Sep 10, 2026 · 30 min · 13 segments
Many younger Australians are in financial freefall - has superannuation become a parachute that opens too late?
Now, Susan, what would be wrong with doing what Mel wants, what Mel needs, giving people early access to super for just one thing to pay off their mortgage, which, you know, is a sensible decision.
What would be wrong with allowing her to simplify her affairs and not borrowing and saving at the same time?
But good policy would say addressing Mel's need by adjusting her retirement savings is trying to make the super system do two things at once.
Now, Mel may be a person who definitely uses any super that she takes out to pay her mortgage, but when we allowed withdrawals from super for a variety of reasons during COVID, paying off the mortgage was not what happened to those funds.
Yeah, so how do we know? How do we know that the money going out of super gets used to pay for mortgages?
Do you agree, Cameron, that it wouldn't stop at housing if we allowed people to have access to super?
So what I've spent on my mortgage now frees up other income I have to spend on other things.
So in a sense, it's just another bit of income during your working life instead of later on.
And you think that would be a good thing? Well, I think you should just let people gradually spend down their superannuation and unwind it because it's doing the opposite of what we think it's doing on almost every measure.
Now, as it happens... we've already got a number of schemes and a number proposed that sort of do enable us to convert super into homes.
Those schemes are what we're about to discuss here on The Economy Stupid on ABC Radio National with me, Peter Martin, and our guests, not always agreeing this week, Retirement Income Specialist at Monash University, Susan Thorpe, and Cameron Murray.
Now, Susan, what would be wrong with doing what Mel wants, what Mel needs, giving people early access to super for just one thing to pay off their mortgage, which, you know, is a sensible decision.
What would be wrong with allowing her to simplify her affairs and not borrowing and saving at the same time?
But good policy would say addressing Mel's need by adjusting her retirement savings is trying to make the super system do two things at once.
Now, Mel may be a person who definitely uses any super that she takes out to pay her mortgage, but when we allowed withdrawals from super for a variety of reasons during COVID, paying off the mortgage was not what happened to those funds.
Yeah, so how do we know? How do we know that the money going out of super gets used to pay for mortgages?
Do you agree, Cameron, that it wouldn't stop at housing if we allowed people to have access to super?
So what I've spent on my mortgage now frees up other income I have to spend on other things.
So in a sense, it's just another bit of income during your working life instead of later on.
And you think that would be a good thing? Well, I think you should just let people gradually spend down their superannuation and unwind it because it's doing the opposite of what we think it's doing on almost every measure.
Now, as it happens... we've already got a number of schemes and a number proposed that sort of do enable us to convert super into homes.
Those schemes are what we're about to discuss here on The Economy Stupid on ABC Radio National with me, Peter Martin, and our guests, not always agreeing this week, Retirement Income Specialist at Monash University, Susan Thorpe, and Cameron Murray.
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