Archive for June 2008
So, as part of signing up for a new job I’m also signing up for KiwiSaver. I’ve managed to put off learning about this for a while now but last night I finally put the time in to do a bit more reading. I knew the scheme is reputed to be generous and is generally seen to be well worth it for the individual but I needed to choose a provider and a scheme.
As my government-enforced retirement age of 65 is some years off I have chosen a growth-oriented scheme with a concentration in the share market. My understanding is that, over the long term, share markets have historically given the best returns. Of course this won’t go so well if we have an economic collapse triggered by climate change or runaway gray-goo or whatever and slide into a post-technological world – but my retirement plans are going to be in trouble if that happens anyway.
More importantly, I have chosen a ‘passive’ fund. This is one where they don’t have smart managers who wheel and deal to choose the best stocks/investments at any given time. Instead they just invest in shares/securities so that the fund tracks well-known indexes like the NZX 50. Therefore if the stock market as a whole goes up you’re winning, and vice-versa. It’s easier to manage so fees are a lot less.
Now, the interesting thing about ‘dumb’ passive funds is that they typically out-perform the ‘smart’ active funds. All that wheeling and dealing costs money (in transaction and management costs) and any increased returns are typically eaten by that. Indeed, I seem to recall that actively managed funds typically perform worse than passive funds, even *before* transaction and management costs are taken into account. Most people aren’t Warren Buffett and are apparently pretty crap at investing. Of course, the managers still get paid their lovely salaries so at least they’re happy about it.
The only major flaw in KiwiSaver (from my selfish perspective) is that the government doesn’t guarantee the investments – but also doesn’t let you spread your risk by splitting your KiwiSaver contributions between 2 or more companies. So, it looks like all my eggs will be going into the scheme run by the ASB.
[Some of the things I believe about climate change and our environment, arranged in such a way as to resemble an argument. Comments are welcome, if I find them suitably compelling I’ll publish a new version with them incorporated.]
That nature has no desire to keep Earth a nice place for humans to live.
That climate change has happened in the past and will happen again.
That climate change will result in changes that make our world a place less suited to human existence.
That the climate is a chaotic system and that we can not know what will happen with it next.
That the current predictions of what is happening with climate change are the best we have to go on and are worth paying attention to.
That there is a good chance that some sort of feedback loops will interfere with predicted climate change.
That the effects of one strong positive feedback loop overrides any number of negative feedback loops.
That human activities are influencing climate change.
That the modern consumer lifestyle directly contributes to climate change.
That people greatly enjoy the modern consumer lifestyle and that many people who do not currently enjoy it aspire to do so.
That individuals can reduce their personal contribution to climate change.
That those individual changes send useful messages to corporations and politicians that will influence behaviour in wider populations.
That these individual and collective changes in behaviour are insufficient to seriously reduce the human impact on climate change.
That there will never be the political will to voluntarily give up the modern consumer life style.
That humanity would rather ride the spiralling corpse of the current ecosystem down into the abyss than voluntarily give up the modern consumer life style.
That this is likely to happen.
That I don’t want it to.
That we can possibly develop new non-damaging technologies to both replace those that contribute to climate change, as well as ameliorate the effects of other technologies’ contributions to climate change.
That these technologies will need significant funding to be developed.
That commercial bodies may not see the benefit in funding the development.
That some form of collective funding (i.e. government) will be required.
That it is is better to spend more of our current resources on developing these technologies than to spend them on reducing activities that contribute to climate change.
That this doesn’t excuse us from trying to reduce activities that contribute to climate change.
That we should get on with it.