Stocks and Shares ISAs

SonOf

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the only benefit of a pension over a stocks and shares ISA, is the fact that you pay into it before tax, and therefore pay less tax on the rest of your earnings. right??
But then when you receive money from your pension, you're paying tax on that anyway. Obviously you don't pay tax on the first £12,000 (currently) or whatever, but state pension takes up a fair whack of this chunk anyway.

Semi right but not quite.
Tax relief on the way in - correct.
Tax on the way out - partially correct.

When you draw on the pension, 75% is taxable above your personal allowance and 25% is tax free.
Your state pension will only use some of the personal allowance. So, around £3500 (in todays terms) will still be available for tax free income. Income above your personal allowance equates to a taxation rate of 15%. Not 20% (75% @ 20% and 25% tax free = 15%).

So, if you are a basic rate taxpayer whilst paying in and a basic rate taxpayer when drawing, the pension will give you more than the ISA.

No one I know my age has even bothered thinking about this and here's me trying to plan my (hopefully very long) retirement down to a tee.

30 years ago, there used to be insurance agents who would call round on your 18th birthday or when you started a job and get you paying into pensions. There were a lot of faults with insurance agents but one area that they were very good at was to get people paying into pensions and medium term regular investment plans. Nowadays, they have all gone and whilst advice today is highly regulated and products much better, there isnt the pro-active side to it any more which is a shame.