We are working on a brand new version of the game! If you want to stay informed, read our blog and register for our mailing list.
Bill: New Hope Resolution
Details
Submitted by[?]: People's Party
Status[?]: passed
Votes: This is an ordinary bill. It requires more yes votes than no votes. This bill will not pass any sooner than the deadline.
Voting deadline: August 2099
Description[?]:
| The lifestory of many Likatonians is a story of accumulating wealth. We buy a car, then a home, then education for the kids. Our wealth continues to grow. However retirement is usually an awful bump on the road. To make sure our wealth lasts, we need a pension system that matches our life story, one that grows our wealth as fast as possible. To this end, the People's Party is proposing to replace the current stagnant public pension system with a fully private one, albeit with the following strings attached: 1> Retirement planning must begin early, because the longer the time horizon, the more a given fund can grow. However, the nature of youth is unparralled confidence matched only by overwhelming ignorance. Let alone the youth, even middle age Likatonians often ignore their retirement needsuntil it is too late. To prevent disaster, the government must force Likatonians to save and invest early, so that we aren't forced to bail them out of poor homes 40-50 years later. 2> I recommend that the govt take force individuals to save 5% of their income ( age no bar) every year in some asset-building program of their choice. This could be investing in stocks, paying down the mortgage, making improvements to their homes, or anything else that can be reasonably linked with building up wealth. |
Proposals
Article 1
Proposal[?] to change The government's policy concerning the pension system.
Old value:: The state operates a compulsory public system combined with an optional private pension.
Current: The state offers a voluntary public pension, combined with other voluntary private pensions.
Proposed: There is a compulsory private pension system.
Debate
These messages have been posted to debate on this bill:
| Date | 11:58:13, August 20, 2005 CET | From | Conservative Liberal Party | To | Debating the New Hope Resolution |
| Message | I don't think it is reasonable for the government to force individuals to save money. Currently our government has a massive surplus, and the Libertarians have proposed massive tax cuts, for corporations and luxury goods. However why not take a part of this surplus and put it into creating a state pension. This means that the government would not be taking another slice of our citizens hard earned income. Secondly this scheme would not work anyhow. An individual earning 4,000+ LIKS will be able to make their own arrangements. However someone earning less than a 1,000 LIKS will only be adding 50 LIKS to their private pension scheme a year.after 50 years of hard working they will have saved 2,500 LIKS. Add to this any gains made from their investment, they will only be able to support themselvs at their already low income status for another 3 or 4 years. This scheme is doomed. It would be much better to increase govt. contributions to state pensions, and to remove any Capital Gains Tax on private pensions. |
| Date | 16:08:49, August 20, 2005 CET | From | People's Party | To | Debating the New Hope Resolution |
| Message | A government pension scheme would still be forced saving, since we are forcing some individuals to save on behalf of others. All i'm saying is that people should be allowed to access the private market so that they can get returns of 9% or more per year rather than the 4.5-5% with the govt. The difference can be quite dramatic: assuming a person saves just $1000 a year, then coupled with market returns, an initial portfolio of $1000 will grow to $889,441 over 50 years. Of course inflation will reduce it to only $308, 756. However thats still a good deal for $1000 a year. (i don't know the exchange rate so I can't convert it to Likaths, but it's sufficient to say that with the market and some discipline, even the poor have a fighting chance.) PS: just for your information, a $308,756 portfolio could theoretically sustain someone drawing even $30,000 a year for atleast ten years. Plus thanks to the Stepladder foundation (see the Grants committee), every poor person in Likatonia will be receiving atleast $30,000 on his 21st birthday. Assuming you get the same returns, every poor person might be able to retire with $842,940.53 after accounting for inflation. That's a serious load of money. Of course this is all assuming that people retire at 70, rather than 63, that people invest wisely, inflation rates stay the same, and the market continues to return 9% a year. That's a whole lot of variables to take into account, and we may need to lightly top up accounts that belong to people who are poor. Still, that's far less costly than a public pension. |
| Date | 16:09:34, August 20, 2005 CET | From | People's Party | To | Debating the New Hope Resolution |
| Message | We have no capital gains taxes. |
subscribe to this discussion - unsubscribe
Voting
| Vote | Seats | |||||
| yes |
Total Seats: 82 | |||||
| no | Total Seats: 0 | |||||
| abstain |
Total Seats: 128 |
| Random fact: In cases where a party has no seat, the default presumption should be that the party is able to contribute to debates in the legislature due to one of its members winning a seat at a by-election. However, players may collectively improvise arrangements of their own to provide a satisfying explanation for how parties with no seats in the legislature can speak and vote there. |
| Random quote: "I don't believe you need to be bitch to succeed in business" - Lucinda Redwood, former Luthorian-Dorvish businesswoman |