A recent online event, COVID-19 and Canada’s Workforce: A Crisis of Financial Security, suggests the pandemic has thrown a wrench into the retirement plans of Canadians.

The event, hosted by the Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan (HOOPP) and Common Wealth, took a look at how the pandemic is impacting our finances.

Common Wealth’s founding partner, Alex Mazer, noted that even before COVID-19, 43 per cent of Canadians were living cheque to cheque. Forty-four per cent had less than $5,000 in emergency savings, and 21 per cent had less than $1,000, Mazer says.

On the retirement savings front, Mazer says, things are even bleaker. “The median retirement savings of near-retirement households is only $3,000,” he notes. Four of 10 Canadians have no retirement savings at all, and 10 million lack any kind of workplace pension program.

With the pandemic now impacting work and income, many Canadians “don’t feel they have the capacity to save… and that is a real problem for our society,” he warns.

Citing recent research from FP Canada, Mazer noted that worries about money impact our performance at work. That research found 44 per cent of Canadians are “stressed” about their finances, and research from the Canadian Payroll Association found we are spending “30 minutes a day worrying” about money.

“If you are worried about your finances, it’s hard to bring your full self to work,” Mazer notes.

He noted that the lack of workplace pensions, long considered a pillar of Canada’s retirement system along with government pension benefits and individual savings, is having a negative impact.

“The greatest weakness in the Canada’s retirement system is the lack of workplace pensions,” he says. Coverage levels today are at about half of what they were in the 1970s.

Mazer is a proponent of giving more Canadians access to pension programs; he says the most efficient types are “large scale pooled plans, or large Canada model (defined benefit) plans.” Both types feature retirement saving at low fees, professional investing, and risk pooling, he explains.

Elizabeth Mulholland, CEO of Prosper Canada, says 47 per cent of people working in the non-profit sector work freelance or part time, and face lower pay. “Insecurity is a way of life for our sector,” she says.

She notes that 28 per cent of Canadians have raided their registered retirement savings plans or Tax Free Savings Accounts due to the pandemic. “They have depleted their already inadequate retirement savings, and are now further behind due to COVID,” Mulholland says, adding that the pandemic has been “a wakeup call for the financial vulnerability of Canadians.”

Pension plans should consider automatic enrolment – an “opt out” feature rather than “opt in” – and need to be flexible for part-time workers. She says support for workers with general financial literacy would help them make the most of their retirement benefits.

Bell Canada Vice-President, Pension & Benefits and Assistant Treasurer Eleanor Marshall says her company’s pension plan is appreciated by employees. “Eighty per cent strongly value the pension plan,” she explains.

When COVID hit, she says, “there were a couple of responses from our employees.” Top priority, she says, was health and safety and social distancing. Next was job security. But the third concern was their pension plan and its investments.

Marshall says there needs to be more emphasis on individuals building emergency savings for situations – such as during the pandemic – when they need to “bridge the gap” for a period of job loss.

Pension plans, she adds, are important “for attracting and retention.” While younger employees don’t worry much or think about their pensions, they “will eventually appreciate having a pension plan” once they get older.

In general, Marshall said, there’s a link between financial wellness and mental wellness, and delivering a retirement system for employees is a positive measure on both fronts.

Renee Legare, Executive Vice-President and Chief Human Resources Officer at The Ottawa Hospital, says that during the pandemic, the worry for hospital workers wasn’t so much job security but definitely “their health and wellness.” She says healthcare workers feel lucky to have a good workplace pension.

She says portability – the ability to continue with the pension when you move from one job to another – is a solid feature of the plan. “It’s a major benefit for healthcare workers; they can move from one employer to another without losing their (pension) investment,” she explains.

The event was chaired by Ivana Zanardo, Vice President of Client Services at HOOPP. Save with SPP would like to thank James Guezebroek of HOOPP for directing us to the presentation.

If you’re among the many millions of Canadians who don’t have a workplace pension plan, the Saskatchewan Pension Plan may be the savings program for you. It features low-cost, professional investing and pooling, and since it is a member-directed savings program you can continue to belong to SPP even if you change jobs. SPP can also be offered as a workplace pension. Why not check out it today!

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Watch out for these 20 mistakes retirement savers are making

The journey between the here and now of work, and the imaginary future wonderworld of retirement, is a peculiar one. We all imagine the destination differently and no one’s super clear on the route!

The folks over at MSN have a great little post about 20 pitfalls we need to avoid on the retirement journey.

The first, and probably most obvious pitfall, is “not having enough savings.” The blog post notes that “32 per cent of Canadians approaching retirement don’t have any savings,” citing BNN Bloomberg research. “Middle-aged and older Canadians should start saving as early as possible,” the post warns.

If you’re already a saver, are you aware of the fees you are paying on your investments? “High fees can eat up huge amounts of your savings over time if you’re not careful,” the post states.

Many of us who lack savings say hey, no problem, I’ll just keep working, even past age 65. The post points out that (according to Statistics Canada), “30 per cent of individuals who took an early retirement in 2002 did so because of their health.” In other words, working later may not be the option you think it is.

Are you assuming the kids won’t need any help once you hit your gold watch era? Beware, the blog says, noting that RBC research has found “almost half of parents with children aged 30-35 are still financially subsidizing their kids in some way.”

Another issue for Canucks is taking their federal government benefits too early. You don’t have to take CPP and OAS until age 70, the blog says – and you get substantially more income per month if you wait.

Some savers don’t invest, the blog says. “While it may seem risky to rely on the stock market, the real risk is that inflation will eat up your savings over time, while investments tend to increase in value over long periods of time,” the MSN bloggers tell us.

Raiding the RRSP cookie jar before you retire is also a no-no, the blog reports – the tax hit is heavy and you lose the room forever. Conversely, there are also penalties for RRIF owners if they fail to take enough money out, the blog says.

Other tips – expect healthcare costs of $5,391 per person in retirement each year, avoid retiring with a mortgage (we know about this one), be aware of the equity risks of a reverse mortgage, and don’t count on your house to fully fund your retirement.

The takeaway from all of this sounds very straightforward, but of course requires a lot of self-discipline to achieve – you need to save as much as you can while eliminating debt, all prior to retirement. And you have to maximize your income from all sources. That’s how our parents and grandparents did it – once there was no mortgage or debt they put down the shovel and enjoyed the rest of their time.

If you have a workplace pension, congratulations – you are in the minority, and you should do what you can to stay in that job to receive that future pension. If you don’t have a pension at work, the onus for retirement savings is on you. If you’re not sure about investments and fees, you could turn to the Saskatchewan Pension Plan for help. They have been growing peoples’ savings since the mid-1980s, all for a very low investment fee, and they can turn those savings into lifetime income when work ends and the joy of retirement begins.

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As a society, we are inundated with advertising on TV, social media and traditional newspapers that urge us all to save for retirement. We see a similar number of headlines, tweets and news items warning us that Canadians have record levels of household debt.

We are told to save for retirement, but also to pay off our debts. Is there a correct answer to the question of which comes first, retirement saving or debt reduction? Save with SPP clicked around to see what people are saying about this topic.

CTV British Columbia notes that the question for any leftover money at the end of the month is typically “spend it or save it.”

In the CTV report, Penny Wang of Consumer Reports proposes doing both. “It’s difficult to tackle two financial goals at once, but if you take a two-pronged approach, you can save for retirement and pay down your debt at the same time,” she tells the broadcaster.

Wang says you need to start by creating a basic budget to see where your money is going. This can help free up more for debt reduction and saving, she advises. Make your own coffee and cook at home, she suggests.

Take that extra money and put some on debt, targeting “high interest debt like credit cards first,” and lower interest debt later. For long-term savings, the article suggests setting up some sort of automatic withdrawal plan so the cash is gone before you have time to spend it.

The MoneyTalks News blog comes down a little more on the side of retirement saving.

“While living debt-free is a great goal, accumulating a pile of cash is critical, especially for those approaching retirement,” states MoneyTalks News founder Stacy Johnson in the article.

Debts like mortgages, he explains, can be dealt with by selling off your house and renting, but when you are entering retirement, “cash is king.”

He advises people to save “as much as possible” inside and outside retirement accounts, and once a “comfortable cushion” is achieved, you can turn your attention to putting extra money on debt, including mortgages.

So let’s put this together. At a time when the pandemic has many of us off work and/or receiving government help, we’re dealing with two problems – high household debt and low retirement savings. We know how much debt we have. According to the Motley Fool blog notes the following:

“To understand whether your registered retirement savings plan (RRSP) measures up, it helps to look at how other Canadians are doing with theirs. There are ample studies out there to help you find that out. One such study from the Bank of Montreal revealed the average Canadian’s RRSP balance.

The amount? $101,155.

At an average portfolio yield of 3.5%, that pays about $3,500 a year.

A nice income supplement, but nothing you can retire on.

Clearly, you’ll need more than that to retire comfortably. The question is, how much more?”

So, for those of us with debt, and without sufficient retirement savings, any road will take us to Rome. Whether you decide to save for retirement first and deal with debt later, or go with the two-pronged approach, succeeding in managing debt and growing savings will deliver you a lot more security once you’re retired.

If you’re in the market for a retirement savings plan, you may want to consider the Saskatchewan Pension Plan (SPP). The SPP allows you to contribute in many different ways – you can have money directly transferred from your bank account on a monthly basis, or you can set up SPP as an online bill and transfer in money now and then. That flexibility can help you ratchet up savings even as you chip away at debt.

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Gordon Pape is one of Canada’s best-known authors and commentators on investing, retirement and tax issues. Save with SPP reached out to him by email to ask a few questions about our favourite topic – saving for retirement.

Q. What are the three most important tips you can provide on saving for retirement?

A. Create a savings plan and stick to it. To do that, make sure it’s realistic. To maximize the odds of success, set up an automatic monthly withdrawal at your financial institution, with the proceeds going directly into a pension plan, Registered Retirement Savings Plan (RRSP) or Tax Free Savings Account (TFSA).

• Start as early as possible. Let the magic of compounding work for you for as many years as you can. If you invest $1,000 for 20 years with a five per cent average annual return, it will be worth $2,653.30 at the end of that time. After 40 years, the value will be $7,039.99.
• Use the tax system to your advantage. All RRSP and pension contributions within the legal limit will generate a deduction that will lower your tax bill. Contributions to Tax-Free Savings Accounts are not deductible, but no tax is assessed on withdrawals.

Q. Given today’s markets, are there any things you think people should be doing differently with their retirement investments?

A. This is a very difficult environment in which to invest because of the uncertainty related to the pandemic and the time it will take the economy to recover. In these circumstances, I advise caution, especially with retirement money. Aim for a balanced portfolio (typically 40 per cent bonds and cash, 60 per cent equities). Dollar-cost average your stock or equity fund investments over time. Always have some cash in reserve to deploy in market corrections.

Q. Given what seems to be a lack of workplace pension plans in many job categories, is saving for retirement more important than ever before?

A. It has always been important but it’s especially so if you do not have a pension plan (most people in the private sector do not). Few people want to scrape by on payments from the Canada Pension Plan (CPP) and Old Age Security (OAS). To enhance your retirement lifestyle, you’ll need your own personal retirement nest egg – and the larger, the better.

Q. Do you think we’ll see more people working beyond traditional retirement age – and if yes, why do you think that is?

A. Absolutely. We’re already seeing that trend. In some cases, the motivation is financial – people simply don’t have the savings needed to quit work. But in other cases, people keep working because they want to. I’m in my 80s and still work full-time. I enjoy what I do and don’t intend to stop until health forces me to. I know a lot of people that feel the same way.

We thank Gordon Pape for taking the time to answer our questions. Be sure to check out his website for more great information.

If you don’t have a workplace pension, or are looking for a way to top up what you are already saving, consider the Saskatchewan Pension Plan. It’s a one-shop, personal retirement plan that you can set up for yourself or your employer can offer it as part of a benefit package. Once you are a member, your contributions are grown via risk-controlled, low-cost investing, and when it’s time to receive the gold watch, you can choose from a variety of retirement income options including life annuities. Consider checking them out today.

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How much is the right amount to withdraw from retirement savings?

OK, so you’ve managed to squirrel away a nice chunk of money in your retirement fund. Now you’re ready to start taking the money out and you know, living off it.

But is there a sensible rule of thumb to employ so that you don’t run out of savings before you run out of life?

According to the Daily Mail in the U.K., there is a new idea making the rounds.

Investment company Vanguard says there’s a way to help make sure your money will last the 35 years or so that you may need it to last, the Daily Mail reports.

“The firm suggest savers determine their income by multiplying their portfolio by five per cent, then comparing it with the previous year and adjusting how much they remove accordingly,” the article says.

“If the fund is higher than the previous year, retirees should withdraw up to five per cent while if the portfolio has depreciated in value, income should be decreased by roughly two per cent.”

Simply put, don’t take out the same amount every year. Take out up to five per cent if your savings have gone up in value, and take out less, say three per cent, if it has not.

The conventional withdrawal rule that has been bandied about for years in the industry is that you can safely withdraw four per cent from your savings annually.

The new Vanguard formula flies in the face of that wisdom, and the four per cent rule was recently questioned by financial author Jason Heath in a MoneySense article.

“Over the half decade I’ve written this column and attempted to practice what it preaches, a central pillar has been the so-called 4 Per Cent Rule,” he writes.

“Problem is, with `lower for longer’ interest rates and the spectre of negative interest rates, is it still realistic for retirees to count on this guideline? Personally, I find it useful, even though I mentally take it down to three per cent to adjust for my own pessimism about rates and optimism that I will live a long, healthy life,” he writes.

He goes on to cite other experts who say four per cent “is a reasonable rule of thumb” for non-registered savings, but once RRSPs are converted into RRIFs, higher withdrawal amounts are mandated by the government anyway, making the withdrawal formula “moot.”

Let’s digest all this. You’ve got savings, you want to live on those savings. But up until now you have never had to live on a lump sum amount that gets smaller every year – you are used to getting a paycheque. Whether you take out two, three, or four percent (or some other mandatory percentage) of your savings every year, there will likely be less money in the piggy bank each year you get older, particularly at a time when interest rates are so low.

Do we want to be pre-occupied with withdrawal rates and decumulation strategies while we are trying to hit golf balls onto the fairway? Surely not.

But wait – if you’re a member of the Saskatchewan Pension Plan there’s a solution to this problem. SPP offers a variety of annuities for its members. When you come to retirement, you can convert any or all of your SPP savings into a monthly income payment – a lot like your old paycheque – that comes to you in the same amount for the rest of your life. You can never run out of money, no matter how long you live or what markets and interest rates do. Security is guaranteed. Check out SPP today.

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According to a recent article in MoneySense nearly two-thirds of Canadians have built an emergency fund. That’s great, but means that one-third of us have not.

For those of us is in that bottom third, an emergency fund is designed to cover “unexpected expenses, such as urgent major repairs (not renovations) to your home or car, unexpected medical expenses not covered by universal healthcare or insurance, or lack of income due to job loss,” MoneySense explains.

As many of us are finding out during this bizarre year 2020, without an emergency fund, these unexpected expenses are being covered “with a credit card… payday loans, or heavily using your unsecured line of credit,” the article continues. All of these are high-interest options, and the interest piles up if you can’t pay the money back in full.

Some folks also raid their retirement savings to pay the bills, a strategy that can backfire at tax time or in the distant future when you’re trying to leave the workforce – more about that later.

MoneySense recommends we all set aside enough money to cover “three to six months’ worth of fixed expenses.” OK, so we know the what and the why – let’s turn to the how.

An emergency fund, the article suggests, should not be set up like a retirement savings account. “Saving for an emergency isn’t about long-term goals, increasing your wealth, or planning for retirement, it’s about having immediate access to cash,” the site advises.

MoneySense recommends that you first create a budget to see how much you can set aside each month. That amount should be invested in either a TFSA or a high-interest savings account, the article notes. “Disconnect the account from your debit card so you won’t spend it,” the article advises. Automate payments so you don’t “forget” to make them, MoneySense says. “Pay yourself first.”

At Manulife’s website, the advice is similar. An additional idea on how to build the emergency fund is to cut back on costs – “think about how much you spend on coffee, lunches out, and other impulse purchases. Give up one or two things and week and stash that money into your savings,” the site suggests.

They also reiterate the idea of making savings automatic – treat your emergency fund “like a bill… the sooner it’s saved, the less time you will have to spend it.” Manulife also warns against the dangers of analysis paralysis – start small, say $10 a week or so, and ratchet things up as you go along.

Sun Life covers much of the same ground, but warns against using debt as an emergency fund or tapping into retirement savings.

“All withdrawals from RRSPs (except for education and home purchases, under the Lifelong Learning Plan and the Home Buyers’ Plan, respectively) are subject to income tax and will result in the permanent loss of contribution room – that is, once you’ve taken it out, you can’t put it back in. Any withdrawals from your RRSP are immediately subject to withholding tax,” Sun Life explains.

“If you withdraw up to $5,000, the withholding tax rate is 10 per cent. If you withdraw between $5,001 and $15,000, the withholding tax rate is 20 per cent, and more than $15,000, the rate is 30 per cent. These tax rates apply in all provinces except Quebec, where provincial tax rates apply on top of the federal withholding tax,” the Sun Life article warns.

So to recap – create a savings account that isn’t hooked up to any of your cards, and automatically transfer money into it regularly. Keep the money in some sort of high-interest savings account so that it remains liquid, and ready to spend when an emergency arrives. You don’t want to risk losses here.

Think of it as an obligation, like a bill, that you have to pay each month. Then set it and forget it, until the next emergency comes along.

And if you’re busily automating your emergency fund savings, think about doing the same thing for your Saskatchewan Pension Plan retirement account. Have a pre-set amount earmarked for retirement automatically withdrawn from your bank account every payday. That way, just as is the case for a well-designed emergency fund, you’re paying your future self first.

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A glance at the title on the Indigo website – How to Retire Debt-Free & Wealthy – made this writer decide to add Christine Ibbotson’s book to our retirement library. What else, after all, could anyone want from their retirement?  What’s great about this book is that it illustrates the path you need to take to get there, and uses dozens of different anecdotal/testimonial trails to illustrate the key points.

Ibbotson starts by noting that “very few clients (she is a licensed financial and investment advisor, estate planner and tax specialist) entering retirement will want to compromise their current lifestyles, but will find it difficult to live on less income, especially if they still have a mortgage or outstanding debt.”

That’s seminal retirement advice, and the book builds on it.

A key part of the book is her five-step methodology to establishing what she calls “your core plan.”  Step one is debt elimination, she writes. No easy way out – the best step is to target one of your debts with extra payments, pay it off, and then go after the others. “Once all the debt is paid, you can use these new-found funds to start a savings program towards investing,” she says.

The second idea is one we’ve not seen before, specifically the idea that your “mortgage amortization should match the years left to your retirement.”

“If you are now 45, the amortization on your mortgage should be 20 years,” she explains. Why this idea is so smart is that it basically guarantees you will retire without a mortgage, which is usually the largest debt we Canadians carry. Carrying a mortgage when you have less money (because you are retired) is not always a lot of fun.

Other ideas in the five-step plan are to set up a daily cash journal and track all expenses (so you know where every nickel of your money is going), determining your total debt-servicing ratio, and to “explore ways to increase your wealth” once debt is out of the picture.

In one of the many examples in the book, 50-somethings “Tracie and Kyle” are able to get out of a debt quagmire by tracking and then dramatically slashing their discretionary spending, enabling them to live on one salary. Then, both added side gigs, their debts were addressed and eliminated, and their turnaround resulted in an education plan for the kids and retirement savings for themselves.

The experience turned great spenders “into great savers,” the book declares.

For those who can’t imagine becoming savers, the book has a chapter just for you on “Ways to Save Every Day.” Do your own house cleaning and cut your own lawn. Do small repairs yourself. Cut back on phone and cable. Bundle services where you can. Buy second hand. Drive your car longer.  Cut back on expensive memberships. Buy generic brands. Buy in bulk, and shop when there are sales. There are many more tips like these in this well-thought-out volume.

There’s even advice on the tricky problem of making your money last in retirement. Ibbotson suggests when you are retired, there will be a “honeymoon phase” for the first five years of retirement, followed by the middle age of retirement (years six to 20) and the “long-term” phase, 20 years and beyond.

Use your unregistered savings for the first phase as much as you can. Start tapping into RRSPs, pensions, and government benefits in phase two. By phase three you will need income from your RRIFs and fixed-income investments, which you will have been “laddering” in phases one and two.

This great little book is well worth adding to your collection.  If, like the book suggests, you are banking on retiring more than 20 years from now, it’s probably well past time to start putting away money for retirement. The Saskatchewan Pension Plan offers you a choice of a Balanced Fund or Diversified Income Fund for your contributions. Be sure to check out SPP today!

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We often hear how scarce good workplace pensions are, and how many employers, notably those in the private sector, have given up on offering them altogether.

But, according to Derek Dobson, CEO and Plan Manager of the Colleges of Arts and Technology (CAAT) Pension Plan, there is an option for any Canadian employer that doesn’t want to go through the effort and expense of managing a pension plan for their employees. That option is CAAT’s DBplus plan.

Dobson tells Save with SPP that there are three main themes as to why some employers – with or without their own pension plan – might want to look at DBplus.

Running what is called a “single employer” defined benefit (DB) plan means the risk of ensuring there’s enough money invested to cover the promised benefits rests on the shoulders of one employer. In a multi-employer plan, however, many employers are there to shoulder the load – the risk is shared.

As well, he notes, it might be a chance to upgrade pension benefits. “A lot of organizations want to have access to something better for their people… some employers offer nothing, or a group RRSP. Now they can move to a modern DB plan,” Dobson explains. One study by the Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan (see this prior Save with SPP post) found that most Canadians would take a job with a good pension over one that pays more, Dobson notes.

A final benefit, he says, is the ability that DBplus has to move all employees to a common retirement benefit platform. “In many organizations, you may find that one group of employees has nothing, one has a defined contribution plan, others have a DB plan that is now closed to new entrants… DB plus allows you to put everyone on the same platform,” he says.

Noting that another large pension plan – Ontario’s OPSEU Pension Trust – has launched a similar program for non-profit organizations, Dobson says the idea of leveraging existing pension plans to deliver pensions to those lacking good coverage “is great…the long and the short of it is that there’s a general belief that these larger plans want to put up their hands to help where they can.”

“It’s the right thing to do,” he says.

Why are pensions so important?

Dobson points out some key reasons. “The average person these days will live to age 90, and on average, they retire at age 64 or 65,” he explains. “That’s 25 years in retirement. So having a secure, predictable income, one with inflation protection and survivor pensions, and that is not being delivered for a profit motive – that’s why these plans are so powerful.”

Another great thing about opening up larger plans to new employers is that it addresses the problem of “pension envy,” Dobson says. Instead of pointing out who has a good pension and who doesn’t, now “everyone has access to one, to the same standard.”

Those without a pension have issues to face when they’re older, he warns. “The Canada Pension Plan and Old Age Security systems weren’t designed to be someone’s only source of income,” he explains. “We had a three-pillar system in the past – CPP, OAS, and the third pillar, your workplace pension plan and your private savings,” Dobson says. But a large percentage of Canadians don’t have pensions at work, and a recent study by Dr. Robert Brown found that the median RRSP savings of someone approaching retirement age is just “$2,000 to $3,000,” Dobson says. Yet the same study found Canadians are willing to try and save 10 to 20 per cent of their income for retirement.

Dobson says he is energized by the goal of bringing pensions to more Canadians. “It’s a way of making Canada better,” he concludes.

Here’s a video about how the CAAT pension plan delivers on benefit security.

We thank Derek Dobson for taking the time to speak to Save with SPP.

If you don’t have a workplace pension, or the one you have offers only modest benefits, don’t forget the Saskatchewan Pension Plan. SPP allows you to decide what your savings rate will be, grows those dollars at a very low management rate, and can convert the proceeds to a variety of lifetime pensions when you retire. Check them out today.

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New research from the World Economic Forum, reported by Corporate Advisor, suggests the “savings gap” between what we should set aside for retirement, and what we actually have, is on track for monumental growth.

“Globally, experts are concerned many people could be sleepwalking into retirement poverty. The World Economic Forum (WEF) highlighted that the gap between what people save and what is needed for an adequate standard of living in retirement will create a financial black hole for younger generations,” the Advisor’s Emma Simon reports.

The WEF looked at the some of the world’s largest pension markets, including Canada, the U.K., Australia, the U.S., the Netherlands, China, India and Japan, and concluded “the gap” could reach a staggering $400 trillion U.S. in 30 years.

But, the article says, there is still time to do something to avert a crisis.

“With ageing populations putting increasing pressure on global pension and retirement plans, employees, employers and governments need to take more responsibility and act to prioritise pensions and savings,” Simon explains.

Countries around the world have done some interesting things to boost retirement savings.

In the U.K., the article notes, “automatic enrolment” was rolled out in 2012. This means that new employees are automatically signed up for their workplace pension plan, with an option to opt out. Thanks to this, there are 10 million more pension plan members in the U.K., although there are concerns about 9.3 million who aren’t in plans because they were too old for auto-enrolment, the article explains.

In Australia, the Superannuation fund system was made mandatory “in 1992 for all employees older than 17 and younger than 70 earning more than $450 (AUD) a month.” So this means everyone is saving on their own – but with the current maximum contribution of 9.5 per cent (soon to rise to 12 per cent), there are questions as to whether they are saving enough.

A Benefits Canada article from a couple of years ago raised the same question – are Canadians saving enough for retirement on their own? While Canadians had accumulated an impressive-sounding $40.4 billion in RRSPs as of 2016, the article notes that the median contribution annually was just $3,000.

As of 2018, reports the Boomer & Echo blog, the average Canadian RRSP was an impressive sounding $101,155. But if someone handed you $100 grand and then said “live off this for 30 years in retirement,” it wouldn’t sound quite so great.

There’s no question that saving needs to be encourage in Canada and around the world. The Canada Pension Plan and Old Age Security both provide a pretty modest benefit, and most of us don’t have a workplace pension. So steps should be taken to encourage more access to pensions, to look at increases to government benefits, and to encourage more saving.

If you don’t have a workplace pension plan, the Saskatchewan Pension Plan may be just what you’re looking for. The SPP is a defined contribution plan. You can contribute up to $6,300 a year, and your contributions are carefully invested at a very low fee. When the day comes that work is no longer a priority, the money you’ve accumulated through growth and ongoing contributions can be converted to a lifetime pension. Check them out today.

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Author Tina Hay’s Napkin Finance is, as the name would suggest, a great way to boil complex financial planning concepts into easy, digestible pieces.

While the book is intended for U.S. readers, there’s a treasure trove of good information for those of us who reside north of the border.

In the chapter on saving, she quotes famed investor Warren Buffett as saying “do not save what is left after spending, but spend what is left after saving.” It’s a great idea, she writes, “to make sure you have cash available for emergencies, unexpected bills… and future goals,” and a savings account, ideally separate from your spending account, is a great way to get there.

Hay talks about budgeting ideas, including what she calls “the 50-20-30 budget.” That’s “50 per cent for essentials, 20 per cent for financial goals, and 30 per cent for flexible spending,” the book explains.

In talking about debt, she calls borrowing for a home or education “good debt,” and credit card balances “bad debt,” noting it takes the average American 12 years to pay off a credit card if he or she only pays the minimum amount owing.

If you want to have a good credit rating, Hay advises, then pay your credit card on time and, where possible, in full; don’t miss loan payments; resolve your bank overdraft (pay it off), pay all bills on time and avoid going into collection. All these factors are strikes against good credit, she warns.

Investing, she writes, can be a “powerful way to grow your wealth,” chiefly because stocks generally perform well over the long term. By buying stock, you become “a part-owner of the company” and share in profits via growth in the value of your shares and, occasionally, through dividends. With a bond, “you become the lender to the entity that issued the bond,” and the interest you receive is basically like rent on the use of your money. Hay says alternate investment classes can also be good in your portfolio, including real estate (“you may earn a return when your tenants pay rent”), hedge funds, and private equity investments.

Watch for fees if you invest in mutual funds, she writes; fees are lower with exchange-traded funds or if you use a Robo-adviser rather than a broker.

For retirement savings, Hay advises that you “save 15 per cent of your income and invest heavily in stocks while you are young.” She says you should “take advantage” of tax-assisted savings (in Canada, this would be things like RRSPs or workplace registered pension plans). Don’t forget, she writes, to think about your estate planning as well – don’t leave the decision on what should happen to your money and possessions up in the air.

This is a nicely-written book that’s offering up complex topics in a simple, easy-to-digest way. There’s a nice splash of colour, such as the fact that some people measure inflation over time by looking at the historic price of a Big Mac! It’s definitely worth a read.

If you aren’t great at investing, and want to follow a diversified approach while avoiding high fees, take a good look at the Saskatchewan Pension Plan. Through SPP’s Balanced Fund your investment dollar accesses Canadian and international equities, bonds, mortgages, real estate, infrastructure and short-term investments – all for a very low management fee.

Written by Martin Biefer
	Martin Biefer is Senior Pension Writer at Avery & Kerr Communications in Nepean, Ontario. A veteran reporter, editor and pension communicator, he’s now a freelancer. Interests include golf, line dancing and classic rock. He and his wife live with their Shelties, Duncan and Phoebe, and cat, Toobins. You can follow him on Twitter – his handle is @AveryKerr22