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Should 1950s WASPI women be compensated?

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  • custardy
    custardy Posts: 38,365 Forumite
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    .. 1890's, quite possibly...

    The pension change was from 1995 though wasnt it?
    So well into the 90s and heading to the 00's

    edit: damn my old eyes :rotfl:
  • colsten
    colsten Posts: 17,597 Forumite
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    The Times reports today that the independent IFS is no fan of Corbyn's £58bn bribe because it says so many WASPI are well-off.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/election-2019-corbyn-s-pensions-giveaway-will-benefit-richest-women-k0f3cgfcl#

    I hope you aren't paywalled
  • Silvertabby
    Silvertabby Posts: 10,162 Forumite
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    colsten wrote: »
    The Times reports today that the independent IFS is no fan of Corbyn's £58bn bribe because it says so many WASPI are well-off.

    https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/election-2019-corbyn-s-pensions-giveaway-will-benefit-richest-women-k0f3cgfcl#

    I hope you aren't paywalled


    Can't read all of it, but it makes sense that those women in genuine need won't actually benefit from this bribe because they will just lose their means tested benefits until they have spent up - and then will have to go through all the faff of re-applying.
  • badmemory
    badmemory Posts: 9,662 Forumite
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    Can't read all of it, but it makes sense that those women in genuine need won't actually benefit from this bribe because they will just lose their means tested benefits until they have spent up - and then will have to go through all the faff of re-applying.


    Whilst I totally agree with you on this, there are many people & according to figures I've read, most of them are women, who don't actually claim the benefits they are entitled to. So my answer would be to seriously improve the benefits for over 60s & not just women.



    Despite what people try to say we all know that if you lose a job once you get past a certain age the chances of getting another are slim to negligible. It is a pity we can't actually force people to apply for benefits. But that would certainly & understandably not be acceptable.
  • Pollycat
    Pollycat Posts: 35,804 Forumite
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    badmemory wrote: »
    Whilst I totally agree with you on this, there are many people & according to figures I've read, most of them are women, who don't actually claim the benefits they are entitled to. So my answer would be to seriously improve the benefits for over 60s & not just women.



    Despite what people try to say we all know that if you lose a job once you get past a certain age the chances of getting another are slim to negligible. It is a pity we can't actually force people to apply for benefits. But that would certainly & understandably not be acceptable.
    I don't see the point in improving benefits if you say the figures say that a lot of people don't claim what they are entitled to...
  • Can't read all of it, but it makes sense that those women in genuine need won't actually benefit from this bribe because they will just lose their means tested benefits until they have spent up - and then will have to go through all the faff of re-applying.

    From the article:
    “If the payment is being treated as pension income, then net gains would be smaller in cash terms for those at the bottom of the income distribution, as some of the payment will be clawed back through lower benefit entitlements,” said Xiaowei Xu, a research economist at the IFS think tank.

    “But this seems like a second-order point compared to the fact that relatively few Waspi women are at the bottom of the income distribution to begin with. Income tax is payable on pension income, so to the extent that higher-income households contain individuals on higher rates of tax, cash gains would also be smaller at the top of the distribution.”

    Everybody loses. Yay.

    Amusingly:
    Asked about the compensation scheme, a Waspi campaign spokeswoman said: “We don’t want anything to be means-tested.”

    But of course.
    Conjugating the verb 'to be":
    -o I am humble -o You are attention seeking -o She is Nadine Dorries
  • Malthusian
    Malthusian Posts: 11,055 Forumite
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    It bears repeating that it doesn't matter if the WASPI bribe isn't means-tested, the benefits that all WASPI women in genuine hardship receive are means-tested, so as Silvertabby and the IFS say, the bribe will simply be absorbed by means-testing.

    Only well-off WASPI members whose income is not means-tested (State Pensions, private pension, investments etc) will benefit.
    badmemory wrote: »
    Whilst I totally agree with you on this, there are many people & according to figures I've read, most of them are women, who don't actually claim the benefits they are entitled to. So my answer would be to seriously improve the benefits for over 60s & not just women.

    As others have said, paying more benefits which people don't claim is not a solution.

    The solution is to help people claim the benefits they are entitled to. Roping them into a Nigerian Prince scam and convincing them to fund a hopeless campaign that won't even benefit them, instead of going to entitledto and looking for real solutions, is the exact opposite of that. It's the financial equivalent of scamming someone with a chronic illness into trying homeopathy.
    Despite what people try to say we all know that if you lose a job once you get past a certain age the chances of getting another are slim to negligible.
    Not true. Many employers employ older people in large numbers, including those post-SPA, e.g. supermarkets. Many late-middle-aged people however decide they can't be arsed with redoing their CV and going through interviews. Or their knowledge and skills are too out of date to allow them to get a job of the same salary they used to earn, and they'd rather do nothing than take a pay cut.
    It is a pity we can't actually force people to apply for benefits. But that would certainly & understandably not be acceptable.
    Not really, if you allow people to backdate a benefit claim to the point they were eligible, you are essentially forcing them to claim as the same money is owed to them whether they claim or not, the rest is just a matter of waiting for them to give you their bank details. The State Pension can be backdated indefinitely, but for other benefits it's likely to be more restricted (e.g. ESA can only be backdated three months).

    However the Government has always used obscurity as a means to reduce the benefit bill and always will. If more people claimed then benefits would have to be cut, harming those who need benefits more in order to benefit those who need them less.
  • Silvertabby
    Silvertabby Posts: 10,162 Forumite
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    I can well understand why someone doesn't want to go through all the faff of claiming means tested benefits because of the requirement to constantly prove that they 'are actively seeking work' - and having to attend cv writing classes, attend work experience placements if they are unsuccessful.

    But if this is the difference between 'sofa surfing and dumpster diving' and actually having an income, then is there really any choice?

    That said, I do remain sympathetic with the 1950s women who may not have had the chances I did - and wonder if a way round this would be to remove the 'must seek work' criteria in the case of 60+ women (although that would probably have to apply to over 60s men as well).

    WASPE won't approve of this, of course.
  • colsten
    colsten Posts: 17,597 Forumite
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    I can well understand why someone doesn't want to go through all the faff of claiming means tested benefits because of the requirement to constantly prove that they 'are actively seeking work' - and having to attend cv writing classes, attend work experience placements if they are unsuccessful.
    But why should only women born in the 1950s be relieved from those chores? Why not 1950s men also? Why not people born after 1959 also? As a 1950s woman, I just fail completely and utterly to see what would make us so exceptional that we, and only we, would be offered special dispensation.
  • Silvertabby
    Silvertabby Posts: 10,162 Forumite
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    colsten wrote: »
    But why should only women born in the 1950s be relieved from those chores? Why not 1950s men also? Why not people born after 1959 also? As a 1950s woman, I just fail completely and utterly to see what would make us so exceptional that we, and only we, would be offered special dispensation.


    I did go on to say that this would probably also have to apply to over 60s men as well. Of course this isn't an ideal solution - it's just being offered as an alternative to Labour's ridiculous 'cash for votes' bribe.
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