Originally posted by ShutterBug:
[b]Media Release: Give us back our CPF
savings
21 Jun 07
And the scheming continues.
The raising of the CPF withdrawal age to 65 is nothing more than
another ploy to delay returning the peoples hard-earned
savings.
The reason advanced for the change, that Singaporeans are living
longer than before, is as lame as it is ludicrous.
When workers retire and need a source of income, telling them that
they cannot use their savings because they are living longer makes
as much sense as telling a man dying of thirst that he cant drink
his water because hell need it later.
Whether they are in their 60s, 70s or 80s senior citizens need
their retirement savings. How they budget their funds to last them
through their remaining years is none of the PAPs business.
Of course PAP would love to hoard more
money through the CPF system but if Singaporeans are allowed to
withdraw all of their CPF at retirement age, the consquences could
be disastrous.
There are a great number of people who are not financially prudent.
Moreover, when suddenly handed with a large amount of money, they
may not be able to handle it wisely.
There would be a lot of Singaporeans dying of poverty
then.
Worse, with the way the political system is what's to stop the PAP
from raising the withdrawal age to 70 and beyond?
Think about it: The elderly are told that they have to continue to
work and for less pay, the GST is raised to 7 percent, hospitals
and polyclinics raise their charges and now the withdrawal of the
CPF savings is further pushed back.
With a government like this, who needs robbers?
This continual change of the withdrawal age coupled with the
Minimum Sum Scheme, which allows the Government to return the
savings to retirees in small monthly instalments, effectively means
that Singaporeans will never fully get back their savings.
This has a pernicious side-effect. Seeing that the Government has
no intention of returning their CPF savings, Singaporeans will
resort to using whatever funds they have in their Ordinary CPF
Accounts to pay for their HDB mortgages.
In other words, the sizes of their flats they buy will depend on
the size of the monthly CPF contributions, not on whether they can
afford it.
Not necessary. He's generalising that
Singaporeans will buy bigger houses so that PAP cannot touch their
funds. I beg to differ unless he has statistics to
show.
As it is Singaporeans are already putting in a worryingly high
percentage of their income into housing, not by choice it should be
added, compared to people in other countries. This leaves them
little or no savings for retirement.
Of course the Government loves such an arrangement, it further
engorges the its already corpulent pockets.
A recent survey conducted by the AXA Insurance Group revealed that
while Singaporeans are the worlds biggest savers, they have the
least amount of funds for retirement. Now we know where all the
money is going to.
With a system as opaque and unaccountable as the one that presently
exists, continuing to allow the PAP to retain our CPF savings is a
dangerous arrangement. It is, however, one made in authoritarian
heaven.
The people need to fight back.
Chee Soon Juan
Secretary-General
Singapore Democratic Party [/b]
Other than that, I agree with him,
less the sarcasm.
