This is Armchair Economics with Hamish McRae, a subscriber-only newsletter from The i Paper. If you’d like to get this direct to your inbox, every single week, you can sign up here.

This is Armchair Economics with Hamish McRae, a subscriber-only newsletter from The i Paper. If you’d like to get this direct to your inbox, every single week, you can sign up here.

The financial impact of the war in the Middle East will have confirmed many people’s view that saving and investing for a pension is a risky business. Shares worldwide have fallen by between 5 per cent and 10 per cent. In New York, Larry Fink, head of the world’s largest asset manager, BlackRock, warns that if oil prices reach $150 (£112) a barrel, there will be a global recession. And there are plenty of warnings, including one from London-based Capital Economics, which says what is happening now is the prelude to a more serious market crash in the near future.

The current ructions are down to Donald Trump’s war, but the UK is in danger of adding another disincentive to saving for a pension. That is because the Government’s Pension Schemes Bill proposes that it should have the power to direct where pension savings should be invested, in particular requiring a proportion of the funds to be invested in UK and private assets. The House of Lords, which has been considering the legislation, has recently struck down the more extreme parts of the bill, arguing that investment decisions should remain the responsibility of pension fund trustees.

We will see how the Government responds when the bill comes back to the Commons. It will probably argue that these are reserve powers only to be used in emergency circumstances, and it may step back. But for many people faced with the question – what’s the better way to save for retirement, property or pension? – This sort of thing will tip them towards property, or even not saving for a pension at all. After all, you don’t want some future government forcing you to back a pet project like........

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