The potential of no longer paying National Insurance.

Germanshepherdsmum

Even those who paid the married women’s stamp’? Was that ‘paying a fair share’?

But they don't get a pension!

Just as WASPI women were lied to, so were those who paid the Married Women's Stamp. I think public service employees were made to sign for thst because it saved their employer money.

TinSoldier

Quoting Martin Lewis: ^National Insurance is a Ponzi scheme. ^

It is, isn't it!

It’s not just about a pension, Callistemon - healthcare, benefits …

However, healthcare cost about a sixth of national GDP and I really don't see why those who can afford it (whether that money is coming from earned or unearned income) should pay so much less towards it, based on age.

Health care isn't just funded from National Insurance, in fact, only a very small proportion indeed comes from NI contributions.
It is funded from general taxation which a good proportion of people of pension age pay either Income tax, purchases. Also funded in small part by payments for prescriptions, dental charges, etc.

Germanshepherdsmum

It’s not just about a pension, Callistemon - healthcare, benefits …

Healthcare?

However, healthcare cost about a sixth of national GDP and I really don't see why those who can afford it (whether that money is coming from earned or unearned income) should pay so much less towards it, based on age.
At what level of income or wealth would you decide that someone ‘can afford’ to pay? Yet again, a means-tested approach would drag down those who have always had low to middle incomes, and reduce their chances of being comfortable in older age.

If someone is not working then presumably their income or wealth is from money they have saved when they did work. Why should that be used against them in retirement?

Would this be a household expense or would those who didn’t contribute in their ‘working’ lives be exempt again? If it is to be included in general taxation would this represent a cut in the State Pension in real terms, and is that ok?

I’m not saying that I don’t agree with pensioners paying NI however it is badged - I pay it myself- but it should be the same rule for everyone.

NI is supposed to pay for the NHS but of course it doesn’t. How much have women who paid the married women’s stamp contributed towards the care they receive?

When I worked in the public sector I knew only one woman who didn’t pay the full contribution - and how she boasted about that when we were paid each month. She divorced, and became ill and unable to work so I suspect she regrets her decision.

Germanshepherdsmum

It’s not just about a pension, Callistemon - healthcare, benefits …

The Married Women's Stamp:
Did not mean no stamp was paid at all, just the part which paid for a future pension.

I can't remember exactly the percentage of salary the small stamp was, but NI contributions were certainly paid.

I know a huge number of women who paid the married woman’s stamp, including my own mother. Many women were put on it automatically when they went back to work, without the wider implications being explained to them, which left them at a disadvantage later on if they became divorced. Thankfully the married woman’s stamp was phased out in the seventies, but we are still paying full pensions to many women who paid the reduced stamp, but whose husbands have died. These women can then claim the full state pension, often plus SERPS, by claiming on the stamps their husbands paid.

Germanshepherdsmum

NI is supposed to pay for the NHS but of course it doesn’t. How much have women who paid the married women’s stamp contributed towards the care they receive?

When I worked in the public sector I knew only one woman who didn’t pay the full contribution - and how she boasted about that when we were paid each month. She divorced, and became ill and unable to work so I suspect she regrets her decision.

Why do you keep persisting in this myth?

The Married Women's Stamp dud not mean no NI stamp was paid at all.
It meant they did not pay the amount which supposedly went towards a state pension, being told that would be paid by their husband.

It saved the employer money too. In my case that was the NHS.

maddyone

I know a huge number of women who paid the married woman’s stamp, including my own mother. Many women were put on it automatically when they went back to work, without the wider implications being explained to them, which left them at a disadvantage later on if they became divorced. Thankfully the married woman’s stamp was phased out in the seventies, but we are still paying full pensions to many women who paid the reduced stamp, but whose husbands have died. These women can then claim the full state pension, often plus SERPS, by claiming on the stamps their husbands paid.

Yes, when I returned to work I told my new employer I didn't want to pay the Married Women's Stamp (there had been more publicity about it by then, and employers were probably not allowed to lie about it either!).

Thankfully the married woman’s stamp was phased out in the seventies, but we are still paying full pensions to many women who paid the reduced stamp, but whose husbands have died. These women can then claim the full state pension, often plus SERPS, by claiming on the stamps their husbands paid.

As can any widow including those who paid the full stamp.

My mother paid the reduced stamp. As I mentioned above, she was one of the women who was never asked if that was what she wanted to do, she was simply automatically put on the married woman’s stamp, without the consequences ever being explained to her. She was paid a reduced pension when she retired, it was about £60 I think, because there was no longer a Married Couple’s Pension. Dad therefore claimed his full pension plus some extra for some reason. When Dad died, Mum claimed his pension through his stamps paid, not her own.
We lived in a very misogynistic society back in the 60/70s.

It’s not a myth Callistemon. Of course I know that the married women’s stamp did not mean no contribution was paid - but it was very little compared with the ‘full stamp’.

I think the new state pension is treated differently. I think only people on the old state pension can claim a widow’s pension as well as her own pension. Someone might know better. I might be wrong, but think that’s the case.

We lived in a very misogynistic society back in the 60/70s

I don't think much has changed in that respect but at least women are more aware of their rights now!

I'm rather fed up of older women being blamed and the implication being that they were stupid but the fact is employers lied.

The employers didn’t tell women what the implications of paying the reduced stamp were. You are right. My mother did not lie to me.

maddyone

I think the new state pension is treated differently. I think only people on the old state pension can claim a widow’s pension as well as her own pension. Someone might know better. I might be wrong, but think that’s the case.

A widow can't claim her husband's as well as her own pension, only instead of or the SERPS part of it.

To give an example, we are talking typically about the '60s and '70s. The culture was different then. Often women married very young, so many of the women who switched over to the married woman's rate were teenagers or in their early 20s. One woman who wrote a letter to me explained that she came back from her honeymoon, at the age of about 19, and the man from payroll came round and said, ''Did you have a nice honeymoon, love? Sign here. You're a married woman. You pay the married woman's rate.''

www.theyworkforyou.com/pbc/2003-04/Pensions_Bill/07-0_2004-03-18a.3.0

Yep.

maddyone

Yep.

To be fair, our Personnel Manager didn't call us "love"
He was a respectful and very polite gentleman 🙂
But toeing the senior management line - just sign here!

And, to press home a point, we still paid about 6% of our salary in NI contributions which presumably went into the general pot from which everyone might benefit.

I don’t think it is fair to blame people who abided by the system they were under. In the same way that I don’t think that anyone who has paid into the current system for decades is responsible for the fact that successive governments have ignored the demographic time bomb, it is not the fault of women who paid a lower stamp if that is what they were told to do. In either case we paid in believing that we would get a pension, and regardless of the fact that there is no ‘pot’ we are entitled to believe that this will be honoured.

My beef is that people who chose not to work got stamps paid, when mothers who worked did not, and with the constant threat of means-testing which would reduce the living standards of contributors to that of those who didn’t work and pay in, on the grounds that having an occupational pension means that they ‘can afford’ to pay for things that others get free.

Both our fathers died just before retirement and received nothing. My mother had worked all her life, paid for a full stamp and her pension was based on her earnings not her late husband's. Although her husband was entitled to a Naval Pension, my mother didn't receive a penny of that either because she wasn't married to him when he retired and she was one of those who didn't qualify when the rules changed.
A civilised society cares for its elderly whether they have paid for the privilege or not and despite it not seeming like it sometimes, we are lucky to live in a civilised society where if you haven't paid for your pension, you will be entitled to some form of state benefit.

Callistemon21

*And*, to press home a point, we still paid about 6% of our salary in NI contributions which presumably went into the general pot from which everyone might benefit.

Which was half the percentage current workers pay.