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Strike day in France | 121 comments (121 topical, editorial, 0 hidden)
Private pensions (none / 1)
The problems with private pensions:

  • some people make bad decisions (unlucky, incompetence, circumstances such as divorce, illness, etc...) - or get screwed over by the employer/pension company (cf Enron, Maxwell et al) Should they end up destitute as a result of their decisions, or do we need a backup solution - which can only provided by the State? (if yes, why leave the State with only the burden of the bad cases, it might as well have access to the whole pool of people);

  • some jobs have different degrees of unpleasantness and harship. some people have different health backgrounds. How do you prevent private companies from picking and choosing their clients? Who will take care of the tough cases? Again, if you regulate obligations on the insurance companies, why not do the job directly and more simply, without having to worry about enforcement which, as we know, is heavily subject to lobbying and lapses...

Ultimately, unless you ARE willing to let people die in the streets from the consequences of their inability to get a good deal, their being screwed over, or their being a "bad profile", you will end up with the State - taxpayers - carrying the burden and you will not be better off.

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
by Jerome a Paris (etg@eurotrib.com) on Wed Oct 24th, 2007 at 06:29:37 AM EST
[ Parent ]
Re: Private pensions (none / 0)
Yes, some people make bad decisions. And this happens also when those people work for the state or are politicians. In fact, the further away from the person that they decide over, the more likely it is that the decision they make is bad.

That's why big centralist totalitarian states usually are bad for people. The decision makers are removed from the people they decide over.

The "getting screwed" parts are when companies are running the type of pension schemes that the states typically run here in Europe, ie, systems where the current workers pay for the current pensions. When companies do that, and they go bankrupt, people get screwed. It's a bad idea.

When states does this, and states run into bad finances, whaddayouknow, people tend to get screwed too. It's still a bad idea. Most of the people working today will have to pay both for those who are pensioneers now, and they will have to save up for their own pensions, becuase todays pension systems isn't working. And we're getting the squeeze. Postponing it is just gonna make it worse.

How do you prevent private companies from picking and choosing their clients? Who will take care of the tough cases?

Well, if you want to do that, you can do it by saying that companies aren't allowed to pick and choose. Done! It can however be argued that they should be able to. As noted above, it's probably a good idea to retire engine drivers and pilots early. Now, are you really suggesting that everybody else should pay for their early retirement? That kinda goes against the arguments in this thread so far...

Again, if you regulate obligations on the insurance companies, why not do the job directly and more simply, without having to worry about enforcement which, as we know, is heavily subject to lobbying and lapses...

Because doing the job directly is even more heavily subject to lobbying and lapses, as this whole discussion shows. What is the unions standpoint on this issue of not lobbying and lapses?

by freedomfighter on Wed Oct 24th, 2007 at 12:11:52 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Strike day in France | 121 comments (121 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)
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