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Third
Last week a scandal arose over Bernardo Fontaine’s statements regarding the Convention’s intention to expropriate pension funds. “The workers will no longer be the owners of their pension savings,” said the constituent. “Fontaine lies”, expressed several colleagues, Twitter and even conspicuous Sunday columnists.
Well, everything indicates that Fontaine is telling the truth. The biggest break-in in human history (no kidding) is underway: $172.831 million of loot. The Constitution will pave the way forward, starting with the new common fund for contributions announced by the President, which is nothing more than a distribution system. All the decisions of the plenary session and the commissions, added to the government program, indicate the route. Today the funds are private. They are protected by DL 3,500 and the provisions related to private property in the Constitution. The silver is mine. Including the right to inheritance. On the contrary, if the funds and contributions are exchanged for a “right to a pension”, they belong to the State. Of the “entity”. We will necessarily exchange (75% of the people do not want it to be so), an asset for a right to a pension flow. A flow subject to the rules of “notional accounts”, which are nothing more than an accounting fiction, which assumes fictitious returns without any asset backing.
As everyone knows, delivery systems are technically broken. A few days ago the measures that the US is taking to avoid the collapse of Social Security, which is estimated for 2034, were revealed. The pension system of the richest country in the world without resources. They need to raise the retirement age, contributions and taxes. The math is very simple: people live longer and there are fewer and fewer young people working to support the old. A system tautologically doomed in the long run.
The AFPs are nothing more than a mutual fund with a predefined redemption date. They give us the possibility of multiplying the savings, taking advantage of the waiting capacity. That is why 70% of the funds are returns. This is understood by any investment neophyte. If they are questioned, it is because of the politicians. A decent solidarity pillar was missing and pensions are low. Now they are going to slaughter them because they are blamed for everything. The perfect plan to get hold of the loot needs a villain. The rest of the script has two parts. First go for the flow, and then go for the stock. In the first part, already announced this week, as long as what comes from contributions is higher than the pensions paid in a pay-as-you-go system, the stock will be “left over”. Then, under some good excuse, the attack on the stock will begin. Millions of tickets will promise “notional” retirements. In this way, infinite ammunition will be available for “strategic” objectives other than profitability. The translation is so broad that it gives for anything. So do not be surprised when, in several more years, there is not much left and you are the one who suffers. As in Argentina, Hungary and Poland.
That is the harsh truth. The blatant lies are the ones that have been spread all these years. Very few had the intellectual honesty and rigor to investigate or deny them: that the AFPs were created to finance businessmen, that there are “ghost commissions”, that the profits are not from the reserve but from the commissions, that they are expensive, that Triangulations were made to benefit Piñera and endless blatant lies. Nobody said anything. If what Fontaine claims is not true, then be clear. It is very easy to calm down. Say it directly: “The funds will continue to belong to each worker.” Put it in the new Constitution. But they won’t say it and they won’t. What better proof of who is lying in this story.