID-19 lockdown

The average take-home pay in South Africa has declined compared with the same period last year as businesses struggle to cope under national lockdown rules. This is according to the latest BankservAfrica Take-home Pay Index (BTPI), which found that the real average salary fell by 2.4% in the past month. “The real average and overall salary paid contracted in January 2021 after coming under strain from the pandemic and level 3 lockdown, according to the latest BankservAfrica Take-home Pay Index (BTPI),”...

February 24, 2021
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22Feb

U.S. Retirement Crisis Hits Black Americans Hard

Kimberly Owens doesn’t know if retirement will ever be a reality for her. A well-educated project coordinator in her late 40s, she has pulled from her retirement funds for emergencies twice in 20 years. Her 401(k) balance is in the low-five figures. “I’m going to be working until I am 75 at this rate,” said Ms. Owens, who works for the New Haven, Conn., campus of a medical-device company. “I’m not anywhere close to where I thought I was going...

February 22, 2021
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22Feb

Rwanda: ‘Rising Cost of Living’ Worries Pensioners

Pensioners have appealed for a rise in pension benefits, citing the rising cost of living. Dorothée Uwimana, the President of the Rwanda Pensioners' Association, told The New Times that the benefits they receive are not adequately adjusted for inflation and the cost of living in general. For instance, she explained that food prices have been rising steadily while pension benefits continued to be calculated based on the salaries that retirees used to earn many years This, Uwimana said, particularly hurts retirees who...

February 22, 2021
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19Feb

Income and Saving Responses to Tax Incentives for Private Retirement Savings

By Marc K. Chan, Todd Morris, Cain Polidano, Ha Vu Many governments offer tax concessions for retirement contributions to boost retirement savings and alleviate the fiscal pressures of population aging. In this paper, we show that income responses are crucial for understanding these impacts. Using tax-register data, we study large changes in caps on tax-favored contributions to individual retirement accounts in Australia. We find that higher caps increase retirement contributions considerably, with around two-thirds of this response financed by increases...

February 19, 2021
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09Feb

Australia. Retirement Income Review Under Spotlight

The future of retirement income policy – including pensions, superannuation and thee role of housing – will come under the spotlight as the nation’s decision-makers and policy experts canvass the implications of the Retirement Income Review at the Council on the Ageing’s National Policy Forum on 26 February. The full day conference to be held at the National Press Club in Canberra, and streamed virtually, will include: A keynote address by Treasurer John Frydenberg A lunchtime debate between Minister for Superannuation Jane...

February 9, 2021
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08Feb

Simple error can leave Brits with £50,000 less than expected in pension pot

Millions of Brits are at risk of being caught short by over-estimating their state pension payments by up to £50,000, a consumer watchdog has warned. Research by Which? revealed three in 10 believe they will get thousands more through their retirement years because they have got their figures wrong. Only three in 10 knew the average weekly state pension is worth around £150 or £7.800 a year. But with guesses ranging from £175 to £200 a week or up to £10,400 a...

February 8, 2021
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04Feb

Greece’s number of retirees at poverty risk surprises

Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union, released new data today that measures how many pensioners are at risk of poverty, and their findings on Greece may very well surprise you. The statistical office said “In 2019, the proportion of pensioners aged over 65 at risk of poverty in the EU stood at 15.1%, slightly above the figure of 14.5% in 2018 as well as above the risk of poverty of working age population (16 to 64 years)...

February 4, 2021
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January 2021

29Jan

Unearned Income and Labor Supply: Evidence from Survivor Pensions in Austria

By René Böheim, Michael Topf We study the effect of lower unearned income on labor supply. To identify the causal effect of an unexpected reduction in unearned income, we exploit a policy reform that lowered survivor pensions in Austria. Men widowed after the survivor pension reform received an approximately 34% lower survivor pension than men widowed before the reform. We follow the employment history of both groups for 150 months and estimate the reform’s effect on labor supply using...

January 29, 2021
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28Jan

South Africa take-home pay numbers decline

The steep decline in the number of take-home payments has adjusted the average South African salary by a few percentage points, according to the BankservAfrica Take-home Pay Index (BTPI) for December 2020. “The real average take-home pay increased by 2,1% year-on-year,” says Shergeran Naidoo, BankservAfrica’s Head of Stakeholder Engagements. “The reason behind this is not positive. The average salary rose as a result of the decline in the number of lower paid earners that led to a 5,4% nominal...

January 28, 2021
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