To think public sector pensions should be slashed?

I didn't say I didn't work until my 40s! I've worked full time since I was 20 but in not well paid jobs with poor (or zero) pension provisions. Your pension is really unusually good, that's what you seem to be missing.

And.... Then with the new IHT rules pensions will be treated differently. So the value of the remaining pension will be curtailed to a spouse and considerably curtailed to a child of an unmarried single person.

People also seem to forget that many private companies didn’t offer a pension scheme or limited access to them until relatively recently. I worked part time from age 16 for seven years whilst I was at school/uni. I then had a series of fixed term contracts until I qualified into my profession at 29. The company I qualified with didn’t offer a pension until you had been there two years. So I was 31 before I had a pension.

Years of 1% pay increases, salary a smidgen above NMW and no final salary pension here, also no bonus, no private healthcare. So go away with your 'slashing'.

Job involves tasks which should be paid way above NMW. You're getting a bargain, mate.

Lots of private businesses don't provide the tea and coffee! There's often a employee kitty where people contribute a few quid a week for a jar of Nescafe etc. Not all private sector businesses are big flash offices and loads of perks... in fact, the vast majority are just run of the mill small/medium businesses. No bonuses, no free food or lunches, statutory min sick pay and statutory min annual leave.

Also, its standard not to accept gifts from customers or the like. We're explicitly not allowed to do this due to anti-corruption and anti-bribery legislation in various global jurisdictions.

This is the norm in many, many private sector workplaces. The vast majority of workers will not be receiving any customer gifts, I certainly don’t and never have. Even those that are received are subject to the UK anti bribery act so people are not getting extravagant gifts to make up for the lack of pension.

It’s typically only sales type roles that get this. We get tea/coffee/milk provided but this varies between employer and isn’t always standard. Hardly perk of the century even if it is!

You need to reread what she wrote, and apologise, because that is not what she said.

She only started earning well in her 40s. That's pretty common tbh, in many professions.

In all my years working in the public sector, I never even got a cup of coffee provided by the employer. And we were specifically told that we could not accept gifts from customers. Anything they did want to give either had to be tactfully declined or regifted to a charity. Despite what people think bribery was not acceptable, and gifts, even after the event were considered likely to be bribes.

I've recently made the move from the private sector into the public sector. The pension is probably what retains most of the staff!

The offices and equipment are 80's throwback and I've not worked in a private office in many years that didn't provide breakfast, fruit, tea coffee, juice etc (I'm not saying the the Government should spend public funds on this, of course they shouldn't but it's all things that form part of the overall package)

she said she didn't start earning well until her 40s - that reads to me as if she has worked prior to that but the roles were badly paid.

@Butterworths says she only started earning well in her 40s,not that she didn't work. In many jobs people only start to earn reasonable money at that age. Part time work clearly doesn't help as that decreases the amount paid into the pension. ( which is why I always worked full time).

What do you expect though, if you only started working in your 40’s? You can’t expect a huge pension if you haven’t worked for a large portion of your life. I started working at 15. No gap years, no swanning around the world on travels, no luxury cars, no luxury holidays. Who was funding your lifestyle until aged 40? I left home at 18 and have had zero financial help since then, no benefits, no inheritance. I don’t mind this, I don’t from a family with any wealth. It is as it is, but I would have starved if I didn’t work so I find it a bit fucking rich having some green with envy keyboard warrior telling me that I am privileged because I have worked and get a below average salary pension. The world has gone fucking mad.
Check YOUR privilege.

No, as people have explained the local government scheme is fully funded by worker / employer. It is career average not final salary. I pay a monthly contribution directly so never see that in my bank account.

i just did a quick annuity quote - assuming no major medical conditions, no annuity protection and no income paid to dependants/partners if you die, for an annuity of 19k p.a. which has inflation protection you need a pot of about 400k.

according to an article the graun published earlier this year, the average private pension pot for a woman of 67 in the uk, is 69k.

public sector pensions are good value which is why they are an important recruitment and retention tool. if you reduce their value then you would need to compensate by raising salaries and other benefits, to be comparable with the private sector.

I want public sector pensions to stay high as we already have a crisis in recruiting good people but this makes you look very out of touch. Most people will have no chance of saving any near enough to have a 19k pension on top of their state one. You'd need to save around £300k and that's being optimistic about returns. I earn about the same as the prime minister (as it happens!) but only really started earning well in my 40s and I'll struggle to manage this level of saving.

UK salaries across the board both public and private have fallen way behind what used to be our comparator countries.

This is depressingly true. With the exception of financial services, the UK has become a low-wage economy.

So what would the public sector need to do? It would need to increase salary to compensate,

Well, yes. It will need to do that. Otherwise the brain drain will continue. UK salaries across the board both public and private have fallen way behind what used to be our comparator countries.

To be able to fund this without it being inflationary productivity has to rise. That means huge reform of public services which are not currently fit for purpose. It also means creating economic conditions in the UK that encourage the investment required to make the economy more productive. And it will mean low and middle income earners accepting that they will have to pay a significantly higher proportion of their income as tax if they want continental-European standards of services, or alternatively accepting that if they will not then a much smaller state offering fewer services is the only other solution.

No politician wants to tell people these realities, however. Hence the current mess that the new Government seems intent on making even worse.

I have a DB/final salary scheme and a separate defined contribution scheme. To get the equivalent in percentage terms in my DC scheme I need to pay in 21 per cent of my salary. Traditionally companies that offered DB schemes paid less but it was still worth taking the lower salary.

Some people (like me) want improvement/fairness for all and IMO the way to do this would be to make all pensions DC and increase mandatory employer contributions into DC schemes.

Yes. This is what Australia and others did successfully decades ago. The problem in the UK with this issue and so many other things is always kicking the can down the road, making it worse. Eventually what you have stated is exactly what will have to happen but unfortunately the longer it is delayed the more painful it will be for people who had been misled to believe they will receive money that there is no plan in place to actually fund for them.

OK, so let's say the taxpayer stops paying that pension top-up.

Without the decent pension, the public sector would be completely unable to recruit skilled professionals. I work in the civil service, in a profession that requires masters level qualifications and constant study/CPD (which my employer does not fund).

My pay is low compared to what I earned in the private sector - I could easily double my pay, maybe more, by going back to my old (private sector) employer. What keeps me in my job is the pension and flexibility. Remove the pension, and I wouldn't stay.

So what would the public sector need to do? It would need to increase salary to compensate, otherwise it would simply be unable to recruit to skilled roles. So the money that is 'saved' on pensions would be spent on salary instead. Either that or public services would go down the toilet because there would be no-one to do the work.

At lower grades (i.e. the less skilled roles) the public sector probably pays as much, or maybe even more than, private sector employers. But once you start to look at the skilled professional roles (the ones that are hard to fill because they require specialist training), there is a huge disparity. A tax lawyer working in HMRC will be earning less than a third of what their private counterparts are earning. Do you want to lose those people?

Some people (like me) want improvement/fairness for all and IMO the way to do this would be to make all pensions DC and increase mandatory employer contributions into DC schemes.

There have been pay increases in some public sectors (healthcare, education etc) where increases have been bought up in line of inflation. In other public sectors, the pay increases have been below the level of inflation and have amounted to years of cuts.

Please tell me you're not a maths teacher

Who has paid for them? Civil servants have not paid for all of them.

I think the numbers are that CS pensions cost £40bn a year, of which the tax payer pays £10bn. So they get 25% on top of the money paid in and, arguably, worked for - assuming 'worked for' means do their job just like all private sector workers do too.

Works for me 😂