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Challenger Financial Group has used new research from Access Economics to defend its position on private sector provision of annuities.
The company released the research today, which it said reinforced earlier evidence that government provision of lifetime annuities would add to the overall cost of public sector borrowing in the long term.
Commenting on the Access Economics research, Challenger Life chief executive Richard Howes said it corroborated earlier research from Towers Watson.
“In light of this it is difficult to see the rationale for public provision, particularly when there is so much innovation occurring in the private sector in relation to next generation lifetime annuity products,” Howes said.
What is more, he said the UK experience had shown the private sector could also better price annuities to match actual risk, benefiting manual workers and others with lower life expectancies.
The Access Economics report concluded that there was “no economy-wide free lunch” to be had from the Federal Government directly selling annuity products to Australians.
