8/16/2007

CPF is forced saving

The CPF is a forced saving for the old age just in case everything is gone. It is not meant to be the sole means of survival for anyone. That is why the term used even to retain after 55 is called minimum sum. It is not the maximum sum or something extravagant. Now that people are talking about compulsory this and that, let them not forget that you can make things compulsory as long as they are within the confines of a minimum sum. Anything excessive will invite rotten eggs and anger. Now, what is minimum sum? This is an illusive figure that varies according to one's pocket, lifestyle and appetite. The $120k figure being used is a ridiculous figure to many people who hardly see $5k in their savings in their whole life. The premises for a compulsory saving scheme after 55 should include a clearer definition of what is minimum. A useful number should be the $300 pm that the govt is giving to the destitutes. This should form the basis of minimum sum. Compulsory saving should work upwards from this number. The people are not saving to eat in restaurants. Such luxury should be voluntary and be left to those who can afford them. Many will do well eating in hawker stalls or cooking for themselves. The next factor is a 20 year time frame, ie 62 to 82. Forcing people to save after 82 is ass talk. By 82, the bulk of the people would have gone. The remaining few if still needed state assistance would not be too much a burden for the state to bear. $300 pm or less. Whether it is annuity or to leave the sum in the CPF should be optional. And for those who wanted to save $120k or $300k in their CPF, by all means. The people must be allowed the option to opt for more savings to be left in their CPF at 55. The compulsion part should only be for the minimum sum, using $300 pm as the starting point for computation. For people who are working beyond 62, the minimum sum can be lowered proportionately and not increased. Who's the idiot who said the longer one works, the more must be saved? The above should be some of the basic premises to compute the minimum savings needed for the aged. As I am not paid for this, this is as far as I am prepared to offer. Let those who are being paid in millions to think of something more realistic and workable. They are not paid that kind of money for nothing. The higher one is being paid, the greater is the expectation. No more slipshod solutions. They must justify the supertalent pay that they are being paid for.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

If you are FORCED to pay a sum of money, for reasons determined not by you by by The State, then that payment—you may call it what you want, but the fact still remains—in reality is a TAX.

Whether or not you get the full 100% benefit of your "sacrifice" is not up to you either.

Anonymous said...

Paying serveral millions for our leaders, yet they can't come out a better way to solve. The big problem lied on our government link investment company where are answerable to the fxxk Share holder & each of the Top managements so called bustard who wanted to save cost inorder to boot up more profits so as to have better profit sharing + huge bonuses, therefore retrenchment of so called high income local older staffs & replaced by cheap forigners or force local staff to take up low houring rates as cheap foreigners labour are taking. An good example are the keppel fel etc.

Now old peoples are expected to work longer but the getting 3rd world salary at world class nation. Their CPF are even extended, this old peoples pay are hard to meet month end so when the hell do they have extra saving beside cpf & worst till who will hire old people unless government link investment company set a lead as an example.

Anonymous said...

I am quite happy with the men in charge, I think they did great. The CPF issues will in time to come be set right. But the poor, old and sick as singapore's pioneers deserve more. We have everything here except compassion.

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean said...

who said no compassion here? you have my sympathy. i can empathise with your pain.

ok, what's next? holiday in the caribean or dinner in the alps?