Coronavirus Pandemic

[Misfit]

Yeah, I know I'm lucky to have a pot in the first place. TBH I'd have never thought about paying in had my company not practically forced it on us. A rep pointed out that "when your employer offers to match your pension contributions (as is common in many British companies) then you're basically throwing salary away by not paying in". That was enough to convince me. In the last 5 years it's grown at 18% p/a so it bodes well for the future but this virus outbreak has shown it's all very volatile.

The pension pot is my biggest fear about the virus. Not that I'll be needing it for 10 years, so as you say, it should recover fine, but it is still not nice. Been working hard to get as much in as possible lately.

When you look at the tax relief you get on it, and if you have company contributions, it's still a hell of a lot more than if you put it in the bank.

And of course, any units you buy at the moment will be buying low, so should do very nicely!

[gilesgoat]

Yeah, I know I'm lucky to have a pot in the first place. TBH I'd have never thought about paying in had my company not practically forced it on us. A rep pointed out that "when your employer offers to match your pension contributions (as is common in many British companies) then you're basically throwing salary away by not paying in". That was enough to convince me. In the last 5 years it's grown at 18% p/a so it bodes well for the future but this virus outbreak has shown it's all very volatile.

The pension pot is my biggest fear about the virus. Not that I'll be needing it for 10 years, so as you say, it should recover fine, but it is still not nice. Been working hard to get as much in as possible lately.

When you look at the tax relief you get on it, and if you have company contributions, it's still a hell of a lot more than if you put it in the bank.

And of course, any units you buy at the moment will be buying low, so should do very nicely!

Just to be clear what do you MEAN with "pension pot" ? .. a "private pension / private saving ?"

We don't have anything like that in Italy or such, there's only the State Pension, everything else you risking to throw money in a black hole never to be seen again.

With the thing going "around 75" .. can you see a 74 years old guy still working somewhere while still hoping that in 1 year time he'll be able to retire ?

( and *cough* maybe spend "the best possible 2 weeks of his life" - before to pass out - )

We are doomed .. pensions .. can't even pay my salary at this rate .. "please buy our games"

[edit] - and if I think I am pessimist, YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MANY TIMES IN ITALY turned out "bogus companies" or "totally legitimate ones" that then at some point "declared some bankruptcy" and "OH WE ARE SO SORRY ALL THE MONEY IS GONE!" .. coupled with ".. and the government is NOT going to recover any of that money, you lost it all, full stop" ..

[Deckard]

My current pension pot is 160 a week in 2034 (thats the state one) and I did work for the civil service for a long time back in the day so we will see what that kicks out but god knows how anyone under 30 has a pension or pot for later life these days.

Savings are odd too as mate just sold his house and has 100k cash or so but max return he can get is 2% ! Back in the Thatcher years he could have lived off the interest alone at 10% plus.

[Rhythm]

Just to be clear what do you MEAN with "pension pot" ? .. a "private pension / private saving ?"

Basically, yeah. Government here has been gearing people up to not expect a state pension for decades. So they make contributions to one's own private pension tax-free to incentivise people to save, and companies generally chip in on top of that to (into the same private funds).

So the theory is that by the time I retire I'll have a pot with which I can go buy a pension/annuity and there should be a (small) NI-funded state pension component too. But banking on that state pension piece is risky AF, to put it bluntly.

[Misfit]

I did work for the civil service for a long time back in the day so we will see what that kicks out
.

Public-sector pensions, from a while, back tend to be pretty good. I worked at a couple of universities for 10 years, until I was about 30 (20 years ago). My USS final salary pension is currently worth about £170k! I could dip into that from 55, but the longer it's left the better.

I'd have thought a period in the civil service should be ok too. It was always those kind of things that make people work/stay in the public sector.

I then lost a fortune after going alone and didn't pay a pension for a while, but am now in a very lucky position where my company does make money and thus very big contributions for me, which are essentially tax-free (I'm sure corporation tax is factored in there) and I'm trying to load enough that I can stop working before I get too old instead of living it up now. If I do another 10 years, then hopefully life will be good. If I need to do 15, then it will be a lot better, but hope 10 is enough!

If 'we' hadn't made the decision to send our kids to a stupidly expensive then I could get out in 5, and have had holidays and a nice car, maybe have moved house. Yes, I'm glad 'we' made that decision.

Anyway, I can't stress to my young staff enough paying something in now makes a huge difference, that and trying to get a property as in the long run it's an investment worth making if you can.

[snaff]

Still keep consider yourself very lucky ... pensions ... what a word .. people like me will never see one at this rate, we'll all die before we'd be even able to THINK about claiming anything ...

The state pension in this country is very generous. You get 130 quid a week which is enough for anyone. If you have rent to pay and no savings then housing benefit covers that. If you haven't paid any national insurance you don't get that, you get 'pension benefit' instead which is even more generous. I've always lived on less than that and invest the rest and forget about it so state pension alone will be a pay rise for me.

[snaff]

In the last 5 years it's grown at 18% p/a so it bodes well for the future but this virus outbreak has shown it's all very volatile.

That's exactly it. The virus itself isn't the issue, it's just the trigger that prompted the re-evaluation. Everybody knows we're not generating 18% more wealth year on year every year but everybody can generate paper wealth for as long as the shared pretense can be kept up. The virus may affect real values significantly, but the market doesn't even know what those real values are to begin with at the moment.

[PFVA]

It's fast. 9 cases here and it's already in my area, not here in town just in the Municipality.

One of the cases is a school teacher who went to spend Carnival vacation in Italy, got back and taught classes Thursday and Friday, getting sick Monday and being diagnosed yesterday. The 2 schools are in this municipality right next the to the boarder with Lisbon. Total of school in quarenteena 4 and one factory up North in the same situation.

I don't know if it was just a coincidency but the bank this morning was almost empty, a rare thing at this time of the month. The Municipal Garden there was quite empty too.

Now there is one thing i'm already hating about this. People are cleaning their staff with very strongly parfumed stuff i'm allergic to. In the bus the person nxt to me was cleaning her mobile with one of those things, and this afternoon downstairs they were washing everything with one of those also strongly parfumed cleaning things.

[Baggypants]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-51749352

Coronavirus: UK moving towards 'delay' phase of virus plan, Northern Rail to take project lead due to an abundance of experience.

[gilesgoat]

Ladies and Gentlemen .. the President of Italy speaks ...



Saying Italy is facing the problem with transparency and information but we must avoid states of panick and misinformation .. we have an excellent NHS that is dealing with the problems, we'll pass throught this even if we'll have to respect/use some precautions to help the work of the NHS .. etc. etc. etc. ...

There you have it "official talk from the president" ...

[Little stoned kiwi]

The super markets have run out of toilet paper.

[Deckard]

Our local tescos has been emptied. Lovely to see the sheep in full flow.

[Baggypants]

Get to the barbers and panic buy beard styles.

[gilesgoat]

Someone that been in USA explains "why cases are so low there" .. to make the tests it costs $3200 .. therefore "less tests are being done" ..

Now if I understood correctly the test is probably just what I thinks is called a "nasal/troath tampon", they take literally a small swab with a sort of cotton bud from your nostrils and throat, takes literally .. 10 seconds ? .. OK plus the time the lab needs to analyze it ( not sure if it's a person that has to look into a microscope or it's done with a machine ) I think "worst case scenario" they have to smear it on an agar plate, let it grow a day or 2 and then look.

$3200 .. sounds "excessive" .. not to mention in those cases "the government should make it do for free" and such as they do in other places ...

[Rhythm]

$3200 .. sounds "excessive"

Welcome to US healthcare. Because the system has been propped up by private insurance it's meant costs have gotten to be utterly insane. There are some extreme examples cited here, but it's an eye-opener nonetheless: