Misunderstanding public pensions, vol. 2

Andrew Coyne’s column in the National Post today is an unusually clear example of a mistake that people on the right always make when talking about public pensions. The headline in fact says it all: Turning the CPP into 18 million RRSPs. Here’s the basic problem with Coyne’s analysis. A public pension, like CPP, is providing an insurance product to Canadian citizens, in the same way that the health care system provides an insurance product to Canadians. Having insurance is not equivalent to having a pile of money in a savings account. And yet people on the right – merely because they don’t like government – are constantly suggesting that we abolish these insurance schemes, and replace them with individual savings – effectively forcing individuals to self-insure. So people like David Gratzer want to get rid of public health insurance, and replace it with individual savings accounts. And now Coyne wants to phase out public retirement insurance and replace it with individual savings accounts.… Continue reading

 •  0 comments  •  flag
Share on Twitter
Published on July 12, 2016 07:34
No comments have been added yet.


Joseph Heath's Blog

Joseph Heath
Joseph Heath isn't a Goodreads Author (yet), but they do have a blog, so here are some recent posts imported from their feed.
Follow Joseph Heath's blog with rss.