With Canadians living longer, the country’s pension landscape continuing to evolve and more private sector companies struggling to fund their defined benefit plans, governments across the country are reconsidering their regulations around pension solvency funding requirements. From coast to coast, here’s an update on the latest consultations and amendments. British Columbia In October 2018, the […]
Canadians looking to replace their working income with benefits from capital accumulations plans and the government are facing a grim reality. Indeed, pre-retirement income replacement from those two sources sits at 55 per cent for Canadian women and 57 per cent for men, according to Eckler Ltd. income tracker. Worsening the situation, returns from equity and […]
A new report looking at four U.S. states that moved new employees from defined benefit to defined contribution or cash balance pension plans found the changes resulted in higher taxpayer costs and no meaningful improvements to the plans’ funding and liabilities. The report, by the National Institute on Retirement Security, looked at Alaska, Kentucky, Michigan and West Virginia — […]
On the same day Keith Dixon began working at the University of Victoria, the campus gained another new addition: its combination pension plan. Introduced in July 1968, the plan is fairly unique in the world of Canadian pensions. It operates on a defined contribution basis, with the university and plan members each contributing. But when […]
The complexities of income tax at retirement can come as a shock to pensioners, but most plan sponsors are providing limited assistance in helping their retiring employees deal with these issues. “In our experience, much of the communication and education provided by employers/sponsors or their plan record keeper focuses on basic retirement and investment knowledge, […]
The president and chief executive officer of the C.D. Howe Institute is once again urging the federal government to raise the contribution limits for savers in defined contribution pension plans and registered retirement savings plans. In a letter to Minister of Finance Bill Morneau, Bill Robson referred to a paper he wrote last year in […]
Two organizations representing Canadian pensioners are asking the British Columbia government to reject the recommendations of a recent report by the Ministry of Finance that suggests lowering required pension solvency funding from 100 per cent to 85 per cent. “We actually disagreed with the very objective of the report,” says Marissa Lennox, spokesperson for CARP, formerly the […]
The Financial Services Regulatory Authority is creating three new technical advisory committees, which will provide advice and feedback to the regulator on pension sector related matters and will form part of its stakeholder engagement process going forward. The aim is to improve processes and approaches to regulation and reduce regulatory burden, noted a press release. In its first year of […]
Population aging is taking place throughout the Americas, with the elderly expected to grow faster than the overall population between 2018 and 2025, according to a report by London-based analytics firm Global Data. The report found Canada already has more elderly people than children in its cities. And in the U.S., the same is expected over the […]
The Pension Investment Association of Canada is commending Nova Scotia on its proposed changes for improving the province’s pension funding framework. In a letter, the PIAC noted it supports the provision for statutory discharge following an annuity buyout, as well as the province’s move to to reduce the solvency threshold to 85 per cent and enhance pension plan […]