ONLY FIVE AGREE TO HAVE THEIR PENSION SPENDING CHECKED BY GOVT
March 11, 2015 – 12:53 pm
In Osaka, Japan, more than 100,000 senior citizens are less than thrilled at the government’s offer to monitor their pension spending habits.
There are certain privileges that come along with adulthood - like how to spend your hard-earned money. When someone starts earning a legitimate paycheck, they are generally considered to have earned the freedom to spend their money however they want.
So, senior citizens in Osaka, Japan aren’t too crazy about a government offer to check up on how they are spending their government-administered pensions, reported Casey Baseel in a Rocket News 24 article on March 7, 2015.
It may not be Japan’s biggest city, but there are a couple of things Osaka can claim to be number one in. Aside from its reputation as producing the tastiest takoyaki octopus dumplings and funniest comedians in the country, Osaka also has more seniors receiving a government-administered pension than any other municipality in Japan. As of last November, members of some 117,500 households in Osaka were eligible to receive such funds.
“Hmm… Mr Tanaka, at your age, do you really think you should be buying so many green bananas?”
Given such a large pool of recipients, there’s obviously a lot of money being circulated as part of pension payments in Osaka. As such, the government would prefer that seniors use their pensions responsibly and, to that end, recently proposed a new wrinkle to the system, in which recipients could opt to receive 30,000 yen (US$252) each month not in cash or as a bank deposit, but in the form of a prepaid debit card.
Planners saw two potential benefits to such a system. First, recipients wouldn’t have to carry so much cash, providing them with extra convenience and more time for things other than running to the bank or ATM. Second, the Osaka government would be legally allowed to access the card administration company’s data and review what the cardholders were buying. This information would then be put to use in providing financial counseling to the cardholders, helping them to make smarter spending decisions.
Deciding to do an evaluative test of the system, case workers in Osaka started spreading the word in early February that the city was looking for volunteers willing to give the card-based system a try. Obviously, not everyone would be instantly on board with the idea, so they set what they felt was an achievable goal of less than 2 per cent of the eligible household, hoping to find 2,000 volunteers.
They got five.
“The number was less than we had expected,” commented a spokesperson for the city, in a display of overwhelming understatement.
Given such a large pool of pensioners in Osaka, there’s obviously a lot of pension money being circulated there. As such, the government would prefer that seniors use their pensions responsibly and recently proposed a new system, in which recipients could opt to receive 30,000 yen (US$252) each month not in cash but in the form of a prepaid debit card… The government was looking for volunteers willing to give the card-based system a try… They set what they felt was an achievable goal of less than 2 per cent of the eligible household, hoping to find 2,000 volunteers... They got five.
Still, the city isn’t ready to scrap the idea just yet. Instead, Osaka has extended the volunteer recruiting period until March 24, and is considering carrying out a six or 12-month trial even if it’s unable to round up 2,000 interested seniors. However, officials have expressed concern over the ability to properly evaluate the system’s effectiveness without significantly increasing the number of users.
In any society that prides personal independence, “Accepting the prepaid cards is the equivalent of being labeled as someone who can’t manage his own finances,” said sociology professor Ryu Michinaka of Kansai University of International Studies.
The grandkids have their AKB48 girlgroup, and Granddad has his KBG84.
He’s got a point. Really, after making it through school and decades in the workforce, frankly it’s a little embarrassing to have a civil servant look over your receipts every month and give his opinion on whether or not you’re dropping too much yen on canned chu-his, dried squid snacks, or granny idol CDs. - Source: Sankei West via Hachima Kiko (click here)
Note: In $ingapore, the government, through the Central Provident Fund, has the last word and controls how much money a retiree gets to spend, much less own.
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