RM,
thanks for the heads-up, will look forward to any news of confirmation on roll-in. It appears that the aptly titled "None Review" (TIC) has been a paper tiger - I am (& I suspect many others also) are on the verge of leaving the ADF based on a bleak superannuation future. Someone previously said that you shouldn't expect your superannuation to provide for your retirement, that you should be making other investments. Well, that's just plain silly - the exact point of superannuation IS to provide for retirement. It should be a low-medium risk, long term investment that when managed sensibly can only result in a profit well above and beyond CPI (thanks to wonder of compounding interest). Obviously whether you can live on it is based on many other factors, but based on my 13 years service (on a good wage) of mostly 10% contributions, if I leave now and rollover all of my super I would barely make $24,000 PA from age 60-80. Quite a lot I hear you say? Not when that amount has to support 2 people beause your wife that has little or no super due to being constantly moved around!
I agree that MSBS does have benefits not found in other Super funds (increased employer contributions, death benefits etc...) but let's face it: a good dictatorship will always be worse than a bad democracy.
As employees we are essentially forced (post 1991) to use it and it alone. The majority of employers allow some autonomy in selection of an employee's fund. Indeed, many funds (eg REST super for the Retail world) allow different investment strategies to be selected (and even changed every quarter) e.g low, medium, high risk etc...
Even if the flying pay is rolled in, what of the majority of defence personnel whose MSBS super is unaffected? I think the ADF is going to have go through major pay reform ASAP if it wants to get its quota of recruits. Let's face it, the average 18 YO today knows 10 times as much about finance and the importance of retirement planning than we ever did - and on paper the Defence just isn't financially promising.
