There is speculation in the media that the state pension age might increase to 68 sometime during the 2030s. I cannot be alone in thinking this is yet another sign of a state that does not care.
I admit to the fact that this issue feels rather personal at present. I will be 65 very soon. As a result I have had letters from companies with whom I have made pension savings during my career asking what I am going to do in my retirement, which feels horribly wrong to me. I see 65 as a number. I am, in any case, not of state retirement age for another year as yet, being one of the first to be impacted by the increase from 65. And I have no intention of retiring at either age.
I am, however, aware of the fact that this makes me one of the lucky ones. Until Covid came along I thought I would make it to retirement without any major illness. I now realise that the six months during which I took antibiotics last year were much more gruelling than I wanted to admit at the time. Having realised that, I now also admit that whilst I am no longer fighting infection all the time, I am not over the effects of that episode. My energy is not back to what it was. A little nagging doubt says maybe that's just the way it will be: this is what getting older means. But whether that is true or not, that still leaves me in much better physical shape than most men (in particular) at almost 65. That is why I am lucky, and I know it.
A great many people when reaching there supposed retirement age are already unable to work. Increasing the retirement age to 68 will not change the health of those people. It will just increase the economic hardship of those who will not be able to retire as soon as they need to and who have very limited other means of support given their inability to work. Raising the retirement age will, in that case, simply increase poverty for those with the misfortune to be ill when for millions being ill before retirement age is a fact of life. That is what the increase in the state retirement age really means. It means the consequences of misfortune will increase when what we know is that misfortune is by no means randomly distributed.
Life expectancy across the UK varies widely. If retirement is at 68, in some areas of the country men will, on average, not expect to claim a state pension. In others they can expect to be in good health, with many years to come. This is not by chance: the difference between the areas is almost wholly explained by differing average incomes. That manual work is associated with low income exacerbates the issue, but relative income explains it.
In other words we have, yet again, a situation where what seems like a reasonable proposal in the face of the growing number of elderly people in the population is anything but that. It is horribly skewed in favour of the fortunate, like me, and against those who suffer disability preventing them from working, often long before retirement age is really reached. In the process the bias towards the fit and well is reinforced.
What to do about this?
First, we might reduce retirement age, but make access to the state old age pension means tested until what is deemed to be normal retirement age. That would be fair.
Second, we need to increase the number of younger people in our society, which only immigration can do.
Third, we need to increase the amount that can be paid in pensions. That would be easy if we controlled the price of land and the associated cost of mortgages, both of which redirect wealth to the already wealthy, many of whom will enjoy state retirement pensions for many years than the average person will. Unless we control rents (in the common and economic sense of the word) we cannot deliver fair pensions.
And, we need to tax those who are working above retirement age more fairly. For example, I see no reason why I should stop paying national insurance in a year or so's time, but I will. That makes little sense and just adds to inequality.
But, and I stress it, the issues we need to face are structural and we are nowhere near addressing them as yet. In fact, the issues are never raised. But they should be. Justice demands it. I see a whole new career opening ahead of me.
PS I am aware that for many women this issue is exacerbated by the equalisation of pension ages. I can't deal with everything in one post.
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The universality and simplicity of the State Pension should not be ditched lightly.
Surely, the first thing to do is abolish NI and raise income tax rates by the corresponding amount (for everyone). That might be a better way to recoup money from wealthy pensioners.
Instead of a steady rise in pension age, cut NI by 1% and raise Income tax by 1% each year for the next 10 or so years. This would allow the next generation of pensioners to make plans/manage expectations in good time.
Interesting
The trouble with abolishing NI and instead raising income tax is that the tax revenue is not ring fenced. What is raised from our pockets by taxation can be spent on, for example, building ludicrously expensive and miitarily obsolescent aircraft carriers, or building motorways and high speed railways that benefit the South rather than the North. NI payments can only go to the NHS and pensions. Taxes can be spent on vanity projects.
NI is a tax
And it does not cover the NHS + pensions
No point pretending it does
Just what I have thought for a long time. I would get rid of VAT too and just have progressive income tax. We would still need other taxes some to prevent abuse of such a tax system but wage earners would have clarity in taxation. I would also go for a land tax instead of the current council tax. Maybe all tax should be local with local government giving some to the central government. Richard will know the feasibility and sensibility of all this better than me.
However, what I wanted to put was that we were by now supposed to be in the leisure society where people had to be advised how to spend all their free time. I used to help with a lunch time concert, even perform for it. One day an NHS medic came in and said – I just retired, what shall I do with my time now?
It seems to me that you are only seen as a proper worker if you are creating more wealth for those that already have to much for our good. David Graeber wrote “Bullshit Jobs: A Theory”. A lot of truth there too. For me one of the good things about being a member of the EU was the FOM. A few people felt they had problems because of that, such as a builder who did work for me, but we could have fixed the problem I think, otherwise a huge positive.
I don’t know if you saw it but there was an article in yesterdays Guardian by Polly Toynbee which covered this very subject. Most of it makes a lot of sense.
I will look
Good points, Richard. Don’t forget that people with private pensions will only be able to access them 10 years younger than their state pension age from 2028. This will be age 57 for most.
I don’t actually ‘believe’ in retirement, per se, as we all need to go on learning, but it’s sad to know that around 40%-45% of the people I advise when thinking about retirement qualify for ‘enhanced’ annuity rates due to health/lifestyle issues. Enhanced (underwritten) annuities were formally introduced back in the mid-1990s by the then Pension Annuity Friendly Society (part of Just Retirement today). Back then only 15%-20% of people qualified. That tells us a lot.
Are people that sick?
Yes. In my personal experience, between 40% and 60% of individuals have qualified for some kind of annuity uplift in recent years. Setting aside whether a guaranteed income for life from the insurance contract that is an annuity is a good idea for now (I think it very often is), high blood pressure/cholesterol would increase the income by around 3%-5%, smoking by 10%, diabetes by 15%-20%, stoke 25%, etc. Just some simple examples.
According to the regulator, fewer than a third of potential retirees are aware of enhanced annuities and fewer even use the ‘open market option’ which is very poor. There are 5 main players in the annuity market and any IFA (or online broker) will invite ‘best offers’ for the individuals pension pot in the marketplace. This costs no more to do and it’s daft no to! I’m working on a case now, where the uplift means that the annuity will be 22.5% higher than standard rates. It’s only a small fund, so the pension isn’t large, but the client is very pleased.
Just look around you to see how unfit/unwell the ‘boomers’ are!
I count my blessings then – no increased annuity for me
No planned retirement either….
“First, we might reduce retirement age, but make access to the state old age pension means tested until what is deemed to be normal retirement age.”
Doesn’t pension credit already do that, kinda, sort of? I remember I myself came off some form of disability payment and went on to means tested pension credits before I reached pensionable age, this at govt request. I assumed at the time this was a way of massaging their figures to reduce the number of people claiming disability. I can’t remember exactly which disability benefits I was on now. Permanent ones anyway.
I admit you push my knowledge of benefits there
To get pension credit as a single person you need income less than £182 a week. No idea how anyone can live on that.
Many pensioners pay tax but not NI. If you alter the system so that tax increases by 1% and NI decreases by 1% it will affect lots of pensioners negatively. There are lots of us who only have just over the amount to pay tax, i.e., between £12500 and £15000. We’re not all like Polly Toynbee. I read her article and wondered why when there are so many other ways to get money for what the government needs, and so many other important topics she could be writing about.
Has she ever written an article on UBI, for example? According to AgeUK 18% of pensioners live in poverty.
I help people claim Pension Credit and there’s a wee bit of misinformation in these comments.
It may have changed but currently Pension Credit gives you extra money to help with your living costs if you’re over State Pension age and on a low income.
Source: https://www.gov.uk/pension-credit
One of the key elements of Pension Credit is that it acts as a springboard for receiving other kinds of financial support.
Here’s a Pension Credit calculator. https://www.gov.uk/pension-credit-calculator
And here’s a more general benefits calculator. https://www.entitledto.co.uk/benefits-calculator/
Citizens Advice, the Jobcentre Plus or various local charities can help people check what they’re due and then claim.
There’s an enormous underclaim of benefits https://www.entitledto.co.uk/blog/2018/december/over-20-billion-still-unclaimed-in-means-tested-benefits/
Please do check for yourselves and help any elderly relatives, neighbours who might be missing out. My experience on the front line is that a lot of people miss out on Pension Credit because they get the State Pension at the same moment and assume that’s all of it.
On this subject, I encouraged one of my former neighbours to apply for attendance allowance as she’s in a situation where her health, in her 70s, is deteriorating. I also told her she needed to get an advocate to explain how the applications work in real life as she’d never manage on her own, witness, I said, my going from 0 points on my own to enhanced for both PIP categories with the help of professionals. She had the supervisor of her accommodation help her and now gets an extra £240 a month. She’s very pleased. This will help her local economy too as she’ll be spending more into it and as noted above there’s an unclaimed £20bn which would really be giving the national economy a lift if it were being spent into it. If in doubt, apply – but do get help in doing it.
Absolutely the right thing to do
According to government information, pension credit will take your income up to £182 a week. Therefore your income must be less than that in order to have it go up to £182 a week, mustn’t it?
Pension credit is only available to pensioners and tops up their weekly income to £182.60. If your income as a pensioner (from all sources) is £182.65 you don’t get pension credit and you don’t get the £1200 odd the government has given to those on means tested benenfits to help with the cost of living.
I was put on pension credit shortly before I was of pensionable age, maybe a year or so earlier. It may well be that my being long-term disabled made the difference, it was obvious, I suppose, I wasn’t going to be going out and getting a job in the near future so I assume the thinking was to get me off the books as disabled and into some convenient uncounted area.
The whole pension scene is just a ticking time bomb.
So many youngsters today can’t save for a proper pension as they’re paying most of their salary on rent – home ownership being a distant dream. When, or even if, they ever get to the constantly increasing state retirement age they’ll have to keep on working just to keep a roof over their heads. Pension returns will never keep up with the ever increasing market rate for rented property.
If the NHS pension scheme is reflected in the wider pensions market, it seems to be pay more, work for longer, and get even less in return.
Only the wealthy will ever get to retire.
Or the system will explode, which I think it will
Back in the Good Old Days, if you got Incapacity Benefit then there was an ‘add on’ which was based on what you paid in to SERPS so there was some sort of way that older workers who were deemed incapable of work got at least some of their pension early.
That was replaced by Employment and Support Allowance which is a fixed rate and for most people runs out after a year
As far as migration goes I had this published recently
https://centralbylines.co.uk/letter-to-the-editor-on-labour-shortages-across-the-uk/
I suggest that we cant rely on importing labour so we need to make better use of what we have
I think we will have to disagree on that
You won’t pay NI personally on your salary but if you are organised as a business the business will pay NI. I have always considered it a tax on jobs and a disincentive where companies want to increase wages. The NI take is another extra cost. You might find other discrimination as you “mature”. I got a shock when the bank wouldn’t extend the term on our mortgage. (Not paid off to to several extraneous factors like the effects on my business due to Covid etc etc). Once over 70 all the bank will take into account is your pension income. Despite the fact that I am still running the business and my wife working. This income is ignored and we will have to sell up. Mind you, same bank of over 20 years standing who removed our business overdraft during the pandemic and despite increasing turnover by almost 100% since 2019 still think we are unfit for one.
Agreed re employer’s NI
Thankfully, I have no mortgage now
Another example of where ‘WON’T’ is portrayed as ‘CAN’T’ sustaining the lie that although the government can bail out greedy and corrupt banks, it somehow can’t afford to look after all those more numerous people who help produce their beloved GDP in old age.
Disgusting.
Hello Richard.
You said, “Or the system will explode, which I think it will”. What does this mean in laypersons terms? A Twitter thread explanation maybe?
I know it had been said before, but I reiterate it here. Continual increase in retirement age, for people who work manual jobs, could only be conceived by people who do not work a manual job. It’s a killer, pure and simple. The work you can easily do at 30 is almost impossible at 68. Why can’t the state pension fund a dignified state pension for all? Doesn’t MMT provide any scope for this? Would the country fail if state pension age was reduced, state pension payment increased but the number of younger workers didn’t change? Couldn’t we alter the tax payments of capital against labour to fund this?
I’m not against more immigration. In fact, I’d welcome immigration from a more diverse cross section of humanity. Maybe this is a necessary (and unavoidable due to climate change) position.
I don’t have any answers. You have answers to many questions. That gives me hope.
I will have to get back on this
Not Saturday morning task
Sorry
What do you think about the idea of a ‘citizens pension’ – a UBI for all those over a certain age?
You mean increase the pension to the living wage?
A major excuse used by the Tories in the past whenever in some way they worsened the state pension scheme is that people were living longer.
Unsurprisingly, not an argument they ever dare use now.
Personally, I think pensions are one of the many problem issues in life contributed to by the demise of the traditional family. a massive change that has occurred in British society over the last 60 years with a total lack of sensible debate about its causes, its consequences or its desirability.
To even mention it is to risk being swamped by tendentious culture wars arguments from all sides
I have to admit I do not see the relevance of your comment
Nor am I so sure that ‘traditional family’ was such a good thing, usually heavily relying on the suppression of women within it
To take just one aspect of the question.
It used to be commonly quoted that the average family in the UK had 2.4 children. Allowing for the unmarried and unfortunate early deaths, something like at least a replacement rate.
Since then we have seen the reproduction rate fall below this replacement rate.
This used to be the Tories argument, that together with increased life expectancy, falling fertility meant that there were fewer people in work capable of paying for the state pensions of the retired.
In public discussions this falling rate of reproduction is hardly ever discussed, indeed it now seems to be taken that this is just one of those things that we all have to accept and work around.
My original comment on this topic was mostly sparked by coming across NoS statistics that showed that the number of non-married couples in the UK now exceeds the number of married couples.
Whether this has any impact on reproduction rates and eventually our ability to pay decent pensions I do not know but I am struck by what is seemingly a massive change in the way that we lead our lives that barely gets a mention, let alone any consideration of its implications.
I suggest marriage now has nothing to do with reproduction rates
The impossible price of property, high childcare costs and low wages has got everything to do with it
The reason more people were living longer was because of the improvements in healthcare. The government has certainly found out how to fix that.
I assume the living wage is based on a 40 hour week. I live on a basic state pension, if it was increased to the living wage it would double my income. I’d be happy with that!
We live in France where there have recently been mass protests and ongoing strikes over the governments plan to raise pension age from 62 to 64. Also, i believe the state pension is rather more generous than in the UK.
The British seem to have given up protesting.
I wish I knew why
The French have always been more inclined to do so, it seems
Any explanations?
We are cowed, a nation of doormats; existing these days only to be ruled and predated on by our upper classes, for many centuries the dominant tribe. The only other tribes we had in recent history of any significance were the unions and Thatcher effectively saw them off. Unless we can mobilise to the extent of having a general strike, game over for the Britons and Britain I’d say. The govt can largely do as it wishes without fear of effective reprisal, and does just that.
I have to agree with Bill Kruse that we have become cowed. I get the argument for saying that we live in an increasingly fascist state, but I think the class system across the UK, particularly in England, is the primary underlying cause. It is still essentially feudalistic, which in turn enables the upper classes and the super-rich to impose fascistic policies on what they perceive as “the lower orders”. It troubles me to say this, but I fear the only way to achieve a fairer society may be an uprising: a general strike and mass demonstrations by the populace might be enough to tip the balance, but runs a huge risk of escalation into violence and destruction.
The safest way forward must be the end of FPTP and the 2-party domination of Westminster government and that’s not going to happen with the current policies of both Tory and Labour parties. Scotland, Wales and N Ireland have potential escape routes, but have the colossal task of first overcoming the labyrinthine legislation of Westminster’s fascist/feudalistic governors.
There are lots of protests on at the moment. If I was fit enough I could have gone to 3 today within a ten mile radius of my home and I live in a village in Durham. Ten years ago I would have done.
The sad fact is that there are an awful lot of unfit people and not just in the UK. They have by choice not necessity eaten junk food and drink all their lives. Used cars and other transport instead of walking or cycling. Having lived in Spain and now in France I have seen people getting fatter and obese increase year by year. Looking at UK TV it does seem reasonably fit people are now the freaks.
Imagine the NHS costs in a country where it was the norm for people to keep themselves fit by healthy eating and exercise. No it does not cost a lot to eat healthily that is complete b/s. I’m 77 and I make sure I walk at least 6K per day as a minimum. I don’t use transport of any kind to go shopping, I use a backpack which often has a load of 6-7K which I carry over 3K. This load carrying is great for bone density.
Richard has the right mentality and almost certainly has kept himself fit so why should he stop working (living).
No government in the UK or elsewhere has made any attempt to ban junk food or drink, remember that terrible Corona that you could by directly from the street. Coca Cola – originally a natural amphetamine type hit – made from an extract from the South American coca leaf or cola nitida a West African stimulant. Just look at all the sugar,salt and artificial flavourings and colours added to food and drink.
The huge amount of tax money that could be saved with a fit population, not spent on the NHS but on pensions instead. As our last dentist in the UK said – you were supposed to die at 65 not go on living.
I am not as fit as I would like to be right now
But going out now and will cover more than 5k before I am back, maybe rather more, and that is never a problem
I’ve had two aortic dissections since I was 60. Not supposed to carry more than 5 kg, which I work out as 3 or 4 bottles of wine, depending on the thickness of the glass.
Before the firast I was able to walk quite quickly and far for a couple of hours. Now just walking down to the village I have to stop at the cafe before I can walk back. I’ve been vegetarian for over 40 years, and eat organic food as much as I can. It’s wrong to always blame people for their circumstances. Illness and poverty come into it a lot. The fact that the North East has the most people in poverty, including those in inwork poverty, has a lot to answer for.
As I said…..
Sorry, that was not in response to you, Richard, but to those who blame people’s bad habits for their lack of fitness.
I am nearly 76 and working.
I have not paid NI since I was 60 (the then-retirement age for women ).
I understand the theoretical reason for this. And would not like to see pension income subjected to NI. But I do not understand why earned income should not continue to be liable for NI, just like my employer has to pay it for me. Seems equitable to me.
I am also unhappy about this hidden pension trap which again hits the lowest paid.
If you only have a state pension then you will (almost certainly) be eligible for Pension Credit aka the Gateway benefit because receiving it unlocks many other benefits (help with Council tax, rent, etc etc)
But if you have saved and now receive a small pension (depends on circumstances but can be as little as £10 week) that will take you over the limit for Pension Credit and you will get none of those benefits.
When I first started a personal pension many years ago the state pension allowed you to live decently, especially if you had no rent/mortgage costs. The private pension was an option to fund the lifestyle “treats” you would have time to enjoy.
That is no longer the case – but until they retire many with small pensions do not realise how much having them affects their actual total income.
Your last point is so true
This thread has multiple resonances for me. I have recently qualified for my Old Age Pension, but there is no question of retiring on so little. It is a comfort to know that if I stopped working I wouldn’t actually starve now, but the pension is very far short of a good living. Fortunately a lifetime of active work and thoughtful nutrition has kept me fit enough to still work two jobs, but it seems to me that a pension that makes me need to is set at much too low a level.
I think with manual work for the elderly there are two counterposed factors: up to a point, keeping going keeps you going, and there is a use-it-or-lose-it deal with physical strength. However, sustained heavy activity starts clocking up cumulative and chronic injuries that eventually wreck your fitness. Personally, I have the good fortune to to have a dawn shift part time for a wholesale greengrocer to get in a couple of hours of intermittently strenuous work to tone up my muscles before my main job, but there are not enough jobs like that to go round and 95% of pensioners would be already too decrepit to cope anyway, from either lack or surfeit of hard work in their prime. My point being that it is condition, not numerical age, that determines when a manual worker ought to retire.
Working pensioners not paying NI is effectively the same as still charging them but paying a better pension, so I see no problem with it. It also partially mitigates the tax a working pensioner pays on their pension
Keeping fit is key, I wholly agree (aching a bit after this morning’s walk)
But there is also s9me good fortune 8n this and that is not right
I’m old enough to remember Barbara Castle going to a Labour Conference to tell them they were destroying a good pension scheme (SERPS), a mirror image (in my view) of McMillan’s HOL speech about selling the Crown Jewels. Both big parties going badly wrong.
There are very many “low hanging fruits” that could be included in policy might like be considered.
(1) Assuming a return of something like SERPS is well off the agenda the one best thing that could be done is to make the scheme follow the person and not be provided by the employer. We live in a world where people move jobs frequently – when you turn up in a new job the employer should should obliged to contribute to the scheme you are already in. The reason for this is obvious, each time you join a new scheme you incur fees (they are front loaded) often the fees are greater in the first two years and then tail off. Sticking with one eliminates this, over a lifetime the difference it makes is huge.
(2) Make fund managers assume a cautious approach to investment (this should aim to limit the types of investments by avoiding things like derivatives, and reduce churm – trades are earning fees). By definition with a pension fund you are in it for the long haul, compound interest will work for you as effectively. Active management has been shown to be no more effective then random selection of stocks in many cases.
(3) Make it impossible for fun managers to take bonuses based on reported fund growth and instead link and limit their bonuses to liquidity – when funds are withdrawn the paper profit should are liquid, so with bonuses, they should reflect real liquid gains not paper ones. As a historical example of how bad this can get dig out information on the collapse of a company callled Target Life in the 1980’s.
(4) Protect funds, remove access to companies altogether and stop pensions holidays. We still – post Maxwell – have funds being used inappropriately as with . Underfunding is often used as a reason to close them or reduce benefits but not always. Glaxo closed a fully funded scheme simply because it was out of fit with modern trends. But we still have many pensions issues; Equitable Life, Sports Direct, British Steel, and in the last month the exposure of the use of risky derivatives.
Im fortunate but my private draw down is not as good as SERPS would have been.
To make matters worse the Fabian Society is proposing the the public purse contributed to contractor pensions. Two problems with this – the like if the well off (IT and business consultants) who do contracting to avoid tax don’t need a subsidy. The hired and retired deserve a better deal and we shouldn’t be subsidising lump labour (now called gig economy) employment. Indeed we should clawback in work benefits through corporation tax.
On the wider issues one cannot question pensions without considering the whole idea of capitalism and employment. Those who don’t want to retire need to reframe the problem; how long should you work for someone else’s profit before you can become a person of independant means? Retirement gives one the freedoms to be self actualised – it doesn’t mean you stop contributing only that you step off the make profit for someone else (at the lowest labour cost they can get away with) treadmill. Only the lucky minority have fulfilling jobs. Again on a personal level, I would have welcomed gradual retirement but in project management that wasn’t available, and because of the changed to work culture in my lifetime I couldn’t wait to get out and luckily was able to go at 60. I am very sceptical about raising retirement ages, humans are “programmed” to live for a certain time and life expectancy can to go backwards (look at Russia, parts of the UK even).
If capitalism is so good maybe we should re-consider its purpose. (1) a way of creating common wealth (2) a mechanism that allow us all to reach self actualisation in time to do something at our own behest and not at someone else’s.
What happens if your independent advisor goes into liquidation?
“If capitalism is so good maybe we should re-consider its purpose.”
Private pensions are designed to make the fund managers and shareholders money, the value of the pension is a secondary consideration. If capitalism was so good, private pensions would be insured and guaranteed. Only the government state pension can do that, and without profiting from the very people who need the money the most.
Since taxes do not pay for government spending, the government could choose to provide decent pensions, like MPs choose to do for themselves.
So you missed the irony, capitalism isn’t so good that it cannot reinvented, changed and/or replaced. It a human construct not a given – hence political economy. As Graber and Wengrow point out there is nothing about our current situation that is inevitable, we can and should be more adventurous, imaginative and willing to change.
Raya Dunayevskaya pointed out that Marx’s “Capital”, was not just about economics, but included history, science, philosophy etc etc, ie all human historical life & our relations to each other, especially the different human roles taken within the most basic exchange of two commodities eg tables for shoes. The active relative role needs what the other person has, who within the exchange, is the equivalent, passive role. At first, these roles are interchangeable, later becoming fixed, as two distinct classes: labour-power as a property we must sell to live, the active relative role, for wages from those with accumulated capital (origins undeclared when history is left out) – the equivalent role ie money, as the universally socially recognized means of exchange.
Marx: “… in a purely economic way, that is, from a bourgeois point of view, within the confines of capitalist understanding, from the standpoint of capitalist production itself ….” ie thinking about production, not aimed at producing productive capabilities “for the ever expanding system of the life process for the benefit of the society of producers.” (Capital, III, p. 293) but instead, production’s aim is dominated by capital itself, aimed at further expanding itself only, however distributed, since the profit returns to itself, not socially, it returns as further means of production aimed at expanding its wealth further, not production aimed at the enrichment of ALL human beings ie capitalist production itself, as narrowly economic, is opposed to the human productive skills & abilities of all.
Now, shall we live in the real world?