Saving and retirement tips, personal finance advice, and other money-related content.

A new era in retirement is dawning as the West’s golden age of pensions comes to an end and the first generation of ‘prosperous pensioners’ appears in the world’s emerging economies, according to a new report from HSBC.

In both Europe and North America, people have enjoyed generous state and company pensions, job stability and rising stock and property markets for many years.

But with people living longer and governments and companies unable to support the costs of expensive pension schemes, individuals are being forced to take much greater personal responsibility for their retirement planning.

And while Canadians as a group seem a bit better prepared for all this than those across the border, they’re still worried. 39% of us associate retirement with financial hardship, and this concern is highest amongst 50-59 year olds (45%), women (42%) and divorcees (53%).

Really, what the heck is going on with shoplifting these days?

Only a week after we discussed that, oddly, a recent uptick in thievery meant the economy was back on track (stealing is an inside job, the thinking goes, and more thefts mean workers are no longer crippled by fear of losing their employ), news comes out that once again throws the idea of shoplifting on its head.

According to a new study on the five-finger discount, the rich steal much more than the poor, suggesting that for every starving mother trying to feed her kids, there may be more than a few Winona Ryders in the fold.

It’s no secret that people spend more money when using credit cards compared to cash purchases, or that consumers also spend less when they look at their expenses in detail.

This just in: Shoppers who pay with plastic are also more likely to make impulsive junk food purchases than those using cash, according to a recent study from the Journal of Consumer Research.

In one experiment, participants — who thought they part of a market research study for a large retail chain — were asked to evaluate a series of 20 items, which unknown to them had been independently evaluated as either a “vice” (e.g., cookies, donuts) or a “virtue” (oatmeal, granola bars).

After viewing each item, participants had to decide whether to toss it into their shopping cart or continue on to the next item. The result: Those who’d been told that they could use any of four popular credit cards were more likely to buy the unhealthier products.

Car makers – well, North American car makers – will do anything to get you in one of their rides these days.

You’d think, with the devastating Japan ‘quake/tsunami having crippled production from giants like Toyota and Honda, domestic manufacturers would hold all the cards – except, of course, when you remember the decades of lousy models, greed and mismanagement that kind of turned us off local vehicles in the first place.

But, wait! What about this? Would your views on buying a domestic car change if a year’s worth of auto insurance was thrown in the deal?

Ads, officially now, are everywhere.

As consumers, we’ve come to both expect and understand why marketing is all around us. We know Times Square, for instance, is full of billboards because, well, it’s Times Square damnit! There’s too many people, too much disposable income floating around, for advertisers to not try and separate our cash from our pockets.

So it’s under that cat-and-mouse guise that we’re okay with ads being even in our bathrooms: on our stalls, in our urinals, even on our restroom mirrors.

Yet at least we live in a world where ads are in the present day. What we see: now. Yet, my oh my, what’s this? On a rerun of a How I Met Your Mother  episode the other day, several viewers saw something fishy. There, on a shelf from the 2007 clip, was an ad for Zookeeper, the Kevin James movie in theatres tomorrow.

Will most of the country’s 100,000 real estate agents soon be replaced by U.S.-style budget operations, in the same way that upstart online brokers muscled their way into the financial industry a decade ago? 

Probably not, but things are certainly heating up in the discounting market.

As technology and deregulation lower the barriers to entry here in Canada, upstarts flat-fee discounters and even general purpose sites like Kijiji have been capturing a bigger piece of the listings pie.

Now, in the hope that they may be able to steal a bit more market share, two of the industry’s biggest discounters are joining forces, the Globe and Mail reports.

Propertyguys, a company that helps people sell their own homes, will merge with flat-fee brokerage Realtysellers Real Estate later this month. 

Talk about a crappy economy.

We have every index to measure the world’s finances – the Unclaimed Bodies Index, the Men’s Underwear Index, the Hot Waitresses Index, etc. – but perhaps, in order to properly gauge economic well-being, we need only to turn our heads slightly while sitting on a public toilet.

Yes, maybe we need the Toilet Paper Index. Because, if you buy a story being reported now by the New York Post, the Big Apple is “so hard up” for cash that it’s having to ration bum wipe in public restrooms.

When it comes to condos, buyers need to balance getting in early — which sometimes means a better price — and plunking down a deposit on a building plagued by poor construction, shaky financing or hiddden fees.

It’s hard to think of any contract where the price on the front page is not the full purchase price, where additional charges are unlimited, and where the seller has no legal obligation to make full disclosure of extra charges to the buyer at the time of sale, says Toronto real estate lawyer Bob Aaron.

When he added up all the extra charges buried in the disclosure statement but not even hinted at in his client’s purchase agreement, the total came to just shy of a staggering $70,000, he reports on the Move Smartly blog.

For instance, it’s become common practice in Toronto and other major cities for some developers to require condominium purchasers in each building to contribute to the costs of guest suites, superintendent’s units, carwash bays, car share units and similar amenities.

This has become a week of extremes.

The day after we discussed the mysterious $100 million ATM receipt, another far-out, excessive news story is among us. Nine figure bank machine transaction record, meet the $100,000 parking spot.

In a move that Toronto may be both proud and ashamed of, the city, via the swanky Four Seasons residence towers, is set to unveil what’s believed to be Canada’s first $100,000 parking space.

In many cases, especially accounting for depreciation, such parking slips will be worth more each year than the cars resting inside them.

Wal-Mart's core shoppers are running out of money much faster than a year ago due to rising gasoline prices, and the retail giant is worried.

So much so that world's biggest retailer is cutting gas prices by 10 cents a gallon for three months to help consumers worried about their spending amid a sputtering economy and busy summer travel season.

Customers visiting participating gas stations in 18 states through the end of September will receive a discount on all fuel, gas and diesel purchases when they use Wal-Mart branded cards.

All of which means, assuming you’re going to be down south anyway, you can save a bit on that fill up. Closer to home though, the discounts aren’t so great — often only a few cents.