thirdcrank wrote:You refer to common sense and being realistic but it's written with the benefit of hindsight. I'm pleased that all those years ago I looked to the future.
Where shift work is concerned it applies across many industries. I personally have always voiced my own feelings on obeying our body clocks, ie thinking you can be night shift one week day shift the next is asking for trouble.... We aren't machines. But fortunately some parts of employment are catching up with science and the health negatives are more understood. In private industry i was never allowed flexitime but in the last decade rules have changed to allow those with families to request it, those without can't, theres parity.
As much as hindsight may be beneficial the calculations for future funding of a ponzi pension system were achievable back in the day. It would have been seen unsustainable, most similar private schemes have long gone. Based on the annuity rate of your retirement date you could calculate the cash pot required to generate the pension you have and i'd imagine the amount would be massively different to your contributions. Thats not a personal dig just the realisation of how much is needed. I have always heard the public sector pays less than private it may have been then but i dont see that today, looking at police, nursing, teaching salaries they seem very good and better than those of other occupations with similar or higher qualifications. The politics of the job may be poor but thats an organisational thing, just as there are poor conditions in some private companies, the salaries aren't poor though. Anyway you must have enjoyed the job to stay at it for 30yrs as you could have done many other jobs outside of that. I studied to 21, will work 46 years and receive about 4-5k pension. So a lot of money saved for not a big return, but thats not unusual and we do have a pensions crisis hence govt efforts to bring schemes in. Too late for. The middle aged though. But it is the reality of private defined contribution schemes, but sustainable with no tax subsidy outside of allowance on contributions that everyone gets.
I suppose another way to view it from what you say, would be to have paid you 20% extra on your salary and removed the pension arrangement completely. Then allowed you to choose your own private scheme..... Which is what thatcher made myself and many do. Separation of pensions from employment would be a good thing, keep it independent from employment. You get paid and you choose how much if anything you pay into your own scheme, just like we choose our car insurance etc independent of our employer. That could be the answer in public sector the pension contribution is returned as salary but no retirement pension is offered. Thats quite fair as they can spend or save the 20% as they feel right. I'm sure they'd grumble about that too even though they'd be better off.
