If you’re like Garret or Gaybo you might dodge pensions time bomb

POLITICIANS are geared to think only as far as the next election. They go into liquidation if they lose their seat.

A personal political legacy is extremely rare, as most political careers are readily forgotten. Therefore, any plan for 2050 is long on aspiration and short on detail. This aptly describes last week’s national pension framework.

The backdrop to this pronouncement is that people are living longer and leading more active lives in retirement. Life expectancy for someone who retires now at 65 has increased to 81 years for men, while women can linger until 84. Add this factor to our demographic bubble. The majority of us are middle aged. For every retiree now there are currently 5.6 workers. By 2050 for every retiree there will only be 1.8 people at work. This double whammy means the proportion of our national income that we spend on the elderly is going to treble from 5.5% to 15% of GDP in four decades.