Spain shows the way

Spain's government said Friday it had approved a plan to raise the official retirement age from 65 to 67 to help social security system to cope with a rapidly ageing population.

Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa Fernandez de la Vega said the plan, which would be debated in parliament, "would bring the new retirement age to 67."
The current legal retirement age is 65 for both men and women.
"Our (social security) system is good shape today," but reforms are necessary to maintain it in the future, said de la Vega.
Finance Minister Elena Salgado said the government would introduce the reform gradually from 2013.
"It's a proposal ... we have a lot of time to debate it," she said.
Two major unions, the CCOO and the UGT, have already condemned the plan but Spain's employers' association, the CEOE, has called for the retirement age to be brought up to 70.

Who  is going to have the courage to do this here? This G'ment says nothing and the Tories are talking about upping it to 66 in 2016. Really courageous.

Saving for Retirement?

A Guardian report by Philip Inman, reporting research by HSBC into retirement trends, says that 20% of the world's workers have raided their savings in the last year to reduce their debts and 13% have stopped saving altogether in the downturn . Almost 90% say they are unprepared for retirement and 75% say they don't know what income they can expect when they stop working. Reluctance to save in the downturn will add to the 'unpreparedness gap' evident in every major economy and the bank's chairman, Stephen Green, says 'A perfect storm is confronting pensions planning, created by an ageing population, falling pension fund values, a drop in state and employer contributions and an economic downturn which is forcing people to make financial choices.' He suggests governments support education schemes and financial advice centres to help people make informed choices about their retirement plans.

The World Won't Be Aging Gracefully. Just the Opposite

This is the title of a fascinating article in the Washington Post which compares countries around the world according to the impact of the coming ageing tsunami. The US comes out looking to have the fewest problems in the future but as for Western Europe, Russia, Japan and China - well - have a look and ponder.

Over-55s lifting share of jobs in Oz

An article in the Australian quotes some new research by Monash University which has found ageing workers are finding more jobs, while young people are being laid off. In fact people aged over 55 are the only ones in the labour market increasing their rates of employment, even after the economic downturn.

This is of particular interest in Australia which has announced an increase in the state pension age to 67 by 2023. The researchers say that their findings run counter to the argument that it was older workers who were facing the chop in the downturn, and destroyed the argument that extending the pension age to 67 would force people on to the dole.

it is difficult to see how our own G'ment can go on ignoring this issue and their plans to increase pensionable age to 68 by 2038 is now looking totally unrealistic with the huge deficit we have. Is anyone out there or even thinking about this? Just a bit too preoccupied in keeping their own seats at the moment....

Economic madness

2 contrasting stories today. The Times has a piece about the pioneering work of George Magnus, who is joining the growing numbers of us in making the point that the demographic time bomb that is with us is as great a natural disaster as climate change in the short term.

"Baby-boomers hitting retirement may not sound exciting next to the threat of countries disappearing into the ocean or drought wiping out food crops, but the threat is real and the results could be expensive. Mr Magnus puts this into context by explaining that the cost of cleaning up the banking crisis will be up to 25 per cent of GDP, but that the cost of the UK’s ageing population – the next four decades of pensions, healthcare, disability benefits and residential care – will cost 330 per cent of GDP." “The richest source of participation in this country is people aged over 55,” Mr Magnus, 60, said. “We have to change the nature of work and the workplace to allow people to work longer.” He states that a retirement age of 65 is a total nonsense. Our economy cannot support an increasing number of people living 20 unproductive years after that.

Yet on the other hand, a recent survey from Age Concern and Help the Aged shows that 1 in 7 HR managers plans to use the default retirement age to help cut jobs. Why is this craziness occuring? Because yet again we have no leadership on this issue from this current G'ment.

Older and wiser?

Today's New York Times (NYT) reporting on the swearing in of the new US Senate says that:

• the average age of senators is 63, and of new senators is 57. The average time spent in office is 12.9 years or about 2.2 terms.( Congressional Research Service)

In the same paper are grim assessments of the huge challenges (especially unprecedented economic ones) facing the new administration (and the world!). Let's hope the trust that the American people are placing in the wisdom and expertise of a body of 50+'s is well placed and bears fruit!

No time for novices there then!