This week: Pensions
Last week, we saw a lively debate in the House of Commons about the future of the UK’s pensions and how we’re all going to die lonely and penniless. Guru’s first suggestion is to follow the debate in depth, listen to all the arguments about compulsory contributions, super-trusts, claiming annuities and the like. This will drive you to an early grave before the cash has had time to run out. Or you could put all your money into a trust fund – but how do you choose which one?
As always, the most sensible example comes from the US, where a tax loophole is being exploited, allowing people to bequeath all their wealth to themselves. The only drawback is they first have to die and be cryogenically frozen.
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The ‘Personal Revival Trust’ names you as the beneficiary of your own death, when you are thawed out hundreds of years later. So write your goodbyes, set up a fund and then gracefully remove yourself from the pensions crisis. You’ll be one less mouth to feed and, with any luck, will wake up a hundred years from now financially much better off.
It’s either that or we force public sector workers to retire at 65 in line with increased life expectancy. But with the unions feeling more militant than a Rambo appreciation society, and the government refusing to stand up to them, perhaps we’d better go back to the more realistic option of cryogenics.
