Falls

I have talked a great deal about falls and the importance of not falling for seniors. I have always tried to be careful and to follow my own advice. The cold has been extreme in my area, as it has in many others, and we have hummingbird feeders to help the birds survive the winter. These feeders are freezing so we have been following a routine like many others of leaving out one feeder and when it is frozen, replacing it with the one that is not. This allows the food to be available to the hummingbirds throughout the day. 

The birds show up about 8:00 in the morning on a regular basis, so I have been getting up at about 7:00 AM to put out a feeder. To replace or put out the feeder I have to climb a stepladder about 3 steps, but yesterday I noticed the steps were icy. I should have cleaned them, but it was cold, so I left the ice and snow on the steps. Big mistake. At 7:00 AM I was up and took the feeder out to put it up. I climbed up two steps on the stepladder and went to take the third step. Ice is unforgiving and I went down. Lucky for me the 8 cm  (3 inches) of snow broke my fall. I landed on my elbow and side but I kept my head up. The feeder flew across the lawn opening but not breaking. The snow jolted me awake and I swallowed my pride and went and put the other feeder out.

Falls can be dangerous to seniors even minor ones, and I am in a bit of pain but a lesson learned. Even the shortest lack of attention can do you harm. Be safe out there and be careful. I am ok but my pride is wounded but the birds were able to feed this morning.

Zooming and Family

Two years ago, my Nephew did a 23 and me DNA test and we discovered that according to 23 and me, we had another brother who was older than I was by three years. I was the eldest of four brothers so this was a shock. So, after a lot of investigation, we were able to reach out and connect with him. 

It was wonderful to meet him and to learn his story. At one point he asked me "What if my dad had known of his birth?" My answer was that I  would not exist, but that is another story.

Because he is on the other side of North America, and because of COVID and Travel restrictions we knew we were unlikely to meet in person so we set up a monthly ZOOM meeting.  Once a month my brothers and I meet to talk and to catch up. Last year we had a family ZOOM meeting but without my older brother as we were in the process of investigating and figuring out our new relations. This year we had the second family meeting and my older brother was invited and he invited his family. His sister, his daughter and her husband and two grandsons and their children were there at the meeting. As none of us use ZOOM on a regular basis, we take advantage of the 40-minute limit, but for some reason, ZOOM upgraded us to unlimited minutes. 

This extra time was used well and before I knew it two and half hours had flown by. My older brother's family and our family explored our stories and learned a lot about each other. As one of the children said, "It is so nice to meet a family we did not know we had." It was one of the highlights of my Christmas this year and look forward to meeting them again.

One of my great-nieces is learning to read and she had her favourite book and she read it to us another highlight of the ZOOM meeting. Technology brings people together and as COVID continues to advance and attack we will, I think, be using more technology to keep in touch.

Pension Rankings 2020

My daughter lives in Australia and my wife has family in the USA so I thought after reading the report on how pension funds are doing I would share what the three countries are doing in this area.

Canada’s Pension ranked 9^th out of 39 pension systems studied by the Mercer CFA institute Global Pension Index 2020

Canada's retirement income system comprises a universal flat-rate pension, supported by a means-tested in-income supplement; an earnings-related pension based on revalued lifetime earnings; voluntary occupational pension schemes (many of which are defined benefit schemes): and voluntary individual retirement savings plans.

The overall index value for the Canadian system could be increased by:

·        Increasing the coverage of employees in occupational pension schemes through the development of an attractive product for those without an employer-sponsored scheme

·        Increasing the level of household savings and reducing the level of household debt

·        reducing government debt as a percentage of GDP

·        Increasing the labour force participation rate at older ages as life expectancies rise

The Canadian index value increased slightly from 69.2 in 2019 to 69.3 in 2020 due to several improvements in the sustainability sub-index which were largely offset by the decrease in the adequacy sub-index with reductions in the net replacement rates published by the OECD

Australia is ranked 4^th out of 39 pension systems studied by the Mercer CFA institute Global Pension Index 2020

Australia's retirement income system comprises a means-tested age pension (paid from general government revenue); a mandatory employer contribution paid into private-sector arrangements (mainly DC plans); and additional voluntary contributions from employers, employees or the self-employed paid into private-sector plans.

The overall index value for the Australian system could be increased by:

·        Moderating the assets test on the means-tested age pension to

·        increase the net replacement rate for average income earners

·        Raising the level of household saving and reducing the level of household debt

·        Introducing a requirement that part of the retirement benefit must be taken as an income stream

·        Increasing the labour force participation rate at older ages as life expectancies rise

·        Introducing a mechanism to increase the pension age as life expectancy continues to increase

The Australian index value decreased from 75.3 in 2019 to 74.2 in 2020 primarily due to a reduction in the net replacement rates published by the OECD.

The United States is ranked 18^th out of 29 pension systems studied by the Mercer CFA institute Global Pension Index 2020

The United States’ retirement income system comprises a social security system with a progressive benefit formula based on lifetime earnings, adjusted to a current dollar basis, together with a means-tested top-up benefit; and voluntary private pensions, which may be occupational or personal.

The overall index value for the American system could be increased by:

·        Raising the minimum pension for   low-income pensioners

·        Improving the vesting of benefits for all plan members and maintaining the real value of retained benefits through to retirement

·        Reducing pre-retirement leakage by further limiting the access to funds before retirement

·        Introducing a requirement that part of the retirement benefit must be taken as an income stream

·        Increasing the funding level of the social security program

·        ' Expanding coverage by providing access to retirement plans on an institutional group basis for workers who don't have access to an employer-sponsored plan

The American index value decreased slightly from 60.6 in 2019 to 60.3 in 2020 due to several small reductions in the sustainability subindex.

 

 

 

Does collecting a pension hurt the economy?

 Pensions contribute to economic well-being but some argue that giving pensions hurt our economy.  The OECD 2019 published Pensions at a Glance 2019 In this study the researchers looked at the disposable income of those countries whose seniors have pensions They found that on average among OECD countries, people older than 65 have a disposable income equal to 87% of the total population. It is less than 70% of the economy-wide average in Estonia and Korea, but slightly more than 100% in France, Israel and Luxembourg. Moreover, income drops further with age in old age, and those older than 75 have a significantly lower income than the 66-75 in all OECD countries, with an average difference of 14 percentage points. In most non-OECD G20 countries it is the other way around, old-age income rises slightly with older ages, except in China and the Russian Federation.

Women’s pensions are lower than men’s. Older women often had short careers and lower wages than men, resulting in low benefit entitlements. In the EU-28, women’s average pensions were 25% lower than the average pension for men in 2015 (Figure 1.6). The gender gap stood at over 40% in Germany, Luxembourg and the Netherlands and below 10% in Denmark, Estonia and the Slovak Republic. This also translates into a disproportionate share of poor elderly people being women. On the one hand, with recent moves towards tighter links between labour

Of the four main sources of income on which older people draw, public transfers (earnings-related pensions, resource-tested benefits, etc.) and private occupational transfers (pensions, severance payments, death grants, etc.) account for two-thirds of the total income. Public transfers account for 55% and private occupational transfers represent 10% of older people’s incomes on average. The countries where over-65s are most reliant on public transfers are Austria, Belgium, Finland and Luxembourg: more than 80% of their incomes come from that source.

Public transfers represent only 6%, 15% and 18% of all income in Mexico, Turkey and Chile, respectively. Private occupational transfers are of particular importance in 12 OECD countries, with the Netherlands being highest at 39%.

Work accounts for 25% and capital for about 10% of older people’s incomes on average. Work is especially important in Korea and Mexico, where it accounts for more than half of old-age income; it also represents a large share of income in Chile, Estonia, Israel, Japan, Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, New Zealand, Poland, the Slovak Republic, Turkey and the United States.

Also, as incomes are measured at the household level, work is likely to be a more important income source for older people where many of them live in multi-generational households.

Capital, mostly private pensions, represents 40% of all income sources of older people in Canada. In Denmark and New Zealand, capital represents over 20% of all income.

In most countries, pensioners are not a drain on the economy, they contribute to it by paying taxes and working.