Nearly half (46 per cent) of working Canadians believe they’ll have to work longer than they’d planned five years ago as a result of not saving enough, according to a new survey by the Canadian Payroll Association. The survey, which polled nearly 5,000 Canadian employees, found 74 per cent have saved only a quarter or less of what […]
Eckler Ltd. has named researcher Bonnie-Jeanne MacDonald as its new resident scholar. MacDonald, an actuary and researcher at Dalhousie University, drew attention in 2014 when she pioneered the living standard replacement rate as a way of measuring retirement income adequacy. Eckler has since used MacDonald’s research to create it own retirement plan management tool. Read: […]
While defined contribution plans were a small piece of the pension market when Benefits Canada first rolled off the presses in 1977, the Co-operative Superannuation Society had already been operating for almost 40 years by that point. Founded in 1939 in Saskatoon, the society’s pension plan is one of the country’s oldest and largest defined […]
Back in the 1990s, senior management at the Co-operators Group Ltd. decided to be more generous with its defined contribution pension plan. While most Canadian companies with defined contribution offerings match employee contributions — often up to five per cent of salary — the Co-operators upped its plan on both sides of the equation by […]
The average income replacement ratio of capital accumulation plans in the second quarter of 2017 has remained stagnant since the start of the year, according to Eckler Ltd.’s latest capital accumulation plan income tracker. The report noted that decreasing investment returns during the quarter weren’t significant enough to change the income replacement ratio, which remains […]
Legislation requires a defined benefit pension plan to provide members leaving active service with the option of transferring out the lump-sum commuted value of their accrued account, instead of receiving a monthly lifetime pension at retirement. However, this portability option isn’t a requirement if members are eligible for retirement at the time they leave employment. […]
Great-West Life Assurance Co.’s European subsidiary the Canada Life Group Ltd. is acquiring financial services provider Retirement Advantage. Based in Britain, Retirement Advantage was created in 2015 when funds managed by TDR Capital LLP merged the retirement income and equity release divisions of MGM Advantage Life Ltd. and Stonehaven Equity Release. The company has more […]
Plan administrators are eyeing the Bank of Canada’s current system that holds unclaimed bank balances for individuals as a possible solution to dealing with missing pension plan members. As the federal Department of Finance launches a consultation on modernizing the bank’s program, law firm Blake Cassels & Graydon LLP sees promise in extending its approach to […]
Employees’ retirement plans are affected by how long they stay in the workforce. Whether or not they work past 65 often depends on government policy, which ultimately affects all Canadians no matter their ages. The previous Conservative government raised the eligibility age for the old-age security benefit to 67 from 65 to save on costs […]
With research showing that Canadian women are at greater risk of experiencing poverty during their senior years, the Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan is asking policy-makers to address pension risks that leave the group vulnerable to financial instability in retirement. As part of a research series that examines senior poverty in Canada, the pension plan […]