Saving is difficult in a weak economy. Inflation eats away at purchasing power. It is then no longer enough to save. But without a good savings culture, the future looks bleak. There will be no significant capital projects at the individual, group or national level.
Like a country with no cash reserves or exhaustive funds, its rating will continue to fall. You would have situations where recurring expenses leave no room for capital expenditures. All infrastructures would gradually collapse – personal or national.
A few years ago, even though my salary was reasonable, I still couldn’t save. I am the first born in my family. It was difficult to save. Most financial cases have been assigned to you as a family. You had to deal with them. I resorted to Paying My Savings. My bank offered what they called “SALAD” to payroll bank account holders. I took it, paid it off every six months, and invested in other assets that have better value today.
What is the essence of this story? The savings culture is closely linked to wealth accumulation. Retirement is one of the best savings cultures in the world. Civilized countries have pensions deeply ingrained in their welfare and development plans. Their elderly and retirees look forward to safaris, adventure and a new life.
Wealth building goes hand in hand with good planning. It can’t be a bizarre attitude to life or casualness. It is not good for individuals or for government to take a casual and/or uninformed position on this important issue. It cannot be guided by mere feelings of ill-informed and incoherent positions of everyday people with insufficient knowledge of financial dynamics and implications. When a blind man leads another blind man, he falls into a pit or runs into a moving trailer on the freeway.
Pensions and retirement plans are great stabilizers for the minds of workers and a steady development tool for the future for everyone. The protection of the fund becomes a duty! Their decimation will be a disservice to everyone. It’s tantamount to a criminal offence.
It is not a plan to leave the employer, the government or anyone alone and go to sleep. However, due to our culture, we were not that casual. Except that our approach seems to be becoming anachronistic. Our traditional pension plans include expecting family heirs, having male children to provide for the family in old age, having many children, building houses for rent, for the ladies it seems to be getting married, among other things.
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While these play some role in retirement planning, they no longer fit directly into the business environments of modern society. Having many children is no longer economical because of the cost of education.
The ladies are now working and either voluntarily or remain single and in need of retirement benefits; Jobs are also no longer guaranteed for the children, among other things.
TIPS ON PERSONAL RETIREMENT PLANNING
Self Development and Career Growth: You need to grow in your career. Continuous development of knowledge, certificates and added value for your employer is necessary to build up a good pension. Sloppy attitudes towards self-development, invisibility and adding value to the employer’s company are self-destructive. You are the only direct loser. Don’t wait to get trained. If you can’t invest in yourself, who should? Knowledge is power. You stand out, your salary grows, your pension grows faster with “bigger” salaries. Its compound interest growth will be amazing in further leaps and bounds. Other growth benefits also add up. The longer and more meaningful contributions you make over time, the better.
Learning investment for alternative income early. This could grow from a simple hobby turned into a good business. As our careers begin to stabilize, we need to think of an alternative or supplemental legitimate income to match. This helps with higher disposable income and increased savings capacity. As you retire, you need something already familiar and ready to keep your mind functioning and healthy. Retirement plans are holistic for good health. Of course, this must not distract you from your main activity if your income is not high enough to deserve your full attention. Doing nothing and waiting for pension benefits is a worse crime.
AVC – additional voluntary contribution. Having free money and “killing” it is exciting. But beware, one day you may need that loose cash. This loose cash can turn into millions of naira over a few years if invested in the right place. In addition to your statutory contributions, you could save extra yourself by instructing your employer to deduct a certain amount from your pension at source from self-disciplined savings or savings that don’t hurt anyway. The truth is that they are investments with savings.
Even before you retire, you can start saving on the legally permissible key date on the basis of compound interest. Returns are higher and more stable as investments are fairly distributed to avoid sharp swings in economic factors. You could use the savings as capital so as not to affect the statutory contributions for a higher monthly income in retirement. So you don’t have to ask for your flat rate. Older years may need more money for health-related matters.
Start planning from day one – don’t wait until you’re 40. At 40-50 you are in the third/fourth quadrant of active life. Then start consolidating, not planning. At this point we can sort of go into panic mode when we were just about to wake up. you don’t have much time. If you are likely to retire at age 60 with a good plan, panic attacks and panic mode will not set in. We would age gracefully and happily because earlier in life you provided answers.
Holistic thinking. Your mindset and life and follow-up details are important. It goes beyond the money we are talking about. Health of the mind is very important for better reactions and joy.
I have made it my goal to become a writer, to work a few hours on my laptop, to pass on the knowledge I have acquired to the younger generation for free and for money, depending on the circumstances. It would be added value and satisfaction. Hobbies, passion can be fun and bring income.
The values of pension laws and careful implementation must be honored and protected. Frivolous baiting simply means a lack of understanding of real things. Environmental impacts are more of a problem than the pension failure of the current defined contribution pension system. It couldn’t have been better, anytime. There is currently no fund that is as successful as he is. Agitators may just envy players the strength and character they used to secure it.
For the government, the pension has more easily provided them with long-term cheaper means of development.
The private sector has been very successful in contributing to the fund at retirement by excluding few credentials, matters that are often important but ignoring legal loopholes caused by either laziness or ignorance. The current challenge lies with the public servants and the bureaucracy involved in the day-to-day affairs of government. These are already disappearing. The government is building up its backlog. The PPP, public-private partnership, works because it keeps everyone alert and in control. The infrastructure growth that is already being enjoyed by everyone is unimaginable.
