Realistic pension gains?

[Deleted User]

O.Henry has a story where he talks about spending 1 cent less vs 1 cent more than earning.  Very different consequences. From the financial point of view that summarizes success vs failure.  We’ve seem plenty of celebrities with massive salaries go bankrupt as well as secretaries who left huge fortunes.  

Albermarle

Deleted_User said:

O.Henry has a story where he talks about spending 1 cent less vs 1 cent more than earning.  Very different consequences. From the financial point of view that summarizes success vs failure.  We’ve seem plenty of celebrities with massive salaries go bankrupt as well as secretaries who left huge fortunes.  

“Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen pounds  and six pennies, result happiness.
Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds  and six pennies, result misery”

― Charles Dickens, David Copperfield 1849

Cus

B0bbyEwing said:

Simon11 said:

You state it is out of your control, however surely you have the ability to boost your income? I don't know where you live, your skills and experience, however for most people they should have the ability to increase their income.

I know too many friends who have taken it easy work wise, with a similar income and not bothered to challenge themselves early on in their career. After 10 years of hard work and career moves, I am on at least three times their salary, with fantastic benefits and actually work less hours!

This would make a huge difference to the quality of life you would have now and in the future- without doing it, you would unfortunately really struggle to retire early.

Well I'm afraid you wont get any crossword cryptics from me. I tend to just talk in plain English I'm afraid. 

Sorry to highlight your post. I could take your name out because I'm actually responding to that kind of viewpoint, not specifically you. It just so happens that you made it on this thread but I've seen it before.

Of course, I've not conducted any scientific survey of 1000s of people but my general feeling is this viewpoint is often common among those who've done well for themselves as they look towards (I'll say towards rather than down on) those who don't earn quite so well.

I take a little bit of an issue with the viewpoint - reason being, everyone is different. We don't know someone else's situation, we don't know them as a person.
It's very easy if we don't have the concerns (not necessarily job concerns but any kind of concern) that someone else has, for us to just say - what you worrying for, just do <this> and your problem is resolved. "Just do it". Hmm, could maybe make some money out of that slogan.

I can only speak for myself on this one. I've been with the same company a long time. It doesn't pay great but there are worse paid jobs. The guys I work with are a good bunch and make the job but the boss, well let's just say you wouldn't believe me even if I started to tell you some of what the boss does & says towards me. My 2 biggest gripes about the place are 1) the impact on your free time at zero notice and 2) the way the boss treats me.
So "just leave". Yes, so easy.
To which they say "yes, it is so easy" - yes, to someone who finds it easy to "just leave". 
My problem is, I don't manage change very well, I don' manage (new) people very well to the point it's quite paralysing the feeling of anxiety, so to me it is not "easy", it's actually extremely difficult. 

Then you get people who'll say, yeah I understand it's not easy-easy, but it's not that bad. Well no, you don't get it at all, because it's not that bad in your head but it is that bad in mine.

It's like a relative of mine who was with an abusive partner. Physically and mentally and in public too. As the relative was male, they felt they couldn't really do or say anything about it. Who'll believe them? Once they started to open up, we'd say just get out of it - but it was easy for us to say yet extremely difficult for them to do. What can be easy or even difficult for one can be damn near impossible for another.

That's just one portion of it though. Add to that that I personally have never known what I wanted to do. They say that's half the battle. It's not. It's much more than half because then you know at least what direction you're going in.

I just feel that some people who say they understand, don't actually understand, they just think their rough idea is near accurate when it can be a million miles off.

Despite the above, and how hard it is, it is still in your control. You've started by making your feelings known here.

Nebulous2

I'm finding it hard to relate to this discussion about management versus technician. I've had a 40-year career in care with roughly half of it as a sole practitioner, often in specialist roles, and half of it in management.

I like them both and think I'm good at both. The problem with people moving from front-line jobs to management roles does involve people skills but is often because they invest nothing in the new role. I used to ask managers how many technical books they had about caring - often dozens.  How many management books do you have? None. 

How can you be good at something if you don't invest anything in it?  

The other issue I've had is that of getting bored. If we were asked for volunteers, I often held my hand up. I often did tasks that were above my pay grade. My colleagues generally felt I was being taken advantage of. Sometimes I found myself on the higher paygrade very quickly. The reason I did it wasn't to progress however, it was for my own entertainment. I'd become bored with the same old, same old, and did it as a challenge. 

I've walked away from higher paid jobs on three occasions to take a lower paid job that interested me more. 

Finally - the reason many people don't take the step into management is that the rewards are minimal or negative in the first instance, and people don't want the disruption to their work-life balance. I retired and quickly found I wasn't ready to retire. I moved back to the NHS after many years away for a lower paid job, and that was a shock. 

I was very quickly encouraged to apply for a promoted, first-line management post. I struggled with that idea as I worried that I could be doing some of my younger hungry colleagues out of an opportunity. In talking to them I was quickly disabused of that opinion. Many of them had young children, were juggling other responsibilities, working shifts around childcare and didn't want to upset that. 

On getting the post I realised why. I need to be there half-an-hour early to open up for my colleagues and do some essential checks. Equally I'm often half-an-hour, sometimes more, late in locking up at night.  I'm the responsible person for any complaints or clinical queries. I pay a contribution to my pensions scheme of 9.5% where most of my colleagues, often earning more than me, as they work more hours, pay 7.3% 

That is true of a lot of first steps into management. Often limited rewards for a lot of more responsibility. If you see it as a stepping stone, and progress to a senior post, which is where I have been in the past, then the rewards are there, but the first management step often doesn't bring that. 

bostonerimus

retiringtoosoon said:

Deleted_User said:

Simon11 said:

Rich1976 said:

we both earn well below the national average at around 22k a year each and our employers only put in and match the minimum required and this has always been the case.

we would have liked to have retired at 60 but based on projections that isn’t going to happen and so like most people are likely to be dependent on the state pension for well over half of what we need. This is based on fund growth of 5% per year and charges of around 0.5% to 0.70%.

without the state pension our funds would only provide 12k between us at most based on 5% growth per year. We are both in medium risk lifestyle funds for our work pensions and our own sipps are invested in the Vanguard LS60 and HSBC Balanced Global Strategy funds respectively. We were heavily invested 100% in equity trackers until earlier this year but realised due to the downturn this was way above our risk tolerance.

so really it is all out of our control. All we can hope is things work out. Things have changed for us personally over the last couple of years and have had to rethink how we do our finances but we are doing the best we currently can.

but it still all plays on my mind like I said and maybe it doesn’t because everyone else I know just buries their head in the sand when it comes to pensions and have the attitude what will be will be.

You state it is out of your control, however surely you have the ability to boost your income? I don't know where you live, your skills and experience, however for most people they should have the ability to increase their income.

I know too many friends who have taken it easy work wise, with a similar income and not bothered to challenge themselves early on in their career. After 10 years of hard work and career moves, I am on at least three times their salary, with fantastic benefits and actually work less hours!

This would make a huge difference to the quality of life you would have now and in the future- without doing it, you would unfortunately really struggle to retire early.

Bragging is a vitally important emotional response to any comment but no need to avoid the real issue.  Why limit comparisons to salaries when we could be measuring pennises? 

I’m 43 and have £400k in my pot.
Is mine average sized?

Comparing your pension to someone else's pension or even "the average pension" is a pretty meaningless activity. The only relevant comparison is whether your pension pot will be enough to support you in retirement. You should be comparing your 400k to a number in your own plan. If you are retiring early and have an extravagant lifestyle then 400k might be rubbish, or if the pot has 20 years to grow and you are frugal you might be doing really well.

I also subscribe to Mr. Micawber's truism up the page. Of course he knew the unhappy end of that saying and spent time in debtor's prison.

B0bbyEwing

LV_426 said:
What industry are you in? In mine (IT), the best way to increase pay is to change jobs. I also find that extremely difficult, and stressful. That's partly because I'm on the autistic spectrum, although never been properly diagnosed.

And a bad boss is a terrible thing to endure. I've often heard it said that people don't change jobs, they change bosses.
Changing jobs can actually be good for you in lots of ways - aside from the usual pay increases, it can let you acquire more skills. I'm too old to be doing it now, as I'm on the home run to retirement (55), but I think you are younger?

I don't want to get too much in to personal details simply because I know people higher up frequent this site & some also fancy themselves as Sherlock. Thing is, they put 1+1 together, get 999 & decide that it's right & that's the end of that. Doesn't matter about evidence, they've decided it's right - The End.

So let's just say I don't do any office work. My job is very much manual labour. 
I work for people with old fashioned views where work is life and life is work. Problem is, the concept of work to live is alien to them. They literally don't understand how anyone could be that way. Surely it's live to work, right?

I've had the boss foaming at the mouth, in my face screaming, all kinds of obscenities & threats (never physical I'm going to hit you kind of threats but threats all the same).
Why would anyone endure it? I don't know. As I say, the idea of new and change is quite paralysing to me. 
Take it away from work for a second & when we get invited out to a social gathering, I literally start to panic, mind goes in to overdrive as to how I can get out of it. Total introvert! 
Back to work again, it seems to be known across the management board that the boss & I don't get along. I'll hold my hand up & say some times I can make a situation worse, but genuinely, 99% of the time, the boss will overreact over the smallest of things & treat it as though I've slaughtered their family or something when I may have just put something in the wrong spot that is easily put in the right spot when they care to tell me and not the end of the world.

It's not daily. Which is probably why I suffer it. It can be but it usually isn't. After one particularly bad episode, they didn't speak to me for about 2 months. That was nice. They'd send others to get messages to me. As they weren't talking to me, others in my department commented how nice the atmosphere had become. 

It's a strange affair. As I say, the co-workers & most of the rest of management is overall not an issue. There's moments but overall not an issue. It's the boss. I could tell you so many stories from over the years & you'd just keep telling me that didn't happen because a boss can't say that, can't do that, not supposed to do/say that.

Yeah I'm a bit younger than you Approx. 25-30 years of work left in me yet.

Cus said:

Despite the above, and how hard it is, it is still in your control. You've started by making your feelings known here.

I've done the same with family/friends over the years. Gone in to much more detail than here. How I feel, what we have to put up with. The good points, the low points.

Generally just get the, "well leave". 
I know it's totally in my hands. They're not going to change. There's a fair part of me that would like to. You could argue that anyone can change (because it's so easy, right?), so I suppose the question for the sake of argument is whether I will.

Cus

B0bbyEwing said:

LV_426 said:
What industry are you in? In mine (IT), the best way to increase pay is to change jobs. I also find that extremely difficult, and stressful. That's partly because I'm on the autistic spectrum, although never been properly diagnosed.

And a bad boss is a terrible thing to endure. I've often heard it said that people don't change jobs, they change bosses.
Changing jobs can actually be good for you in lots of ways - aside from the usual pay increases, it can let you acquire more skills. I'm too old to be doing it now, as I'm on the home run to retirement (55), but I think you are younger?

I don't want to get too much in to personal details simply because I know people higher up frequent this site & some also fancy themselves as Sherlock. Thing is, they put 1+1 together, get 999 & decide that it's right & that's the end of that. Doesn't matter about evidence, they've decided it's right - The End.

So let's just say I don't do any office work. My job is very much manual labour. 
I work for people with old fashioned views where work is life and life is work. Problem is, the concept of work to live is alien to them. They literally don't understand how anyone could be that way. Surely it's live to work, right?

I've had the boss foaming at the mouth, in my face screaming, all kinds of obscenities & threats (never physical I'm going to hit you kind of threats but threats all the same).
Why would anyone endure it? I don't know. As I say, the idea of new and change is quite paralysing to me. 
Take it away from work for a second & when we get invited out to a social gathering, I literally start to panic, mind goes in to overdrive as to how I can get out of it. Total introvert! 
Back to work again, it seems to be known across the management board that the boss & I don't get along. I'll hold my hand up & say some times I can make a situation worse, but genuinely, 99% of the time, the boss will overreact over the smallest of things & treat it as though I've slaughtered their family or something when I may have just put something in the wrong spot that is easily put in the right spot when they care to tell me and not the end of the world.

It's not daily. Which is probably why I suffer it. It can be but it usually isn't. After one particularly bad episode, they didn't speak to me for about 2 months. That was nice. They'd send others to get messages to me. As they weren't talking to me, others in my department commented how nice the atmosphere had become. 

It's a strange affair. As I say, the co-workers & most of the rest of management is overall not an issue. There's moments but overall not an issue. It's the boss. I could tell you so many stories from over the years & you'd just keep telling me that didn't happen because a boss can't say that, can't do that, not supposed to do/say that.

Yeah I'm a bit younger than you Approx. 25-30 years of work left in me yet.

Cus said:

Despite the above, and how hard it is, it is still in your control. You've started by making your feelings known here.

I've done the same with family/friends over the years. Gone in to much more detail than here. How I feel, what we have to put up with. The good points, the low points.

Generally just get the, "well leave". 
I know it's totally in my hands. They're not going to change. There's a fair part of me that would like to. You could argue that anyone can change (because it's so easy, right?), so I suppose the question for the sake of argument is whether I will.

It's not easy, it might be the hardest thing you ever do, but it's still your choice.

LV_426

@B0bbyEwing I have to ask, would starting a new job be worse for you than your current situation, which to me seems absolutely dire.

kawaton

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Workerdrone

In your situation I'd be logging each incident in detail with time and date. This sounds like an untenable work environment and grounds for constructive dismissal. Even if you choose to carry on for a bit longer, when you eventually decide you've had enough you will have the evidence there for tribunal should you decide you wish to redress the wrong.