The wisdom of my peers comes in many guises. The image above was sent me last night on WhatsApp by an “old-timer”.
Yesterday, I published the grumpy thoughts of one of my elderly friends who thought it hilarious that I thought him old enough to be my father.
I wish I could say the the child is father to the man, but I can’t, he/she shows no sign of cognitive decline.
Myself must I remake
Till I am Timon and Lear
Or that William Blake
Who beat upon the wall
Till Truth obeyed his call;A mind Michael Angelo knew
That can pierce the clouds,
Or inspired by frenzy
Shake the dead in their shrouds;
Forgotten else by mankind,
An old man’s eagle mind.
Here is his/her thoughts on the purpose of the PPF
The trouble with the regulator is that it doesn’t listen. And isn’t smart.
Why didn’t they look at PPF. Awash with too much money because it set too strong a funding level and charged too much even when in surplus. (The analogy is a bit unfair as PPF needs to be ready for possible future claims, but you get the point). I’d a scheme gets to a self sufficient level of funding on a prudent basis, surpluses fold in after closure. Almost certainly. The correction of interest rates just made that happen sooner. The objectives are wrong and industry should have fought against them long ago.
On guarantees
I agree with there being no guarantees in life….So we have overdone the “guarantee” in pensions. In more ways than one.
We have overused the word – as your blog makes clear. Nothing is guarantee. I remember x trying really hard to get Malcolm Wicks not to say the PPF would GUARANTEE …. And then the PPF board understandably really wanted PPF to Guarantee (as what is the point if it didn’t and people think it does).
But guarantees cost lots and that is not sensible either. So we have regular reviews of NI so that adjustments can be made in good time which Osborne and Webb undermined by the increase to 66. That was wrong.
We should make sure the next government uses the next SPA review to set when SPA rises to 68 and adjust the NIC rates and updating to fit in with that.
Ideally fix up to 2050. As with PPF it cannot be 100% guaranteed either, but it is certainly possible to adjust in line with best estimates.
Like CDC. It is profoundly sad that industry is fixated on DB and D.C. when life is CDC.
And the more C the better. I am relying on the next CEO of the PPF to bring Canadian good sense to the table. But worried about who might be the next CEO of NEST though! An Australian?
On Lifestyling
Target date funds. How do they “apply lifestyling sensibly”? They avoid complete and utter nonsense, but don’t they still “derisk” in a lifestyling way.
And where can you get enough deferred annuities to make them a viable mass market option? And what is (1) their price (2) their security?
Confucius, La Rochefoucauld, Churchill, my correspondents share with me some of the ripe wisdom that comes with the liberation from work that a pension brings.
So get yourself a proper pension, stop working and then say what you really think. Hats off to the many grumpy old people who by now know my correspondent and are chortling behind their stern faces.
