Col Rouge,
I don't disagree with any of your statements here. Unfortunately, many people do net get the opportunity in the first place to get a good start to life. Give one minute to think of those who due to Whitlam & Keatinge's Labor lost their jobs & subsequently became unable to continue with mortgage payments & lost homes & had to rent again. We can send the Navy (under Howard) to rescue a Millionaire sailor at millions of $ but anyone not in the Ambulance fund due to lack of affordability has to pay $800 for a 7km trip. Thrill seekers get expensive rescues for nothing & the genuine invalid is lucky if the Authorities pick up the phone. You should see the homes being built for people who hardly ever worked & the low income worker gets evicted from caravan parks. Col Rouge, I know Public Servants who had to be promoted to get them out of communities because of their uselessness. They still get ½ Million $ super pay-outs for which they contributed $200 a week. Let's see 200 in 500,000 is 2500 weeks which is let's see 48 years. some contribution indeed considering most of them only worked till 55 0r 60.. Top that with free travel & free accommodation & you have your standard Public service conditions in remote areas. For many years I could not manage to put anything aside let alone even consider a super fund. Does that mean I failed in my earlier days to plan for my future ? The reason why we have poor in this country is because those in Authority & it's highly paid consulting expert policy makers are incapable of seeing reality.

What a coincidence that someone who can afford to put away $1,000 per month (with 'sacrifices' of course) pronounces that everyone should be responsible for planning for their retirement and bully for them if they haven't put away sufficient money.

I'm guessing someone in a job that doesn't pay super and spends all their meagre salary on necessities would probably have a different view on the issue. Will the proposed 1% really add up sufficiently to sustain them in later life?

I recall talking to a fidgetting taxi driver about a year after GST came in who hadn't paid any GST because he simply couldn't afford to save the GST from his meagre earnings. I didn't get around to discussing his retirement budgetting with him but his lack of retirement savings would be a safe bet. Years later when he is elderly after occasionally losing his job for accumulating too many demerit points, paying tax fines for overdue BASs and being on unemployment benefits while out of work some wealthy adviser will scold him for poor budgetting.

In the current system it is scandalous how deprived elderly pensioners are from meagre government assistance. They deserve an apology and a larger slice of the pie. However I note that the current system itself is flawed as traditionally the extended family would have ensured they didn't go without and there was no need for elderly to deal with meagre pensions or blame. There has been a weakening of families over the years that is part of the problem.

What a pile of twaddle.

I came back to Oz in 1976, with about $3000 to my name, aged 36.

A few years later I met, & married a somewhat younger lady.

With a bit of a struggle we bought a house, & with no struggle we had 3 kids.

I was still putting them through Uni, & school when I reached retirement age. A very expensive time, so not much savings.

I am now retired, on the pension, with very little other income, or reserve cash, [I got $8,000 super], living in my now $800,000 acreage property.

I think the Australian tax payer is extremely generous to pay me the pension, which I live on reasonably comfortably.

It will not buy me a replacement car, but it might stretch to a cheep TV. If I want any more, why should I not have to sell my valuable home, & buy a cheeper one?

Get real.

As for forcing young people to pay more into super, also get real.

The need their income, in their early years to pay for their family. The worthwhile ones have houses to pay for, & for the others, I don't give a damn about them. If they chose to spend their money on having fun, as I did for many years, why should the taxpayer now pick up the tab, for their lack of forethought?

I would like to add another aside to this debate.

From research published in the press it appears that about 80% or so (I know it was an
extremely high number) of retired people do voluntary work. This must, of itself, save the
government a great deal of money in providing services to those people the government, otherwise, would have to support and assist.

I recall an otherwise extremely generous person, with both money and time, refusing to
donate to the blind society as she maintained very strongly that the government should
be supporting such groups.

I know a woman, who raised her children on a widow's pension. Without much in the way of childcare in her day, she was unable to work - and doubtless would have been denied it. She couldn't afford to have her children's shoes repaired, so lined them with plastic.

When I was younger, employers did not like to employ married women, especially those with children. I recall travelling a long distance to a job interview just to be severely lectured by an employer about women taking a job, whose responsibility was their children. At this time, my husband had been unemployed for a considerable time. At this period unemployment benefits were so low - as one departmental officer admitted - it was just enough to support a smoking habit. Going without a meal to ensure that the children had enough, was so frequent, as to be the norm and not even worthy of discussion. We didn't think twice about it; nor did we consider that the unemployment benefit should be higher. Often to meet a utilities bill, we sold a possession/s. Things, fortunately, changed for the better due to the feminist movement.

cont ...

Whilst, we became better placed financially later when we both worked, this early period was a salutory lesson - and I have the utmost compassion for those undergoing financial hardship.

As for massive salaries and golden handshakes, I have changed banks because of this; when I became aware that such obscenities were the result of increasing profits for the bank TYPICALLY through the cutting back of staff, who relied on their jobs. I would rather have less interest on finances, than more, knowing the latter was at the cost of others losing their incomes.

I watched the segment on television relating to the pensioner lady who was in financial penury. My first reaction was of sympathy, In fact I even remarked to my companion at the time that if I lived nearer I would give her a helping hand. However it then occurred to me that just perhaps the TV channel put a bias on the programme, as they often do, to appeal to an emotional side of their audience. It is for this reason I feel there could be other areas of the equation in addition to those already mentioned in the posts here. I could be entirely wrong for instance in questioning the expensive alternative medicines that she said that she had to buy. Some of these potions do not have the effect claimed by the purveyors of such things and perhaps this is something that could be examined. This is apart from the lack of provision she may not have made in her previous years.