Retired people could work for pensions..

paulmapp8306

REALLY late to this thread, and only read the first page - so if this has been covered i apologies - but:

1. i think hes talking about the STATE pension - so those moaning anout paying into their own schemes should calm down a bit They cant force you to work for something youve provided yourself.

2. Despite point 1, its still bad. If your working, then your not retired, so not receiving a pension. what they would be effectivley doing is increasing the retirement age.

3. If there asking you to work for you pension/income - wont they have to pay you at minimum wage? So that would mean not many hours given the level of the state pension.

4. Where are they getting the work for you to do? If there is work that needs doing - give it the unemployed who are of a PROPPER workng age.

paulmapp8306

Oh - forgot.

I have said on many occasions to many people, that when you receive a state BENEFIT (NOT pension) you should work for it at the minimum wage rate. So, if you receive £180/week you work 30 (ish) hours. You should be able to offset job-finding against those hours - so (for instance) your on a training course, interveiw (and associated travel and preparation) or activle filling out job aplications. Jobs you should then do are things that need doing (preferably for the community) that arnt beig done now (litter picking, grafiti removal, or assisting other people in employment).

I cant see this happening (though it would get a lot of peopl out looking for better work - many dont work because it doesnt pay them to as why should they go to work 35 hours a week for a £20 pay rise), however until it does - how can you possible ask pensioners to work for their (earned and paid for in most cases) state pension.

ruggedtoast

CLAPTON wrote: »

In 1960 the government debt was about 100% of GDP and only fell to 50% by the early 70s.

I'm bemused by your opinion that the young in no way suffered from the debt (only the adults) but that was a different time where the young were busy inventing sex, were optimistic and were building a pretty good future for the succeeding generations. And they didn't 'blame' the older generations for the problems of the world but instead sought to improve life fo all mankind.

In the 1940's government debt was nearing 250%. It had more than halved by the time you lot were buying your first kaftans and scouring Woolworths for 7 inches.

By the time the 70s dawned the oldest boomer would still only have been mid 20s. Somehow I dont think people bumming around Cornwall in sharabangs paid off the debt.

All you had to do was hunker down until the 80s and it was happy days.

antrobus

thorsoak wrote: »

....

In the 1980s,under Thatcher, sales of local authority housing went through the roof - but the monies from these sales went straight into central government coffers - therefore no more local authority housing. Whilst much blame for the financial situation can be put at the door of Blair and Brown, this one cannot be.

You need to check the numbers. The total number of houses built by Local Authorities in the decade 1980-1989 when Thatcher was in charge was 392,090. The total number of houses built by Local Authorities in the decade 1998-2007 when Blair was in charge was 3,510.

Sadly therefore it appears that Blair and Brown are to blame for a failure to build local authority housing.

grizzly1911

antrobus wrote: »

You need to check the numbers. The total number of houses built by Local Authorities in the decade 1980-1989 when Thatcher was in charge was 392,090. The total number of houses built by Local Authorities in the decade 1998-2007 when Blair was in charge was 3,510.

Sadly therefore it appears that Blair and Brown are to blame for a failure to build local authority housing.

Perhaps that has something to do with the rental stream from council housing being removed (reduced rental stock) from the financing arrangement.

paulmapp8306

Loughton_Monkey wrote: »

It is fairly obvious to anyone, I would have thought, that the only way of maintaining spending (note: not earnings) after retirement is to spend less than you earn by the 'correct' amount.

It is generally percieved that the 'correct' amount is in the order of 20% to 25%

While I agree in principle here, for a large % of the working population, its just not possible to put 20-25% of their earnings away for old age.

How can someone who barly earns enough to afford accomodation (bought or rented), utilities, food and clothes reduce their spending by 20%. Not saying everyone is in this boat - and there are lots who spend money on trivial things - but there are a lot who dont as well.

CLAPTON

ruggedtoast wrote: »

In the 1940's government debt was nearing 250%. It had more than halved by the time you lot were buying your first kaftans and scouring Woolworths for 7 inches.

By the time the 70s dawned the oldest boomer would still only have been mid 20s. Somehow I dont think people bumming around Cornwall in sharabangs paid off the debt.

All you had to do was hunker down until the 80s and it was happy days.

The point being that it was painless paying off the debt last time so it will be equally painless paying it off this time?

And presumably, the only pain is felt by the workers of the era and not their children?

And it wasn't Cornwall it was Indian, Katmandu and other places east.

Love and peace.

grizzly1911

ruggedtoast wrote: »

In the 1940's government debt was nearing 250%. It had more than halved by the time you lot were buying your first kaftans and scouring Woolworths for 7 inches.

By the time the 70s dawned the oldest boomer would still only have been mid 20s. Somehow I dont think people bumming around Cornwall in sharabangs paid off the debt.

All you had to do was hunker down until the 80s and it was happy days.

That is making a sweeping statement that is patently rollocks.

No doubt some layabouts did bum around. No doubt spoiled brats did go off and do bizarre things. No different to today.

It is just as bad as the stereotype that says all the current younger generation waste all their money on i pads, i phones, flat screen TVs, game consoles, stag dos etc.

The reality is most boomers were working damn hard in a variety of jobs and careers paying tax an NI. Whilst there have always been the landed gentry , a few well off individuals and the those in dos houses the gaps in society for most weren't as marked for those in the middle. Many more people could actually get reasonable jobs with reasonable prospects, which today is sadly not the case. The fact they can't isn't the boomers fault.

In that generation we also had home based business that also contributed more fully to the tax pot. Avoidance wasn't so prevalent back then at any level personal or corporate. I'm not saying it didn't happen.

paulmapp8306

PaulF81 wrote: »

Why should you be allowed to retire now when I will have to work till much later, as I was promised when I started paying tax?
Why should I have to pay for your retirement when the current setup is not affordable?
All of your complaints are no different to a doleite who turns around and says why should I work when I can get paid for doing nothing? The only difference is, the work you have done seems to make you think that despite the scheme being completely unaffordable, you are still entitled to NHS treatment that will preserve you well past the order of things and a pension which as i say is unaffordable, costing the state over 120 grand for the modern life expectancy of a pensioner. This is all paid for with state debt (not been paid for by you), university fees (before you go on about lots more going these days I still think it should only be the top 5% who go) and reduced infrastructure spending.

The bad news for OAPs generally is my generation are not very happy about this and in a decade from now will be in power and will be most definitely changing things like funding to the NHS and index linked state pensions. Watch this space. The NHS is one area the conservatives needed to chop by a quarter, instead they pandered to pensioners and boomers and killed other valuable areas of state expenditure. If pensioners had 5 years shaved off life expectancy, we wouldn't have a deficit!

You could prevent this by demonstating to my generation you can serve a purpose in stead of whining about being a pressed man or woman!

Um. Having got this far - you are an !!!! IMO.

I have no idea how old you are, but Im 45 and cant believe you feel this way - and you seem to be talkimng for ALL of us of a similar age. Well your not. your figures are all "made to fit". I agree about your "tax paid" figures, but not the ones you quote regards pensions received. I believe the average life expectance is still in the 70s - so the pensions received ar about half that which you quote.

You cant ask pensions to work longer without impacting on the younger generation - theres only so many jobs to go round. It just mean other benefits will be paid instead - which generally cost more. Having said that, the working life does need to be extended a little as life epectance goes up - but its a fine ballancing act.

Pensions are NOt a benefit oin the true sense of the word. If you want to make is so - then fine, in which case anyone with a private income more than the state poension should get NOTHING. I dont think thats the way it should go - but if you want to cut costs and treat the state pension as a benefit then thats the way to do it.

If your going to make people work for "benefits" then you have to make people work for ALl benefits - throughout your life.

If pensions are BENEFITS - then the government should stop topping up peoples personal pension funds, or allowing Tax benfits against them. If you can afford to pay into a personal pension pot then you dont need benefits.

i seriously cant believe anyone with an ounce of humanity in them has the views you do - your a disgrace.

grizzly1911

paulmapp8306 wrote: »

If pensions are BENEFITS - then the government should stop topping up peoples personal pension funds, or allowing Tax benfits against them. If you can afford to pay into a personal pension pot then you dont need benefits.

Having removed almost all other incentives, apart from compulsion(used to be NI and still is), then removal the tax benefits or marked reduction has got to be on the cards somewhere.

I appreciate that NI isn't a ring fenced pot etc. before I get picked up on that bit.;)