Are pensioners about to be shafted – again?

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  • Andy_L
    Andy_L Posts: 12,765
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    Sapphire wrote: »
    It is at present – the increase each year is extremely small.

    Isn't it 2.5% this year due to the triple lock
  • hyubh
    hyubh Posts: 3,526
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    Sapphire wrote: »
    preventing benefit seekers from outside and inside Europe from coming here and benefitting from taxpayers

    Poles etc. quickly become net contributors.
    a better thing for a government to do would be to tighten border controls massively,

    I see in the news that one of the arch Bexiteers in government is now backtacking on doing exactly that for agriculture. Got to keep food on the plate!
    have the right people in place who wouldn't just wave everyone into our country, and make sure that the NHS is used as it should be, by our citizens

    Presumably you're chuck out any immigrant staff as well?
    Given that our pensions are lower than those of other European countries, any British government that ruthlessly penalises lower rate tax-paying pensioners as suggested is not going to be looked on favourably by many. :cool:

    If you're looking for other people's taxes to see you through old age, how about moving away from Kingston-Upon-Thames? I hear it's quite expensive.
  • Sapphire
    Sapphire Posts: 4,269
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    Andy_L wrote: »
    The average civil service salary is well below the higher rate mark

    Is it? I didn't know that. I thought many civil servants, MPs, etc., accrued very large pensions due to the work they do in addition to their work in government.

    In any case, there must be other ways of raising money than taking it from people who've worked incredibly hard for decades, and have often contributed a lot to society, and are still doing so in many cases. There's this picture that some on this site like to spread, of pensioners constantly going on cruises and splashing out money. If that was the case I would agree that pension 'benefits' could be cut for such people. However, the reality is quite different, at least for those who I know who are pensioners.
  • Sapphire
    Sapphire Posts: 4,269
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    hyubh wrote: »
    Poles etc. quickly become net contributors.

    Presumably you're chuck out any immigrant staff as well?

    If you're looking for other people's taxes to see you through old age, how about moving away from Kingston-Upon-Thames? I hear it's quite expensive.

    Don't worry, you don't need to tell me about Poles – I speak Polish and know exactly who comes here and how they use their money. Many send it back to Poland, though the contributors are of course welcome. Shame so many British people north of the south of England are being deprived of work/aren't being given the right skills or motivation to work like the Poles. Not good for them, or for our nation.

    When did I imply that I'd 'chuck out any immigrant staff as well'? I've always said that migrants from Europe should be accepted if they are of use to our economy.

    That's a silly, rather jealous-sounding comment at the end, though believe me, if I didn't have family in London, I would move away like a shot, as far away as possible from London. But I'm a Londoner born and bred, so it is not easy to do…
  • steampowered
    steampowered Posts: 6,176
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    edited 8 January 2017 at 4:48PM
    Sorry, but I don't agree that any of this is "shafting pensioners".

    Pensioners as a group have been treated extremely well in recent years. During a decade of spending cuts, the benefits paid to older people (such as the state pension) have been increased and other benefits such as free bus passes and winter fuel allowances have been introduced. Meanwhile, benefits paid and services given to working age people and younger people have been cut dramatically.
    In any case, there must be other ways of raising money than taking it from people who've worked incredibly hard for decades, and have often contributed a lot to society
    I don't think that argument works. Because fairness should be achieved between generations. If you want to subsidise today's retired people, tomorrow's retired people will have to pay for it. I don't think it is fair for today's retired people to expect a more generous retirement system than they have actually paid for.

    When the figures were crunched by the National Institute for Economic and Social Research a few years ago, they found that the average 65-year-old receives £223,183 more in state services and benefits than they paid in tax, whereas a new-born child would on current projections have to pay £159,668 more in taxes than they receive in services and benefits merely to fund the current level of pensioner services and benefits. Link.
    There are plenty of other ways for the government to gain money, such as cutting down the massive amounts of foreign aid (much of which is wasted), preventing benefit seekers from outside and inside Europe from coming here and benefitting from taxpayers
    The problem with this argument is that your numbers don't add up! You could abolish foreign aid and benefits for EU migrants but it wouldn't make much difference to the numbers. I don't think there are any painless ways for the government to save the kind of money it needs to save.

    The foreign aid budget last year was about £12 billion.

    On the immigration side, the figures I found on google suggest that EU migrants are paid about £0.5 billion in benefits while paying £3 billion in income tax each year (source).

    Both of those are a drop in the ocean compared to the £557 billion which the government projected it would spend on pensioner benefits over the next 5 years in the recent spending review (source).
  • Sapphire
    Sapphire Posts: 4,269
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    edited 8 January 2017 at 4:55PM
    Andy_L wrote: »
    Isn't it 2.5% this year due to the triple lock

    Correct – which works out to roughly £3–£4 per week extra.

    Still, one good outcome of a cutting of benefits might be to propel the ejection of idle, unmotivated and hedonistic 30-year-olds from their parents' homes (there are two like that just in my family, who have no ambition other than to indulge themselves), when they realise that they have to work, like their parents did when they were their age. :T

    I'm sure those who are currently not pensioners would bitterly regret the cutting of pensions today, once they are themselves of pension age, particularly given that many pensioners now have to pay for their own care, even if they can ill afford it. We'll end up with people dying on the street again, as they once did, given job prospects, automation and the huge rise in population worldwide, much of it clamouring to come to the West. Nice things for future generations to look forward to…
  • Number75
    Number75 Posts: 205
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    You say pensioners who have been carefully planning...
    Well, lucky them that they were able to plan!
    I joined my company 16 years ago. My boss just retired and his DB scheme is now paying out exactly what he has know it would for those last 16 years. So the planning bit was kind of easy for him.
    I'm lucky that I've got 16 years DB that gives me predictability too.
    However, this year we go DC and I've lost a third of my projected retirement income, instantly. And that DC portion that I'll build for next 15 years til I retire isn't too predictable in what it will build for me.

    Compare that to the person 16 years younger than me who joined today straight into DC. They'll be jealous of me being able to plan with at least a core amount guaranteed.

    Many (far from all!) of today's pensioners had the benefit of DB schemes that today's younger workforce can only dream about. These people are not poor planners - they simply don't have it as easy, in that respect.

    In my opinion, anyone planning their retirement should do so based on SP and nothing more. Coming unstuck because a bus pass is taken away, means you didn't plan well - because you should never count on a political benefit as a god given ongoing right.

    I'm not too sympathetic to pensioners on £38K (!!!) losing winter fuel and bus passes and triple lock.
    For the ones on £155 a week, I am.
  • Number75
    Number75 Posts: 205
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    Sapphire, your idle 30 year old relatives surely have had that indulged far more by a state system generous to pensioners (no fears to retirement funding by their parents) and their own parents' actions?

    The ONLY reason that these people are living at home, is because their parents allow it. (possibly they allow it because rental prices in some areas are crazy) You can't blame the government for parents not instilling some kind of work ethic and pride in their children - or at the very least, just booting them out!
  • xylophone
    xylophone Posts: 44,140
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    The late Margaret Thatcher began her pension reforms with the Social Security Act of 1980. This saw the correlation between average earnings and state pension increases severed, with the aim to reduce public spending.

    Pensioners have only started "catching up" with what they would have received had the link not been severed.

    The full new state pension is still below what a basic state pension would have been had the earnings link not been severed?
  • dunstonh wrote: »
    Pensioners have largely been the least affected by austerity. So, what are these shaftings you speak of?
    .

    One particular group of pensioners have been particularly shafted, namely those relying on social care.

    There needs to be a shift from some pensioner benefits to provide reasonable social care for older pensioners. Thus, the triple lock and fuel benefits should go and possibly charge a lower NI rate for earnings of pensioners (free bus passes should probably stay). This would generate significant funding which can be redirected to other pensioners who need social care.
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