Delaying pension

[Tkydon]

The Rational Reminder YouTube channel recently made a video on this topic.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=C66FqW4Bmyc

It was very interesting, and changed my mind on this topic. Worth a watch if you’re unsure about delaying your pension or not. It’s Canadian based, but it seems to be very similar to how it’s done in Japan (8.4% increase per year, 42% increase if you delay until 70).

Yes, I plan to pay voluntary contributions from 60 to 65 to get my Total Months up to the maximum possible for me (still not 480), then delay no further.

And if I don't immediately need the money, it'll go straight into NISA and be forever more tax exempt...

Also, a thought I had. I think many of us here are married to a Japanese wife. With how long women in Japan live, and the lack of survivors pension after 65, it may be a good idea to take your pension at 65 or 70, and have you wife delay taking her pension until 75. It will leave her with an extra 84% on her pension.

That's an interesting one. I hadn't thought of that.

[Beaglehound]

Also, a thought I had. I think many of us here are married to a Japanese wife. With how long women in Japan live, and the lack of survivors pension after 65, it may be a good idea to take your pension at 65 or 70, and have you wife delay taking her pension until 75. It will leave her with an extra 84% on her pension.

That's a good point, thanks.

[Deep Blue]

I’ve been unable to find good quality information about the Japanese NPI funding status (if anyone has please point me in the right direction).

https://www.gpif.go.jp/en/

i've looked through that before - I could not find out any information on how funded the scheme is. For corporate pensions, they look at how much money is in the scheme vs. projections on how much they will pay out to members, based on actuarial assumptions on longevity etc. As such the pension schemes publish if they are 70% funded or 120% funded etc.

I can not find this informatiom for the Japanese state pension system.

Just updating this as @beanhead found the information.

https://www.gpif.go.jp/en/faq/faq-20.html

GPIF manages the reserve fund to stabilize pension finance. The current system aims at balancing pension finance in approximately 100 years, when the current population would finish receiving the pension premium. On the average of this 100 years, about 90 percent of the financial source of pension benefits is funded by pension premiums and government contributions for the year, while the financial source obtained from the pension reserve accounts for about 10 percent.

So it seems Japan is very similar to the UK - national pension system is essentially unfunded and taxation is the mine source of how pensioners will be paid, rather than the current GPIF assets.