Is This The End Of Final Salary Pension Schemes?
News that the UK's top 100 companies have seen a massive fall in their pension funds values has led to suggestions that the end of the final salary pension scheme is nearing. In total the top 100 companies in the UK saw pension fund values fall from a surplus of £12 billion this time last year to a deficit of £41 billion today. The trend is being replicated across the board in the final salary pension scheme sector.
When you consider that many of the top 100 companies can ill afford to add extra funds to their pension funds at the moment, with free cash in short supply, it is not difficult to guess how some smaller companies will be fairing. The survey by Lane Clark & Peacock has confirmed the worst fears of many amid calls for the government to reduce the straight jacket placed around the pension industry and look a little more long term.
The government can huff and puff as much as they want and exert as much pressure as they see fit, but if these companies cannot support their pension funds it will be the pensioners who suffer in the end. Every sector in the UK economy has seen help from the authorities but the pension fund industry is still very much under the same rules as those in play when the economy was flying high.
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