A major announcement on pensions is coming from the Government. One-million people who have jobs don’t have a pension so their only earning on retirement will be the state pension, currently just shy of €12,000 per year.

Newstalk is in the private sector with a mainly young workforce so yesterday the station was frought with worry – the pension “time bomb” is upon us type stuff.

The emails, texts and tweets from listeners were the same.

The talk is that we’re going to be made hand over a mandatory 5% of our wage to build up a nest-egg. However we’ve been doing the maths and the amount that gives you in the golden years is still very low.

So we calculated on behalf of the one-million pensionless(results below) and here’s a link to do your own specific calculation: Pension Calculator

The foundation for this is…

• You earn the current average earnings as per CSO figures in the private sector: €33,000
• You have nothing yet in a pension fund
• You are aged either 25, 35 or 45
• You want at retirement to have scenario a) 50% of your current wage or scenario b) 66% of your current wage per year
• The state pension remains around its current level, just shy of €12,000

SCENARIO (A) – 50% of your current wage

What you need to do to get there…

What you need to do to get there…