Some important homework is in store for those retiring during 2016. Age 65 was the normal age to begin receiving CPP/OAS pensions.
A few timelines have changed recently. The changes are about deferring CPP/OAS pension benefits to age 70.
Your finances will need review vis-a-vis the personal circumstances. Here’s my summary of pension deferrals (figures rounded):
CPP benefits
2016 maximum CPP pension is about $1,092/mo at age 65.
Starting CPP pension after age 65 increases benefits by 0.7%/month of deferral, up to age 70.
Individuals who start CPP at age 70 receive a maximum 42% more, versus starting it at 65.
Hence, delaying CPP from age 65 to 70 raises pension benefits near $1,550/month.
Electing to receive CPP before age 65 reduces the pension by 36% at age 60.
Those employed after age 65 can make voluntary CPP contributions up to age 70.
Requesting your “CPP Statement of Contributions” provides the personal estimates.
Imagine celebrating at your retirement party without a clue as to how much you can expect to receive in pension income. It sounds incredible, but many people who will end their career in a few years are in just that situation.
When you work for an employer you receive your salary, but once retired your income can come from multiple sources. You need to know how much you will receive from these sources.
Since CPP is one of the cornerstones of retirement income, this is where I will begin.
A brief history of the CPP
The Canada Pension Plan (CPP) is a national public plan that covers people in all provinces except Quebec. It was created in 1966 by the government under Lester B. Pearson. Quebec wanted its pension monies to be under their control and so became the only province with its own program.
When CPP was created the contribution rate was 1.8% of pensionable earnings, to be shared by employers and employees; self-employed persons were on the hook for the full amount. The first deductions were so minuscule that they were unsustainable to fund the retirement costs of the baby boom generation that was just beginning their working years. Also, life expectancies were starting to increase substantially. Continue Reading…
Because the Financial Independence Hub was moved Monday to a new server to accommodate ever-rising volumes of web traffic, we took the liberty of posting the normal Monday “Hub” blog at sister site FindependenceDay.com. The guest blog below is on optimizing CPP benefits: the same subject as my Financial Post column that ran online Monday under the headline: Optimizing Your CPP is no trivial exercise. Now let’s get it from the horse’s mouth: Doug Dahmer. — Jonathan Chevreau
By Doug Dahmer, Emeritus Retirement Income Specialists
Special to the Financial Independence Hub
Canadians are an easy going and trusting people. Every year thousands of people, across the country, carelessly start their CPP payments and in the process forego hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments to which they are entitled.
I call this “The Great Canadian Pass Up.”
To ensure you fully appreciate the value of making the right decision, before you elect to a start your Canada Pension, Emeritus Retirement Income Specialists has created a powerful tool called the CPP Optimizer. Give it a try at: www.cppoptimizer.com.
Most people seriously underestimate their lifetime CPP income entitlement:
Your CPP benefits are a big deal. For a couple, where both spouses have regularly contributed to the CPP plan, the lifetime CPP income they can anticipate will likely exceed $700,000. Consequently it represents an important strategic contributor to the creation of a sustainable retirement income. Therefore, decisions about this benefit need to be taken seriously.
Reliance upon “conventional wisdom” can be very costly
I have just returned from a two-week trip to Hong Kong and Taiwan, just in time for the Federal Reserve’s long-awaited decision to delay the first rate hike since the financial crisis.
The key phrase “Heightened uncertainties abroad,” spoke as loudly as the lack of action, as Fed chairwoman Janet Yellen noted the risks of both China and Emerging Markets in generally spilling over into the United States.
Hedging in the Retirement Risk Zone
For those of us who are in the “Retirement Risk Zone,” — including Yours Truly — the caution behind the Fed’s decision could suggest that for some it may be appropriate to dial down portfolio risks. Since late August, I have followed my personal financial adviser’s recommendation to remain invested but to hedge back one third of US and Canadian equity exposure.
Generally, at whatever age, it makes little sense to take more risk than you need to take and the Fed’s decision (or non-decision) underlines that there are still extensive risks out there, certainly in the equity markets as well as fixed income. Fred Kirby, a fee-for-service planner at Dimensional Investment Planning, says it’s time to be cautious and protect profits. As I quoted him earlier this year, he suggests that those who are averse to market timing can consider the newer “low-volatility” ETFs. For Canadian exposure, he suggests the BMO Low Volatility Canadian Equity ETF (ZLB), which holds 40 stocks deemed to have the lowest risk. For U.S. stocks he likes the BMO Low Volatility US Equity ETF (ZLU), which uses the same methodology and holds 100 companies. For international equities, Kirby likes the iShares MSCI EAFE Minimum Volatility Index ETF (XMI). (There’s also an iShares low-vol ETF for Emerging Markets).
“These ETFs automatically position the cautious investor for any additional future gains without having to make a market-timing re-entry decision,” Kirby says. “This could be just the sort of compromise that lets some investors stick with their investment plans even when they do not want to.”
The 1,000+ point drop in the Dow Jones Industrial Average Monday morning will long be remembered by investors but, unless you sold everything at market prices in a panic that morning, those that just sat it out (or meditated, as we suggested that morning) were fine by week’s end. You can find a nice recap of the market’s near-death experience in this WSJ article, complete with charts: U.S. stock swings don’t shake investors.
Still, the scary start to the week was enough for one magazine to create the cover shown to the left. In what some bulls interpreted as a “reverse indicator,” the current cover story of Bloomberg Businessweek features not just one but several bears on its cover.
In a commentary on that phenomenon, Business Insider’s Myles Udland noted that the market often does the opposite of what magazine cover indicators may be suggesting, which would make a bear cover bullish. Remember, Business Week famously proclaimed The Death of Equities in a cover in 1979, triggering a multi-year bull run.
China & other submerging markets
Mid-week rallies aside, one reason for the continued bearishness is China and other Emerging(“Submerging?”) Markets. One of Bloomberg BusinessWeek’s accompanying stories was entitled Will the Next Recession be Made in China? It noted that after Monday morning’s 1,000 point-plus drop, all markets seemed to be correlated: that “the world suddenly seemed like a very small place.” Continue Reading…
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