How much do the Catalans who can save money every month save?
The bulk of savers have their money in bank accounts that yield less than inflation or nothing
BarcelonaNot everyone can save. In fact, 70 out of every 100 Catalans do so, while 30% claim they cannot put money aside with what they earn per month. And among those who do save, the most common amount is about 150 euros per month, while the average is 292 euros. In any case, of all those who can save a monthly sum, only 13% account for about half of all savings, with an average of over 300 euros. At the Spanish level, those who hold half of the saved money, which is 21%, set aside an average of 400 euros.
These are the results of a survey conducted by Mapfre Vida on 465 people aged between 18 and 65, which reflect that there is a long way to go in terms of financial education. A reflection of this is that 79% of Catalan savers do so through current accounts, which practically do not yield a single cent. Only 21% do so through investment funds, 17% in cash, 15% with pension plans, and 3% with insurance, as explained by José Manuel Corral, CEO of Mapfre Vida in a meeting with journalists in Barcelona. To understand the importance of obtaining returns higher than inflation, the high executive of the insurance company states that 100,000 current euros would have a real purchasing power of about 81,000 euros in 10 years and 65,317 in 20, with an average general price level of 2%.
According to the study, the most common reasons for putting money aside are, in the first place, with 24%, having an emergency fund, being able to buy a home (22%), supplementing retirement (14%), and being able to take trips and vacations (10%). And the reasons of those who say they do not save are that they do not see themselves capable of doing so. 67% claim they started doing it but no longer do, and others claim that if they could start saving again they would allocate it to an emergency fund. It should be noted that the ability to save falls to 48.4% in single-parent Catalan households, compared to around 73% of those formed by couples, whether they have children or not.
Corral, who highlights that the more financial training one has, the more options to invest, as happens in the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, stresses not only the low investment culture in both Catalonia and Spain, but also in companies, where this formula "is almost non-existent". According to the survey, only 6% state that they have a savings system.
The senior executive of Mapfre has defended the public pension system, but also the role of the private sector, because "mathematics are stubborn". And he has recalled that the population receiving pensions is growing and at the same time the gross replacement rate (the amount relative to the salary that the pensioner receives) is 80.4%, well above the 57% average in the European Union (EU). This means that for a gross monthly salary of 2,543 euros, a pension of 1,610 will be collected. And this, according to Corral, who has defended "setting aside the ideological debate", is "unsustainable" over time. In his opinion, reforms will be needed, as well as strengthening public-private collaboration and promoting complementary savings through tax incentives, as the European Commission is promoting.