While working for Employee Benefits over three days, one issue continued to crop up: Pensions. As an undergraduate student in my final year, should the ‘2013 to-do list’ be: Complete degree, get job, enrol in pension scheme?
Surely I don’t have to start thinking about such a thing yet? If the average 40-year-old has confessed to giving little consideration to their pension scheme and financial future post-retirement, why on earth would a 20-something student question annuity, auto-enrolment and the like?
However, with an increasing presence of pension talk and an ever-growing concerned collective facing less and less financial certainty in their senior years, perhaps it would be wise to start opening the links that are currently sent to junk or are deleted with little thought, because they simply don’t concern me.
Research published by the Department for Work and Pensions in November 2012 found one in five people have no pension or other resources for later in life, with women (23%) more likely than men (15%) to have no savings for old age. It begs the question: Do you follow the savvy advice and save as soon as you start or join the consensus and live while you’re young?
With people living longer than ever before, perhaps I should educate myself and take heed of other people’s warnings.
As part one of my checklist is nearing completion, maybe it is time to consider the future beyond employment, and the fact that, like it or not, pensions are an issue that will affect me.