Saving and investing news
Government and banks 'should help low earners'
15 January, 2007
Financial experts are calling on the government to do more to give a helping hand to those on low incomes who want to start saving cash
A senior analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown said today that banks should join forces with ministers to help people who aren't earning much money to start saving.
Meera Patel believes that one possibility would be to encourage those with lower incomes to save by promising to add 20p to every pound saved in a savings account.
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The comments were made after Lloyds TSB announced the launch of the Save the Change scheme, whereby every debit card purchase is rounded up to the nearest pound and the extra put into a savings account.
She explained: "More needs to be done by the banks and building societies and even more so by the government to encourage savings in one form or another."
"I don't know what the ideal way is but I think it is more down to the government to get together with the banks and offer some form of subsidy maybe for low income earners who don't have savings or who have high debt."
Lloyds hopes that the new scheme will help the 30 per cent of 25 to 44 year olds who have no savings at all.
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