The Pension PlayPen meeting on Tuesday was a lot more fiery than the healthy crowd assembled could have expected Sahil Shah produced an excellent presentation which he has shared with us both with the video and the slides (which are quite something). You can download them here or read through them on the deck below.

The slide deck carries the sub-title “Pension Trustee Training” and we had been introduced to Salih Shah by Bobby Riddaway, a professional trustee who is as bright as a button. The actuarial profession get the modelling of climate change and they encourage “training” like this so standards raise with trustees. This is what the Pension PlayPen encourages.

But there is another side to this discussion and one that Tom McPhail carried into the meeting – a healthy common sense about what can be done and what needs to be done. Tom and others in this meeting were quite vocal in pushing back on Salih’s didacticism. Quite right too! I supported from chat as I was whizzing around the country when the live event was going on and couldn’t speak, but I agree with Tom’s virulent refusal to be trained to think a certain way.

See what you think..

I’ve got to congratulate Steve Goddard and Bobby Riddaway to getting this week’s show on the week and sustaining the Pension PlayPen meeting at such quality that they have been well attended through this summer period! Many others have shut up shop and nipped off on holiday, not us!

Climate change and common sense

We all know that climate is changing and we know that will continue. In the 1950s people could hardly find their way around London from Smog, today we have glaciers collapsing on Swiss villages. We need to recognise that the world is changing because of human endeavour and that in many ways these changes are for the better (no smogs).

Common sense wins through, we will adapt to a new world and find new ways to deal with the impending disasters just as we did after a pretty disastrous world war (or two).

We need Sahil Shah and we need Tom McPhail and we need Bobby Riddaway to bring them together. Most of all, we need to have forums for discussion that give us all a chance to engage with the complicated clashes of research and common sense.

Do download the slides and watch the video, thanks to Salih Shah for an excellent presentation and for answering the questions!