enjoy my retirement<\/a> without feeling like I\u2019m flaunting my security.<\/p>\nShould I be feeling this guilty and is it best to not tell people about my pension plan to avoid this sort of confrontation happening again? <\/p>\n
Emily Braeger, The i Paper\u2019s money reporter, replies<\/p>\n
I\u2019m sure you\u2019re not the only family who debated this over the Christmas dinner.<\/p>\n
Public-sector pensions, especially final-salary schemes, are very different from most private-sector arrangements. <\/p>\n
Under these schemes, people receive a guarantee of an annual income each year for life in retirement. These are earned benefits, based on years of contributions and contractual agreements.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, most private-sector pensions are defined-contribution schemes where the total you have for retirement is based on how much you have invested over your working life.<\/p>\n
Feeling guilty about receiving your public-sector pension, that you worked hard for is understandable emotionally, but it isn\u2019t a moral failing \u2013 at all.<\/p>\n
The tricky part is perception. Comparisons with other people\u2019s pensions can make your benefits feel unfair even when they are entirely legitimate.<\/p>\n
Conversations with family can become heated because money is tied up with fairness and inequality, not just contracts.<\/p>\n
Explaining calmly that you earned your pension, and how it works, can help, though it won\u2019t always change someone else\u2019s view, so remember that.<\/p>\n
It can help to separate entitlement from generosity so you could try to explain to her that you can enjoy your pension while still being thoughtful about those struggling.<\/p>\n
Some people find it useful to balance feelings of guilt with action, such as giving gifts, helping younger family members, or supporting charity. You don\u2019t have to do that though so don\u2019t feel obliged.<\/p>\n
Receiving what you\u2019ve earned is not shameful, and understanding the optics can guide how you talk about and use your pension without feeling weighed down by other people\u2019s assumptions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The reader, who works as a teacher, was told their retirement provision was unfair in comparison with jobs…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":415183,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[45,49,48,133,113838,6107,131,132,1705],"class_list":{"0":"post-415182","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-finance","12":"tag-money-moral-maze","13":"tag-pensions","14":"tag-personal-finance","15":"tag-personalfinance","16":"tag-retirement"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=415182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/415182\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/415183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=415182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=415182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=415182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}