The government will not be making automatic annual payments to the Super Fund until the government accounts are next in surplus which is not expected to be for at least ten years.
“Many people will be wondering what this move means for them. It will not affect the fortnightly payments made to superannuitants,” said Diana Crossan.
The government has also reiterated that there will be no change to the current age of eligibility which is 65 years.
New Zealand experienced a sharp rise in labour force participation rates among older people over the period 1991–2001. This stands in contrast to the experience of most other OECD countries where such participation rates have been in steady decline. The predominant reason for this turnaround was that the age of eligibility for New Zealand Superannuation, the universal public pension, was raised from 60 to 65 over a nine-year period.
The central question addressed in this paper is: does having a workplace or personal superannuation scheme result in a higher level of accumulation for retirement? The paper presents a range of information about the participation and level of holdings in workplace and personal superannuation schemes based on data from the Household Saving Survey (HSS). While the proportion of people holding a scheme is small (around 10%), the value of a scheme for those enrolled represents about one third their total net worth.
In this presentation, the Director of the UK's independent Pensions Policy Institute, outlines work recently completed to suggest that the UK's pension system could learn from New Zealand's policy, in particular comparing the simplicity and equity of New Zealand Superannuation with the UK situation.
New Zealand, like Australia, entered the 1980s without a mandatory earnings-related pension program. Unlike Australia, however, New Zealand also ended the twentieth century without such a program. Although the New Zealand pension system has been perhaps the most frequently changed of any of the six countries considered here, the basic shape of that program remains very close to what it was two decades ago. Indeed, one prominent analyst of New Zealand pension policy has likened it to an old-fashioned wobble doll [which] has taken many a thump from politicians in the last decade.
New Zealand’s universal superannuation scheme is one of the best in the world. But what are the issues as the population ages? This book written for lay persons to raise awareness of the economic constraints and the need to understand the strengths of the New Zealand approach in order to ensure that it is protected.
Published by Tandem Press, Auckland: Available from bookstores or libraries.
New Zealand has persisted with its unique superannuation policies into the 21st century. This implies travelling in a different direction to the course taken in Australia, and that favoured by the World Bank. New Zealand has two pillars only: a state pension and voluntary unsubsidised saving. There is no compulsory pillar of pre-funded privately provided pensions. This paper reviews the policy debates of the 1990s and examines recent initiatives under the Labour Alliance government.
The New Zealand Superannuation Fund is being established as a means of smoothing out the impact on the rest of the Crown's finances of the transition that will take place over the next fifty years to a permanently higher proportion of the population being eligible for New Zealand Superannuation, the universal pension paid to New Zealanders over the age of 65. This paper discusses the financial issues surrounding the determination of the contributions that the Government would be required to make to the Fund over time in order to meet this objective.