Columns
Private Portfolio - Swallowing my advice
- Columns
- Published Date
- Artur Illmer
- Hits: 479
Recently we were treated by an insurer to a launch of enhancements to their product range. One underlying tenet that is now being focused on is the longevity of life.
Where many traditional protection benefits in the event of disability and dreaded disease used to cease on reaching a predetermined retirement age, the aim is now to extend these benefits to cater for after retirement as well.
We are living longer than ever before and it is alleged that the first person to reach the age of 150 years is already living today!
Apart from having a rethink on traditional insurance product structures, it also emphasises the issue of being financially able to retire for so long.
For most of us contemplating retirement at the age 60 or 65 with the prospect of having to live off our savings and investments for 30 years or even longer, is quite daunting to say the least.
Many of us will not have more than 40 years to accumulate the savings necessary to fund such a lengthy retirement. However, this discussion is not new and I know that I may be guilty of labouring this issue at nausea.
This Week in The Khuta - Teachers deserve better
- Columns
- Published Date
- Lorato Khobetsi
- Hits: 462
They say a hungry employee is an angry employee. The teachers strike is a good example for that statement. While high government officials are living a good life, the ones actually doing the job are left to suffer.
Many will agree when I say that the teachers at pre-primary, primary school and high school are the ones who laid the foundation of our future. They have shaped us into the people we are today. Teachers deserve to be amongst the highest paid employees in this country.
I think the Government should take the teachers concerns into consideration and stop the blame game. It is not about who is right and who is wrong, it is about the future of the learners who are affected by the teachers strike.
Teachers are probably the most patient people I know. Have you ever tried explaining something to someone over and over again, and not stopping until the person actually understands what you mean? How annoying is that? But that is a scenario every teacher knows only too well. I remember how my teachers at school would come into a class full of disinterested learners but still, they did not say “well, you do not want to listen or keep quiet, I am going home.” No, they would get us to listen to them one way or another.
This Week in The Khuta - The heretic merit system of dead paper
- Columns
- Published Date
- Daniel Kavishe
- Hits: 366
As Johnnie waddled along to the front of the well-decorated high school podium, his heart skipped a beat with the exciting notion of receiving his academic certificate for achieving 11th position in his grade. He like many believed that it was this piece of paper in conjunction with the several other certificates of participation from other rudimentary activities, that would earn him the opportunity to study at a higher tertiary institution and eventually work for a big conglomerate which would satiate his pockets with dollar bills and lavish his income with numerous employment benefits.
The plethora of the certificates that lie gathering dust at the corner of your room can be assured to get you an interview and at best a job. Unfortunately, everything else relies on the unquantifiable skills you have gathered over the years. In fact, your personal demeanour is possibly your best marketing strategy as you brave into society. The accolades we acquire at different levels of our education system should indicate our desire to learn and possibly work.They should not in any way give us a false hope that we will ease into the job market where missed deadlines translate to losses in company profits or worse your retrenchment as opposed to a disgruntled teacher who threatens to call your mummy or to fail you for a particular subject.
Read more: This Week in The Khuta - The heretic merit system of dead paper
Hardfacts on Software - The cost of Cheap 2
- Columns
- Published Date
- Immo Bohm
- Hits: 337
I feel sorry for the guys that start setting up their online store the wrong way! Just yesterday I had a two-hour discussion with a bright young entrepreneur who is setting up a web store. He’s busy for three years now and not yet live. He’s in a dead end! What happened?
Well, he is in an industry that makes products to order, from a selection of about four or so components. Think bicycles with different options for tyres, seats, frame size and frame material. (He is actually in a different industry which I won’t reveal – but you get the idea) He needed a web store that could enable customers to build a product on the fly using those components. He also needed a calculator that could calculate the cost of the finished product on the fly, given the day’s exchange rate, commodity prices and so on. So quite complex!
Private Portfolio - Taking Stock
- Columns
- Published Date
- Philip Deetlefs
- Hits: 384
This is my second last column for 2012 and I wish to take stock of a couple of things that I think need to be attended to in the new year.
While one is a member of a pension fund, you should at least once a year get a statement of your retirement benefits and how the amount was calculated. When this member retires, he eventually is told what the amount of money is that he has accumulated over the years if not decades.
In spite of perhaps keeping annual benefit statements on file, he would not be a lot wiser of how his eventual retirement benefit was calculated. I think this is unfair.
