Australian retirees facing $700 billion savings gap
Australia’s superannuation savings have a retirement “savings gap” of $695 billion with the average savings gap per person being $73,000, an increase of $26,000 over the previous four years.
As the Federal Government released the Intergenerational Report research, the Investment and Financial Services Association said the $695 billion was a dramatic increase on the $452 billion gap in its previous assessment.
The association is pressing for the Government to boost the compulsory employer super contribution to at least 12% from the present 9%. It also wants other measures to encourage voluntary super contributions and flexibility in the area of caps on concessional contributions.
The association’s chief executive, John Brogden, said that if these measures didn’t occur then “much of the shortfall is going to have to somehow be funded out of future Government revenue”.
He said that part of the solution would come from people remaining in the workforce to delay their access to superannuation.
“We need to be much more flexible in encouraging people not to retire and stop working and leave, but for them to ramp down their working life,” Mr Brogden said.
