The global financial crisis (GFC) still haunts older Australians, with the latest National Seniors Australia (NSA) survey results stating that 70 per cent of Australians over 50 feared another GFC and the impact it would have on their superannuation.
While more than 90 per cent of seniors surveyed thought they would not be able to tolerate losses to their savings of 20 per cent or more, a quarter of respondents said they would not be able to tolerate any losses at all.
Over half of seniors were concerned about outliving their savings with almost a third of respondents over 80 and almost a quarter of those between 75 and 79 reported to have run out of savings.
Challenger’s chairman of retirement income, Jeremy Cooper, said the results showed concerns among older Australians were still strong, particularly for those who were already in retirement when the GFC hit and have since been unable to recoup their losses.
“This, combined with increasing life expectancies, has left many seniors uncertain about the future,” he said.
Interim CEO of NSA, John McCallum, said the priority for almost all older Australians was clear: “seniors want regular and consistent income.”
“When asked to rank several financial goals, having income that lasted for life was one of the most important, with 80 per cent of seniors rating it as ‘very important’,” he said.
The only goal rated higher than this was a desire for regular and consistent income, which raises a strong case for better and more accessible retirement income products to mitigate the risks of running out of savings.
My comment would be that it seems like the loss mostly of 40% asset value is a lesson forgotten from 2007 until now. We the older folk who accumulated and lost have not managed to convince younger people of the benefits of ensuring no repeat. Why then has no-one come up with a Capital safe model? All we see is more of the same with most money invested outside Australia. Ron Roberts