Vine-Lott: How can we encourage savers?

Encouraging people to save is seldom easy, least of all when inflation is eating into the purchasing power of capital and returns.

Certainly the announcement that September’s Consumer Price Index had risen to 5.2% made for depressing news for those with money in lower-yielding deposit accounts. Yet for committed long-term savers there was some upside. Next year’s ISA limit is set to increase in line with this September’s CPI, boosting the maximum contribution into stocks & shares ISAs from April 2012 to £11,280, up from £10,680. Half, £5,640 may of course be put into a cash ISA. While to some, it intuitively makes sense to prioritise and look beyond the present market turbulence in order to set aside money for the ...