Rise in Pension Age

I have neither said nor implied that all public sector workers are less clever than their private sector counterparts. I can only speak of those with whom I worked.

maddyone
The argument used why should younger people pay for your pension is so very selfish. The answer surely is ^because I paid for the pensions of older people than I am because that’s how it’s done

I think the concern is the growing size of the amount of money younger generations will have to pay to fund the pensions of those older them.

When pensions were first introduced, the avaerage time that someone drew a pension was 7 years. We had a growing population so the number of working people contributing towards these pensions was quite high.

Nowadays most pensioners will be drawing their pension for 20 years and more and we have a declining birthrate so the number of working people contributing to each pension is much smaller and there is a very real concern that the taxation burden on those in work will not be able to be cut and may be needed to increase just to pay for state pensions.

Concern about this isn't selfish, this heavy burden, far heavier than in the past, is all ready causing friction between generations. We see this in the housing market and the real resentment felt towards older people who own their own houses that have rapidly increased in value, and the end of occupational pensions with defined benefits.

maddyone

The argument used why should younger people pay for your pension is so very selfish. The answer surely is ^because I paid for the pensions of older people than I am because that’s how it’s done.^

That is how it's done, it works really.

No other workable solution has been promoted that I recall.

Not quite the same, but what about working people, who maybe have never had children, seen their taxes helping to pay for child benefit?

Thinking of a work colleague, just left work at nearly 66 years old, having worked full time since 18, single, never had children, hardly ever any sick leave.

I expect she’s quite happy to think her state pension is being provided courtesy of all these taxes she’s paid for nearly 50 years.

Calendargirl Surely the fact that it will be the children of other people paying their pension is justification enough for single people contributing to the support of other people's children.

In old age it will be entirely other people's children caring for them, providing medical support, mending roads, growing food, driving buses etc etc. In bee hives they kill off the drones once they have served their useful purpose. Should we do that to single people who have outgrown their usefulness and done nothing to ensure their future?

That question is rhetorical. I have a happily single and childless daughter, but she has never expressed any resentment at her taxes being used to support other people's children.

Calendargirl

Not quite the same, but what about working people, who maybe have never had children, seen their taxes helping to pay for child benefit?

Thinking of a work colleague, just left work at nearly 66 years old, having worked full time since 18, single, never had children, hardly ever any sick leave.

I expect she’s quite happy to think her state pension is being provided courtesy of all these taxes she’s paid for nearly 50 years.

Her pension will be paid out of current taxation, not out of the money she has paid in.

(Someone will be along to correct that in a moment, no doubt 😀)

She's also been paying for the education of children who will become taxpayers and pay for her pension.
She's been paying in to the NHS for all those less fortunate than her who need treatment - and for maternity services.
She, and all of us, pay for services we may never need.

That's how society works here.

Paying for services we may never need is how insurance works. Sometimes we hope we never need them, sometimes we are, effectively, paying in advance for something we hope we do live long enough to get back.

I know we never realise when we are young, but today's younger generation will be old one day. The intergenerational unfairness we keep hearing about is manufactured, but turning groups against one another is an effective strategy. We don't need to compare pensions with anything - they are pensions, and should be judged as such. There is no need for pensioners to live a subsistence lifestyle after a lifetime of work. That there is no need for younger people to live like that either is a separate argument, and the merits of one are not linked to those of the other. There is no element of needing to persuade pensioners that going to work is better than not. Pensioners have contributed both financially and in terms of their productivity - often since they were teenagers - they are not so much claiming on insurance as cashing in a policy. Whether the government has mishandled their custodianship of our cash or not is not the point. They can find the money growing on the same tree as that on which they found enough to pay their chums for no PPE, or to pension off Liz Truss and Kwasi Karting after a few days of service.

Calendargirl

Not quite the same, but what about working people, who maybe have never had children, seen their taxes helping to pay for child benefit?

Thinking of a work colleague, just left work at nearly 66 years old, having worked full time since 18, single, never had children, hardly ever any sick leave.

I expect she’s quite happy to think her state pension is being provided courtesy of all these taxes she’s paid for nearly 50 years.

I'm one of those and it's never been problem. My taxes pay for the education of future nurses, doctors etc etc. I have had sick leave but nowhere near as much as maternity leave.

Doodledog The intergenerational unfairness we keep hearing about is manufactured, but turning groups against one another is an effective strategy. We don't need to compare pensions with anything - they are pensions, and should be judged as such.

Agreed. Life changes, prices go up and down, no need for intergenerational unhappiness regarding home prices, wages, pensions - anything. Times are different, some paid 17% interest, we paid 5%. Some paid into pensions for 30 years, some 50. something to deal with, no need for jealousy.

Agreed, Norah. The strategy of telling young people that 'Boomers' all got houses virtually free (we paid 16% for years) and free education (only something like 10% went to university and hardly any from less well-off families) is divisive, as is telling us that 'Millenials' would all be able to afford houses if they didn't buy takeaway coffee.

There are differences within those groups as well as between them, and it is all a huge distraction from the real problems faced by us all.

Doodledog

Agreed, Norah. The strategy of telling young people that 'Boomers' all got houses virtually free (we paid 16% for years) and free education (only something like 10% went to university and hardly any from less well-off families) is divisive, as is telling us that 'Millenials' would all be able to afford houses if they didn't buy takeaway coffee.

There are differences within those groups as well as between them, and it is all a huge distraction from the real problems faced by us all.

I don't agree to the bit regarding not saving every pound to a home deposit, by not frittering it away on coffees and takeaways. But I'm a saver, so a point I won't understand, init?

Same here Norah. I think if some of them totted up what they spend on coffees, takeaways and other bits and pieces they would be horrified. If you want to save money something’s got to give.

I'm a saver too, but I was able to save for a house, which is something out of the reach of many nowadays. Also, takeaway coffee didn't exist - I'm sure that by a measure of only buying absolute essentials most of us would fail.

I think the notion of a feckless younger generation is as fallacious as the notion of a pampered and entitled older one.

Germanshepherdsmum

Same here Norah. I think if some of them totted up what they spend on coffees, takeaways and other bits and pieces they would be horrified. If you want to save money something’s got to give.

If you want to save money something’s got to give.

Indeed.

Thus no frivolous spending during (say) deposit saving.

It served me well and I still had fun.

Didn't 'our' generation get described as feckless and spendthrift, spendng all our money on Dansettes, pop records and holidays in Majorca?

Well if they did I wasn’t one of them.

I spent my pocket money on pop and jazz records and had a Dansette for my birthday.
It was red, I loved it.

I never got to Majorca until I was about 60!

M0nica

Didn't 'our' generation get described as feckless and spendthrift, spendng all our money on Dansettes, pop records and holidays in Majorca?

Perhaps other people had Mums who allowed more freedoms?

I certainly never did the things you list. No holidays to Majorca or fancy beach. Mum liked ski and Continental holidays as a family.

Very conservative "Churchy' family at that.

As usual, all families are quite different.

Mum liked ski and Continental holidays as a family

We went to Cornwall, North Wales and Bournemouth.
But this was the 1950s and very early 1960s; Continental and ski holidays were not de rigueur and only for the well-off as they were relatively expensive then.

Well, Norah my father was in the army. I led a peripatetic childhood, I went to 8 primary schools and like so many army children went to boarding school at 11, paid for by the army, to ensure I stood a chance of getting a decent education and passing some exams.

It worked so well for me, that I went to university, got a job in London and left home at 21 to share a flat with friends. I had a record player, not a Dansette and a collection of records, mainly classical. The holiday in Majorca came when DH and I married. He had a cousin married to a Majorcan.

My background is very different to yours Norah, but that makes it no better and no worse, just different. I married much later, 24, and had children even later, 28 & 30. Again, not better, not worse, just different.

The joy of living is knowing the variety of experiences of other people's lives. I remain endlessly curious about everything. DH says that when I die, the word he will have inscribed on my tombstone is the word 'Why' because it precedes so much of what I say and is the word I use most frequently.

I had a record player, not a Dansette and a collection of records, mainly classic
I had a friend who used to cycle over every Sunday afternoon and bring jazz records and classical records; by then we had a very highly polished radiogram.

Norah

Germanshepherdsmum

Same here Norah. I think if some of them totted up what they spend on coffees, takeaways and other bits and pieces they would be horrified. If you want to save money something’s got to give.

If you want to save money something’s got to give.

Indeed.

Thus no frivolous spending during (say) deposit saving.

If you can't be frivolous at 16, 17, 18 then when can you!

They’re probably not saving for a deposit then, still in school!

Callistemon21

Norah

Germanshepherdsmum

Same here Norah. I think if some of them totted up what they spend on coffees, takeaways and other bits and pieces they would be horrified. If you want to save money something’s got to give.

If you want to save money something’s got to give.

Indeed.

Thus no frivolous spending during (say) deposit saving.

If you can't be frivolous at 16, 17, 18 then when can you!

IDK. I'm not frivolous.

I was married at 16, had our eldest at 17. My husband saved our deposit in the 2 yrs he worked after he left school, before we married.