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Monday, November 16, 2009

KiwiSlaver reality bites

About 160,000 of the 1.2 million people who have joined KiwiSaver are under 18 but fewer than 10 per cent actually contribute to it

KiwiSaver would get a bad reputation from people signing up their children, only to have the money whittled away by fees before they could start contributing

Reality sets in as the laws are tightened. If you, particularly grandparents, have signed your rugrats up to it, they are committed for life, whether or not they might want it post 17-18 years old.

Meanwhile, KiwiSlaver fund providers get ever richer on your tax dollar...

1 comment:

pdm said...

While I do not like the KiwiSaver format with all contributions going through the IRD I disagree that it is a bad thing to sign up children as far as the children are concerned.

However it is a bad thing for the taxpayer to have each child given $1,000 of taxpayers money.

The $1,000 which is what I suspect most children have will ahve grown by the time they start work despite the poor investment returns of the last 2 years approx. The funds will not be whittled away by fees as fees are negligible.