investment into retirement

Most of us, me included, know near zero about AU. How is that retirement money invested or is it not invested but rather a pay into Liberal Socialist program? If the latter than I would put a minimum into it and fund a personal index market fund, say monthly if possible, over your pre retirement years. Some cash too into safe high as prudent yield accounts.

cheers

The whole pension issue is a nightmare, full of risks. But although I don't contribute to a proper pension myself (mainly because I'm a basic rate taxpayer and my employer only makes up to 3% contributions (and only then based on my basic wage rather than actual earnings)) if I had access to a scheme like yours I would certainly contribute the maximum for a few years to build up a halfway decent seed fund. You could then back off and diversify with that "insurance" pension ticking over in the background.

Andrew McP

I think to measure 'genorosity' you should check how much it pays out. Both employee and employer contributions have had to increase to fill the large deficits. And in the worst case, some people got nothing.

If the fund invests in something that should appreciate over time - say a conservative G&I fund, you are making a big mistake by not taking advantage of the plan.

In message , carrera d'olbani writes

Whilst I note that you use the word 'superannuation' can you advise if it is a 'final salary' or 'money purchase' scheme just so we can be sure?

That other 10% that comes from them is like free money. You should get on that plan. Max out your contributions, but read below for some more caveats...

Not to worry too much unless your employer goes through a significant downsizing in which future contributions will be less. There SHOULD be increased contributions since pay scales should keep going up.

You should ask for copies of past annual reports to see what the trends are.

The

You have to look at what your inflation is, where you are at, and look at the ROI of the retirement plan. Most that I know about are doing better than inflation.

You will have to look at your tax department, its forms, and come up with a sample/example with near real numbers to answer this.

so that the taxed money

You should examine, by google etc, the situation with pension funds wherever you live. Some are in good shape and well funded. Others are not. If your retirement system, whatever it is, is good, then its better to go with it than just do silly things with your money. If you have otehr options, eg. IRA, then you should put some money there too.

I am now retired. I get social security and a pension. so does the wife. We are covering our costs of living and so everything is OK. You have to look at your cost of living now, factor in increases and factor in what your benefits would be in 10-20 years. Outside of that, there are all kinds of doomsday scenarios. Only if there is a really major economic crisis where you are at, do you need to worry about your money evaporating.

Your best bet is to read about all of those recent examples and find out who lost their money. Or, more correctly, how much did they lose. Its a reason why one of the best strategies in investment is not to put all of your money in one place. So, study the 10% plus 10% match option, and also put some more money into something else, too.

Better to put money away for a rainy day than not.

From the very little that I have read about superannuation, it seems that you are able to invest in assets based outside the country. If you invest a part of your retirement plan in investments denominated in some other currency then you will lower the risk of inflation in Australia. However, I would not buy into the story about boomers causing inflation too much. This problem can be solved by other means than devaluation. For example - more emigration might be allowed as an offset. Anyway, the whole world has much the same problem and everything is relative. Maybe the AU boomer retirement is less problematic than the USA boomer situation. You, nor anyone else can predict with any certainty what will happen in 20 years; so don't put too much stock in all that talk about the disasters to come. A 10 percent match is hard to pass up just for uncertain reasons you have enumerated. IMHO

From the very little that I have read about superannuation, it seems that you are able to invest in assets based outside the country. If you invest a part of your retirement plan in investments denominated in some other currency then you will lower the risk of inflation in Australia. However, I would not buy into the story about boomers causing inflation too much. This problem can be solved by other means than devaluation. For example - more emigration might be allowed as an offset. Anyway, the whole world has much the same problem and everything is relative. Maybe the AU boomer retirement is less problematic than the USA boomer situation. You, nor anyone else can predict with any certainty what will happen in 20 years; so don't put too much stock in all that talk about the disasters to come. A 10 percent match is hard to pass up just for uncertain reasons you have enumerated. IMHO

Etrade has an online savings account, 5.05% APY which is better than most CDs and you can withdraw at any time. I don't remember what the rate schedule is.... $1 minimum. FDIC insured up to the usual amount.

Washington Mutual has a competitive online account (don't know the APY offhand, or the balance requirements). The advantage with WaMu is that you could actually walk up to an ATM and get the cash (transfer from the online account into your regular savings or checking with them, e.g.).

The OP is in Australia... the local WaMu is a bit far of a drive.

Is he? He didn't say. Why's he posting to uk.finance, then?

The inflation (CPI in US Dep of Labor lingo) in the USA is around 3% which is easily surpassed by any US government-backed savings bond (yielding around 4% at the lower bracket), let alone private investment.

Bottom line: you should not worry too much about inflation. In case of a major crisis, prices will go down, not up.

Marcos

his IP is in AU:

NNTP-Posting-Host: 219.90.148.73

gotta get up with the birds or ya miss the worms