Shauna Ferris

The Impact of Children on Australian Women's and Men's Superannuation

Using data from Wave 2 of the Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey, this article examines how superannuation savings by women and men vary according to the numbers of children they have. The results show that for women there is a clear inverse relationship between the value of superannuation and the number of their children. Moreover, this inverse relationship persists after controlling for an extensive range of variables which may affect both number of children and superannuation. The analysis also shows that level of education, migrant status, being an employer or self-employed, marital status, age and sex are significantly related to an individuals level of superannuation. The implications of the results for Australias public debate and possible policy responses are discussed.

Ansett's superannuation fund : a case study in insolvency

The past few decades have witnessed a global move towards private provision for retirement through individual defined contribution pensions at the expense of publicly provided and employer-sponsored defined benefit pensions. As a consequence, workers and retirees are becoming increasingly exposed to uncertainties in financial, labour and economic markets. The contributors to this book analyse the implications for retirement income policy, workers and retirees in view of the current climate of heightened exposure to scary markets. The implications of a broad range of scary market scenarios are presented, and novel solutions prescribed. Retirement incomes across a number of countries including the US, the UK, Japan and Australia are explored.

SM Bonds—A New Product for Managing Longevity Risk

A new type of retirement bond is proposed called an SM bond. SM bonds are long dated government bonds divisible into two parts: a survivorship (S) part and a mortality (M) part. Each SM bond is associated with a particular age. SM bonds associated with a particular age are only purchasable by (originators) of that age. The SM bond is then splittable into an S and M component. The S part must be retained by the originator, who receives the face value of the bond if he/she is alive at maturity. For originators who die prior to the maturity date, the maturity value of the SM bond is assigned to a mortality pool. The holder of the M part of the bond receives the annual bond coupon, and at maturity a pro rata share of the mortality pool. M bonds are tradable: holders can sell their M bonds to anyone, at any time. It is envisaged different age bonds are issued every year for ages say 30–64 each with say a 35‐year term. The market will be regularly informed about the mortality experience, and the market price of the M bonds will vary over time to reflect that experience.

Extending employment entitlements to non-standard workers: Alternative models for long service leave portability

This article contributes to the emerging scholarship on institutional and regulatory innovations to extend core employment protections to workers on non-standard contracts by examining different policy models that could potentially improve access to statutory long service leave entitlements in Australia. With the growth of casual, contract and short-term employment reducing access to this entitlement for many workers, there have been calls for the creation of a national long service leave scheme that would be portable between employers, so that the benefit is more generally available to workers over the course of their working life. The article proposes three possible models for implementing a portable long service leave scheme. These are evaluated with regard to the relative costs and benefits for employers and workers and implementation issues for governments. We find that the three models distribute risks, costs and benefits differently between the stakeholders, and any model adopted will involve trade-offs.