I recall the saying “I’ve been rich and I’ve been poor, rich is better” but I had to do a Google search to remind me who said it (Wikipedia attributes it to singer, actress Sophie Tucker).
So recent news that 20% of Brits retiring this year will be below the poverty line (set I understand at some £8,254 per year) and that 14% had no pension at all, absolutely got my attention.
When did we go from having one the best retirement provisions of any Western European nation to the mess we appear to be in today?
Personally I attribute that decline to constant political interference in the UK pension system.
In the desire to simplify and protect, politicians have simply made it more complicated and less likely that people will be motivated to save for retirement.
I guess we need to consider how much is enough in retirement? The answer is a big “it depends”.
It depends on whether you want enough to be able to afford accommodation, food, clothing and heating. It could be argued that pretty much everything else is discretionary spend.
But no one, surely, would want a huge chunk of their life to be spent not doing some of the things they want to do.
So making sure you have the finances available for the retirement lifestyle you want is surely vitally important?
I can’t honestly believe that if you sat down with a young person today and asked them about their long-term ambitions any of them would put on their list “When I retire I would like just about enough retirement income to be below the poverty line”. It simply wouldn’t happen.
More likely they would agree with the statement “I don’t want to be poor” but are they motivated enough to ensure that will never happen?
It appears that 20% of the people retiring this year did not have that motivation.
