Ladies, time to boost your Super?!

Standby for some alarming facts when it comes to women and their super and why the Age Pension might not be your best answer..

 Ready?

  • Women retire with 47% less super than men, on average.  
  • Women live 5 years longer than men, on average.
  • 40% of single retired women live in poverty.

 

The super gender gap starts with the gender pay gap but it doesn’t end there. Being primary caregivers makes a massive impact on women’s super as it’s usually women who take time out of paid employment to take on parenting or caring responsibilities (the average is 5 years) and usually find themselves working part-time for similar reasons.  It’s easy to appreciate that the super of women taking on these unpaid roles could completely stagnate during these periods in their lives.

 In short ladies, you need to take action:

  • Boost your savings early
  • Make smart choices around your super
  • Educate yourself and get advice

And just why should we be excited about Super again?

The main one is that it will be your source of income for 20-30 years of your life upon retirement.  Twenty to thirty YEARS.

The government is incentivising us to build our own pool of funds to support ourselves through our retirement years and are offering some pretty lucrative tax benefits along the way.

 Super has two modes, which are referred to as Accumulation and Pension, and here’s why they’re so tax effective:

 Tax-Effective Structure while you accumulate it:

Superannuation whilst in the ‘accumulation’ phase, generally through your working life, has earnings tax capped at 15%.  During this phase, Capital Gains Tax is generally taxed at 10% (if you’ve held the asset for 12 months, otherwise 15%). These rates compare pretty favourably to Marginal Tax Rates, but the catch is you can’t access your funds until retirement and you meet your preservation age.

 Tax-free income when you retire:

Once you reach the age of 60 and commence an income stream from your superannuation the earnings within the pension account are taxed at 0% (capital gains tax is also 0%).   That’s right ZERO. 

And you can draw a tax-free income from this pool of funds (a limit of $1.7 million will apply in 2021/2022 to the amount you can commence a pension with and in return be able to access the 0% tax-environment)

 For many Australians, superannuation is likely to be the biggest asset outside their family home.

 It’s easy to think, “she’ll be right we’ll get the pension” but, and being completely upfront, the amount of the full age pension wouldn’t cut it for most given it’s $24,770 p.a for a single home-owner or $18,670 p.a for a home-owning member of a couple. My suggestion to you is not to rely on it and do what you can early to build your own nest-egg!

With the end of financial year fast approaching, it could be an opportune time for you to consider the types of contributions you can make to your super to give it the boost it needs.    I recently talked with Jessica Irvine, a senior economics writer with The Sydney Morning Herald/The Age about how to boost your tax refund with a contribution to superit’s worth a read if you’ve been thinking about doing this or have some cash available to invest, and I’ll also be running a session in the Savvy Mumma facebook community next week about this topic.

 Join our webinar in the Savvy Mumma facebook community to find out about some of the types of contributions you can make before the end of the financial year to boost your super and your take-home pay.

If podcasts are your thing, be sure to also check out an episode I recorded with Pauline Taylor last year, Ladies – it’s time to be Super smart!

MoneyMode Advice Pty Ltd (ABN 29 627 492 791) is a corporate authorised representative of Integrity Financial Planners Pty Ltd (AFSL 225051, ABN 71 069 537 855)

This information has been prepared without taking account of your objectives, financial situation or needs. Because of this you should, before acting on this information, consider its appropriateness, having regard to your objectives, financial situation and needs. This presentation provides an overview or summary only and it should not be considered a comprehensive statement on any matter or relied upon as such.

Renae Vercoe
administrator
Founder of Money Mode, financial professional, passionate educator, partner, mum and financial freedom fighter!