How to Get Through The Tough Times The Old Style Way.

jackieglasgow

Shall we start a new thread now we're past 3000 posts?

jackieglasgow

Sorry larumbelle we cross posted that looks like I am ignoring your post, I wasn't - honest

TBH I have buried my head in the sand about retiring. I have thirty years to worry about it, my present employer has a great final salary pension scheme and other than that, I am not dwelling on it for now

mardatha

I think the new thread should be called "As The Workhouse Approaches "... :rotfl:

jackieglasgow

pmsl, I think that's genius!

Pitlanepiglet

Ohh how strange, there was a new thread but now there isn't! I thought we were encouraged to have new threads to avoid running threads that were too big?

Oh well....stay calm and carry on OS'ing

jackieglasgow

Its a 4000 post limit, I was getting way ahead of myself

GreyQueen

I feel that it is wickedly hard to spring pension changes onto women with only a handful of years left to reach what was their expected retirement age as it leaves them with almost no room for making adjustments to their plans. I was one of the age cohort who was under 44 years ago when that line was drawn in the sand some years ago and have had a long time to accept that I would have to go to at least 65, and it has now crept to 66 and with 20+ years of working left, I have every expectation that my retirement age will recede further perhaps to age 70 or beyond. The youngest colleagues in my office are already facing age 68 but they are so young that they can't even imagine being 40 never mind 60 + (bless 'em all).

Extending a person's working life into what is now the pensioner years pre-supposes that a person is enjoying reasonable health and has a type of job which is feasable given the loss of strength and vigour, as well as likely worsening of eyesight and hearing. Manual labourers, or their female counterparts in caring and ancillary jobs do intensely physical work and the human body wears out a lot faster for some than for others who push a pen or captain a keyboard. Will a 65 year old care worker or nurse be expected to woman-handle a 71 or 80 year old around? I've worked in factories where the pace of the "lines" was so fast that it was a rare women past 40 who could do the job, and many of those had hands deformed by heavy, repetitive work. Women with manual jobs will be brutally treated by these changes.

And where there are no jobs, what are we supposed to do, work unto our dotage with failing strength whilst the youngsters sit twiddling their thumbs waiting for their chance to be economically active? I suppose if they wear us all down into a grease spot of exhaustion we'll die more quickly and not be a burden on the NHS or the pensions service.

I'm already suffering from ME with a severely-comprosmised ability to earn my own living, so when age-related problems are added to that, I shall have a jolly time as my life shrinks down to working, coming home to eat and collapsing into bed before doing it all again. Remind me that we are supposed to be in the Big Society.......:rotfl:

Of course, everything has unintended consequences. I think of my friend and neighbour SuperGran, who took early retirement from the NHS in her early fifties. She was a theatre sister, a demanding and harrowing job and she often had to dash between 2 hospitals 50 miles apart at antisocial hours. It wasn't uncommon to come home from a gruelling shift, get her coat off, then get called back in as there had been a road traffic accident and energency surgery had to be done. She chose to take the NHS pension she'd contributed into since her teens and subsidise herself from savings until she qualified for the state pension at 60.

SuperGran is 66 next week and is a one-woman dymano, very active in her church and a number of organisations, someof which she's been associated for 40 years. She wouldn't have done what she has done if she had been in work as she's as busy about community activites as many people are about their jobs. If she was retiring next week, she wouldn't be starting 15 years of active service to the community, she'd be putting her feet up, and deservedly so.

I think there are millions of SuperGrans out there, humbly keeping everything going, and if their future versions are going to be in the workforce, getting more and more ragged with exhaustion every year, who will do all this stuff which we value but won't pay hard cash for?

Since I have a couple of other problems other than ME (don't want to give to many details but one is life-threatening) I don't know how well I shall be in 10 years, never mind 25, or what my physical capapbilities will be. It's possible I might not reach pensionable age, rendering the debate moot for me at least.

So, if I'm going to be grafting until I'm an old lady, I shall have some nice modestly-active holidays now and scrimp and save to keep the wolf from the door in the latter years when I shall huddle in my rugs and and reminisce about the grand old days in the early twenty-first century.

:mad:Let's work on this together and give the barstewards something to complain about. My MP has a majority of less than 500 and is from a coalition party.....think I must make him sweat a little for his salary......:rotfl:

BitterAndTwisted

How long do MPs have to serve their constituencies in parliament before they qualify for their gold-plated inflation-proofed pensions?

bertiebots

BitterAndTwisted wrote: »

How long do MPs have to serve their constituencies in parliament before they qualify for their gold-plated inflation-proofed pensions?

As most of them are "old money" anyway I doubt they even care..look at the expenses scandal and how they claimed they didnt realise that they (for eg.) already payed off the £500k mortgage.. so it wasnt their fault they were still claiming for it etc etc...how much money do you have to have to not know ,if you are ,or are not paying a mortgage of that amount fgs????!:mad:
As for the scandolous amounts of elderly freezing to death/starving in our ever increasingly harsh winters I bet they knew to the penny what their outgoings were..which is why they froze to death .

Erm soz..went off on one there !:eek:but this country makes me so angry sometimes, the system is so unfare and is getting worse!

mardatha

B&T....don't. You sound scarily like my husband and one of them is enough !