10 years ago, Jeremy Cooper, now Chairman of Retirement Income at Challenger, chaired the Federal Government’s Super System Review, commonly known as the Cooper Review. With the final report from the Banking Royal Commission due to be released in a couple of days, we took the opportunity to talk to Jeremy about the current state of retirement in Australia.

“Retirees are well aware of increasing life expectancies, and we’re in an environment where self-provision is the order of the day. There are not a lot of people who aspire to living solely on the aged pension. So, they’re underspending – they’re being too frugal. They’re doing this because in our system, we’re effectively asking them to self-insure.”

In this episode of The Rules of Investing, we discuss what worked and what didn’t from the Cooper Review, his take on the Banking Royal Commission, and the investment risks that matter to retirees.

Content discussed

• Reading recommendation: Haruki Murakami - Kafka on the shore
• The ABC of sequencing risk

Time stamps:

• 2:35 – The journey from lawyer to regulator; Jeremy explains how he came to chair the Super Systems Review after starting his career as a lawyer.
• 6:04 – 10 years on from the Cooper Review; what worked and what didn’t?
• 9:50 – The surprising and not-so-surprising revelations from the Banking Royal Commission.
• 12:02 – Understanding sequencing risk; what is it, and why should I care?
• 18:34 – Outliving their super balances in retirement is a big fear for many retirees, so what can be done to mitigate this risk?
• 23:35 – A Super dilemma; a superannuation lump sum is the biggest sum of money most people will have access to in their life. Contrary to popular opinion, retirees have not been blowing their cash on renovations and overseas holidays… and that’s a problem!
• 29:57 – Is the superannuation system fit for retirees? And what can be done to fix it?
• 34:06 – Jeremy answers our three favourite questions (with a twist on the final one).

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