Keep in mind, though, that I live in Canada where the system is more public than in the US...

>>Most of us, on each paycheck, pay tax payments towards some
>>type of national pension plan. What's been going on over the
>>last couple decades, is that national governments -who
>collect
>>these payments- have been taking all the money and lending
>it
>>to investors who then play that money on the market. Scary
>>shit huh? What's worse is that the loss of these monies on
>the
>>market is apparently the prime reason why there have been
>>apparent shortages in pension funds available. At least,
>this
>>is what has been described to me. Correct me on any
>>innaccuracies because I am quite interested in this topic.
>
>First of all, this has to do with Private Pension funds which
>operate completely differently from social security and the
>problems with the two of them have nothing to do with each
>other.
>
>As far as the Govt. Goes, the surplus money isn't be lent to
>Investors - the surplus money has been loaned to the Govt. in
>the form of special issue bonds, meaning that it's a loan that
>the Govt. has to pay back with interest.
>
>Private Pension funds are "lent" to Investors, they're
>directly invested into the markets with the idea of growing
>the size of the fund, so that the people who are vested in it
>can benefit financially. It's supposed to be done in a
>conservative manner so that capital is preserved but the
>pensioners still see some return.
>
>Some companies are able to do this rather successfully and
>have extra money from Pensions that they have to report as
>profit, or find ways to get around reporting it as profit
>(Like GE) since it's really money that's for the benefit of
>the pensioners, not the company anyway.
>
>Private Pension funds are in trouble for various reasons
>whether it's the company raiding it to make up for revenue
>shortfalls, making financial problems that exceed
>contributions to the plan, bad planning, etc.
>
>Private Pensions and Social Security are two entirely
>unrelated issues that have nothing to do with each other.
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>Peace,
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>M2
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