Nice People Thread No. 14, all Nice and Proper

Generali

Oh @ viva, some very interesting stuff for you on fiduciary duty in the 21st century. I'll PM you a link in a few days. Much applies to the US but some will apply to you too.

GDB2222

I didn't even know that NZ had a sovereign wealth fund.

kabayiri

GDB2222 wrote: »

I didn't even know that NZ had a sovereign wealth fund.

Most countries can afford a single sovereign, surely?

Even Scotland.

(Assuming we haven't sold ours off to an offshore trust somewhere..)

Generali

GDB2222 wrote: »

I didn't even know that NZ had a sovereign wealth fund.

Yeah, it's set up on the same basis as Australia's Future Fund. The idea is that when you privatise something you bung them some shares and when Labour aren't in you try to run a surplus and give the fund some cash to invest.

The fund is meant to be used to pay for future off-balance sheet liabilities like aged pensions and health care for old people rather than paying for them out of uncertain future taxation. As the liabilities grow so should the assets.

GDB2222

Apparently, we have unfunded pension liabilities in the UK of £7 trillion.

michaels

GDB2222 wrote: »

Apparently, we have unfunded pension liabilities in the UK of £7 trillion.

I feel I am on the wrong thread...but surely that is just a function of population and pension rates and is no comment on suastainability of pensions with a PAYG system.

Don't forget it is only external savings (claims on the output of other countries) that matter in determining what we will be able to consume as a nation in future. Internal savings make no difference to domestic future productive potential merely about how it is shared out.

GDB2222

michaels wrote: »

I feel I am on the wrong thread...but surely that is just a function of population and pension rates and is no comment on suastainability of pensions with a PAYG system.

Don't forget it is only external savings (claims on the output of other countries) that matter in determining what we will be able to consume as a nation in future. Internal savings make no difference to domestic future productive potential merely about how it is shared out.

Without getting all politic on this thread, yes that's true. All pensions. once in payment, are a transfer of income from workers to pensioners. That's true whether funded or unfunded.

Nevertheless, funded pensions imply that money has been held back from immediate consumption and ploughed into productive assets. That seems on the face of it "a very good thing", as hopefully it will increase future production. Or have I missed something?

Spirit_2

GDB2222 wrote: »

Without getting all politic on this thread, yes that's true. All pensions. once in payment, are a transfer of income from workers to pensioners. That's true whether funded or unfunded.

Nevertheless, funded pensions imply that money has been held back from immediate consumption and ploughed into productive assets. That seems on the face of it "a very good thing", as hopefully it will increase future production. Or have I missed something?

It took until this post for me to grasp what you were all on about, I was still in bits of wood, drills and unsurmountable PN problems. First world economics are totally unexpected here.

Generali

GDB2222 wrote: »

Without getting all politic on this thread, yes that's true. All pensions. once in payment, are a transfer of income from workers to pensioners. That's true whether funded or unfunded.

Nevertheless, funded pensions imply that money has been held back from immediate consumption and ploughed into productive assets. That seems on the face of it "a very good thing", as hopefully it will increase future production. Or have I missed something?

The idea is that by increasing the investible pool of money you increase investment and thus increase the productive capacity of the country.

michaels

Seems to me the big story of the year is nothing to do with IS but that little piece about antibiotic resistance. I wonder how long it will take for people to change their behaviour to make much more effort to avoid infection in the first place?