Australia's mandatory retirement saving policy : a view from the new millennium

Formal retirement income provision in Australia, can be traced back to occupational schemes first offered by banks, and state governments in the nineteenth century. However, the year 1909 marks the beginning of a national retirement income policy, with the introduction of means-tested age pension. Since then, retirement income provision has evolved into a multi-pillar arrangement comprising the Age Pension, occupational annuity, and other long term saving through property, shares, and managed funds. The 1990s saw the introduction of private mandatory retirement saving in the form of the"Superannuation Guarantee". With this introduction, Australia joined a growing group of countries which center their retirement income policy, on private mandatory retirement saving. This paper provides a succinct description of the current system along with an analysis of its strengths, and areas where improvement is still needed.