Media Release

Retirement costs remain steady: new ASFA Retirement Standard figures

Media Release: 6 February 2012

Retirement costs remain steady: new ASFA Retirement Standard figures

A couple looking to achieve a ‘comfortable’ retirement will need to spend $55,249 a year, while those seeking a ‘modest’ retirement lifestyle need to spend $31,675 a year, according to new figures released today for the ASFA Retirement Standard. These figures are marginally down on the equivalent figures for the previous quarter.

The updated figures reverse the trend of the previous few quarters where the amount needed by retirees to fund their post-work lifestyle continued to increase.

The aggregate costs for a couple living comfortably in retirement were down by 0.1 per cent in the December quarter 2011 from the September quarter 2011 (see Table 1 for budget breakdown).

The movement in costs over the quarter for retirees was similar to the ‘no change’ recorded in the All Groups Consumer Price Index (CPI). Both were basically unchanged between the two quarters.

However, in some quarters the price increases recorded will differ as retiree households on average have somewhat different spending patterns to the rest of the population.

Along with generally owning their own home outright (so cost increases for housing are less important for retirees), on average they spend a negligible amount on education services.

In contrast, food, health, transportation and recreation spending form a large part of retiree budgets.

Table 1: Budgets for various households and living standards (December quarter 2011)

  Modest lifestyle – single Modest lifestyle – couple Comfortable lifestyle – single Comfortable lifestyle – couple
Housing – ongoing only $58.20 $55.87 $67.46 $78.20
Energy $34.35 $45.62 $34.86 $47.28
Food $74.61 $154.56 $106.59 $191.86
Clothing $18.08 $29.36 $39.14 $58.72
Household goods and services $26.08 $35.36 $73.36 $85.94
Health $34.32 $66.24 $68.09 $120.18
Transport $92.21 $94.82 $137.41 $140.02
Leisure $73.40 $109.36 $222.44 $304.83
Communications $9.30 $16.29 $25.57 $32.55
Total per week $420.57 $607.47 $774.93 $1,059.57
Total per year $21,930 $31,675 $40,407 $55,249

The figures in each case assume that the retiree(s) own their own home and relate to expenditure by the household. This can be greater than household income after income tax where there is a drawdown on capital over the period of retirement. Single calculations are based on female figures. All calculations are weekly, unless otherwise stated.

Between the September quarter 2011 and the December quarter 2011, retirees had a 1.5 per cent decrease in the cost of food but over the year to the December quarter, there was an increase of 2.5 per cent. A fall in the price of fruit in the December quarter (by 13.4 per cent) and a five per cent fall in the price of vegetables were largely responsible.

The decrease in the price of fruit and vegetables was due to seasonal factors and favourable growing conditions. The movement in the price of fruit was particularly affected by a fall in the cost of bananas as supplies recovered from the adverse impact of Cyclone Yasi.

Electricity costs rose on average by 0.6 per cent, reflecting substantial price increases in a few, smaller states following relatively large increases in other states the quarter before.

Transport costs were unchanged between the quarters with a decrease in the cost of motor vehicles offsetting a rise in the price of petrol.

The price of leisure goods and services rose by 0.8 per cent between the quarters, with the cost of domestic holidays increasing by 7.3 per cent and the cost of overseas holidays falling by 1.9 per cent.

Communications costs increased by 1.1 per cent in the quarter mainly due to increased prices for telecommunications equipment and services but over the year the increase in costs was only 1.6 per cent.

The 1.2 per cent fall in the price of health services reflected a fall in pharmaceutical prices with more individuals benefiting from the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme safety net. However, over the year there was a 3.6 per cent increase in the costs of health services. Over the longer term, health services tend to experience higher increases in prices than other categories of consumer goods and services.

More information
Costs and summary figures can be accessed via the ASFA website. The document on the ASFA Retirement Standard also includes estimates of the lump sums that would be needed in order to support expenditure at the various levels set out in the modest and comfortable budgets for singles and couples. These lump sums did not change between the September and December quarters because the expenditure needs were basically the same. The lump sum needed for a comfortable lifestyle, assuming access to a part Age Pension, is around $510,000 for a couple and $430,000 for a single.

For media inquiries, please contact:

Pauline Vamos, CEO, 0433 169 342

Rebecca Glenn, GM Marketing and Communications, 0416 170 439

Megan McDougall, Media and Communications Coordinator, (02) 8079 0849

About ASFA – the voice of super

The Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia is the peak industry body representing the superannuation and retirement industry. Its members represent over 90 per cent of the approximately 12 million Australians with superannuation. ASFA members manage or advise on the bulk of the $1.3 trillion in superannuation assets as at September 2011. ASFA is the only organisation that represents all types of superannuation funds (retail, industry, corporate and public sector) and associated service providers.

Carmen Beverley-Smith

Executive Director - Superannuation, Life & Private Health Insurance, APRA

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Carmen joined APRA in March 2023 and holds the role of Executive Director, Life and Private Health Insurance and Superannuation.  

She has had an esteemed career in financial services, spanning over 25 years. She has held diverse leadership roles at Westpac and Commonwealth Bank of Australia, including across risk, transformation and change, product and portfolio development, and sales and service. 

Prior to joining APRA, she held the role of General Manager, Risk Transformation Delivery Integration at Westpac. This involved leading the group-wide implementation of a suite of solutions to uplift risk management capability and develop data, analytics and reporting. 

Carmen leads with a values-driven approach and a particular interest in developing and mentoring talent. 

She holds a Bachelor of Commerce and Accounting, is a certified Chartered Accountant and a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors. 

Amy C. Edmondson

Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management, Harvard Business School

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Amy C. Edmondson is the Novartis Professor of Leadership and Management at the Harvard Business School, a chair established to support the study of human interactions that lead to the creation of successful enterprises that contribute to the betterment of society.

Edmondson has been recognized by the biannual Thinkers50 global ranking of management thinkers since 2011, and most recently was ranked #1 in 2021 and 2023; she also received that organization’s Breakthrough Idea Award in 2019, and Talent Award in 2017.  She studies teaming, psychological safety, and organisational learning, and her articles have been published in numerous academic and management outlets, including Administrative Science Quarterly, Academy of Management Journal, Harvard Business Review and California Management Review. Her 2019 book, The Fearless Organization: Creating Psychological Safety in the Workplace for Learning, Innovation and Growth (Wiley), has been translated into 15 languages. Her prior books – Teaming: How organizations learn, innovate and compete in the knowledge economy (Jossey-Bass, 2012), Teaming to Innovate (Jossey-Bass, 2013) and Extreme Teaming (Emerald, 2017) – explore teamwork in dynamic organisational environments. In Building the future: Big teaming for audacious innovation (Berrett-Koehler, 2016), she examines the challenges and opportunities of teaming across industries to build smart cities. 

Edmondson’s latest book, Right Kind of Wrong (Atria), builds on her prior work on psychological safety and teaming to provide a framework for thinking about, discussing, and practicing the science of failing well. First published in the US and the UK in September, 2023, the book is due to be translated into 24 additional languages, and was selected for the Financial Times and Schroders Best Business Book of the Year award.

Before her academic career, she was Director of Research at Pecos River Learning Centers, where she worked on transformational change in large companies. In the early 1980s, she worked as Chief Engineer for architect/inventor Buckminster Fuller, and her book A Fuller Explanation: The Synergetic Geometry of R. Buckminster Fuller (Birkauser Boston, 1987) clarifies Fuller’s mathematical contributions for a non-technical audience. Edmondson received her PhD in organisational behavior, AM in psychology, and AB in engineering and design from Harvard University.

 

Daniel Mulino MP

Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services

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Born in Brindisi, Italy, Daniel was a young child when he moved with his family to Australia. He grew up in Canberra and completed his first degrees – arts and law – at the ANU. He then completed a Master of Economics (University of Sydney) and a PhD in economics from Yale.

He lectured at Monash University, was an economic adviser in the Gillard government and was a Victorian MP from 2014 to 2018. As Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer of Victoria, Daniel helped deliver major infrastructure projects and developed innovative financing structures for community projects.

In 2018 he was preselected for the new federal seat of Fraser and became its first MP at the 2019 election, re-elected in 2022 and 2025. From 2022 to 2025, Daniel was chair of the House of Representatives’ Standing Economics Committee in which he chaired inquiries; economic dynamism, competition and business formation and insurers’ responses to 2022 major floods claims.

In 2025, he became the Assistant Treasurer and Minister for Financial Services.

In August 2022, Daniel published ‘Safety Net: The Future of Welfare in Australia’, which aims to explore the ways in which an insurance approach can improve the effectiveness of government service delivery.