Superannuation and the Marketisation of Retirement Incomes

Abstract

Prior to 1983, access to superannuation was largely confined to male managerial and professional employees. In the 1970s unions began to exploit limited episodic power in particular enterprises and industries to pursue superannuation as deferred income. After 1983, occupational superannuation was extended to most workers through the industrial relations processes using the dispositional power flowing from the Accord between the ACTU and the federal Labor government. With the passing of the Superannuation Guarantee Charge legislation in 1992, superannuation moved into the political rather than the industrial relations sphere.

Occupational superannuation is based on individual ownership of contributions made into private funds, with entitlements directly related to labour market success. As a consequence, the aged pension is being constructed as a safety net for those who have failed in the market, not as a right of citizenship. Low income earners, particularly women, are likely to be no better off in retirement than they would have been in the absence of mandated superannuation, while high income earners benefit the most. And the ex post construction of superannuation as a rational economic policy, underpinned by the discourse of economic liberalism and supported by private interests, has ensured that a progressive and equitable national superannuation scheme is unlikely ever to be adopted.