To think public sector pensions should be slashed?

Indeed
I was replying to the Op and others who want pensions cut-immediately.
While there will be filtered changes inevitably Ops suggestion of cutting them would be illegal

DB schemes have changed multiple times over the decades. McCloud related to specific discrimination during the last change - it depended on your age whether you moved into the new scheme or stayed in the old one.
More changes are inevitable particularly for unfunded schemes. This time they will know to apply it to everyone equally.
It will not change historic entitlements - it will only apply going forward.

Hoardasauruskaren, well said. I don't know how old the OPis, but if she gets her way there will be no bloody nurses to look after her in her twilight years cos the pays crap and she's slashed their pensions. She needs to change herself if she's not happy with her current financial setup. Not whine about other people's.

Tier
Pensionable pay (tier thresholds from 1 April 2024)
Contribution rate from 1 April 2024 based on actual pensionable pay
1
£0 to £13,259
5.2%
2
£13,260 to £26,831
6.5%
3
£26,832 to £32,691
8.3%
4
£32,692 to £49,078
9.8%
5
£49,079 to £62,924
10.7%
6
£62,925 and above
12.5%

The amount of money that's being used to support public sector pensions is insane. If you think of the pot you would have to save in order to get the pensions you do you just wouldn't be able to do it. Ever.

The equiv of a public sector pension of £20,000 a year for 30 years would be a pot of £600,000 or £20,000 a year being saved (including potential growth of course but still. And this, as has been stated is tax payers money.

And I love all the arguments saying "it's not a race to the bottom" too. You know that this is one of the argument's that is being used against the introduction of VAT on school fees? Oh and school fees are not paid for by the state. They are paid for by people like me, who also pay for the state education system too but just don't use it. And of course, we all want all education to be good but state education just tends to not be, especially where we are. So make that better. As it's not a race to the bottom.

Apologies it has cost 17 billion to remedy!

I don't see that the Gov would risk another disaster like that.

Agree.
To me it makes sense that at least public sector employees shouldnt have to rely on government help when they retire, it's a sensible approach when the govt is paying someone's wages.
They could pay people less, but would have to pay much higher salaries to compensate

You can propose all you like but the reality is that cutting the pensions of those already paying into the scheme would be illegal.
We already had The McCloud judgement which is taking millions to fix
The only way is to change the terms of those starting but if pay and pensions are low then all our services would collapse if people look at the terms and can earn a similar amount/ pension in a less taxing environment.

Fight for better private pensions, not decimating public ones

The problem you get though is that pensions and salary come from completely different budgets. My salary is paid by my employer, but my pension is paid by LGPS. My employer has a very tight fixed budget, and all areas that can be cut are being cut though obviously statutory responsibilities can't be. So where would the extra come from for increased salaries? Our lowest grades are pennies only above minimum wage so have to be increased every year to stay at that level when the minimum goes up, the differential between grades is being reduced every year because they just don't have enough money and are in a large amount of debt anyway.

Then you get all the residents whinging about cuts to things like the arts or why the grass in the parks is only being cut fortnightly rather than weekly, but ask them where they would make cuts instead (e.g. roads, social care, infrastructure) they come up blank.

The thing is though - I work for one of the charities who you are increasingly having to rely on and we get similar rates of pay, just without the good pensions. We are also understaffed and overworked and are expected to pick up the slack in the public sector. I propose the pensions SHOULD be cut and the salaries increased. Then the public sector would be easier to compare to the private. And it would probably help recruitment.

Exactly @Allergictoironing

I know so many people working with double or triple the work load they should have. Working till they burnout and then others are more stretched.

It's hard to recruit because salaries are low (and noone seems to factor in the pension everyone is so envious of). And probably hard to recruit because of idiots who describe "all" public sector staff so negatively. There are so many brilliant and industrious people in the public sector organisations I have worked in (I have switched between private and public sectors several times in my career )

These "third world levels of service" you're talking about - ever considered that maybe the staff are trying to do their very best, but are hampered by staff shortages and lack of funds?

I work in local government in a social care area that has statutory requirements on what we must do as a minimum. Case loads per front line worker are the highest they've ever been, and due to the peculiarities of the county we have much larger case loads proportionally than the rest of the UK. However our responsibilities have increased year on year, and local government funding has been cut year on year.

Turnover of front line staff is higher than it's ever been, and recruitment is getting harder all the time. Most teams are short at least one staff member, and one team is short 2 out of 8. But the majority of the candidates we get are sub-par for the requirements of the role, and there's virtually no chance of getting anyone experienced because the salary is so low for the work they need to do.

Then we look at the other types of cost cuts we deal with day to day. There was great rejoicing in our team the day another section moved into a different building and left behind a couple of boxes of envelopes, some note pads and folders - this meant we could save a few quid by postponing our next stationery order. Any and all resources are hoarded and carefully guarded; we need to lock away even such things as scissors, sellotape and staplers every night as otherwise they vanish - not to staff for personal use, but to other cash-strapped teams. We had to write a case for a purchase of around £20 the other week, because it isn't something that technically is defined as essential to our area but was very much needed due to a change in duties.

We have to rely on local charities to help us support vulnerable people with things like food boxes and hygiene supplies.

I got an approval email on Monday that one manager had sent at around 9pm Sunday night, and managers are regularly sending emails at 7pm as it will have been the first chance they get to sign off on expenditure as they are so overworked - and these aren't workaholics, they just don't have the time to do their jobs. I can get in at 8am and find a manager on a call already, and if it's my late day they are still there at 6pm despite their young families being at home waiting for them. Yes I know many people in the private sector also work all the hours in the day, but they tend to at least be remunerated at a much better rate.

Then add in the mental stress that working in the social care sector can have on the staff; the abuse and threats we can receive, the stresses of not being able to help as much as is needed

So please stop suggesting that public servants in the main don't earn our half decent pensions. Which, by the way, are being eroded with the increasingly popular method of awarding performance with one off awards rather than a salary increase - which of course doesn't count towards our pensions.

Excuse the rant - I had a particularly rough day yesterday with calls coming in from people in crisis e.g. due to delayed payments no food for them or the baby, someone suddenly made homeless sleeping rough on the streets in this weather, someone's room broken into in supposedly secure housing & possessions stolen etc. Then updating the calendars with yet another staff member off sick, plus trying to do my "day" job.....

opt out entirely and live off the rest of us just like public sector retirees do?

Do you just mean... retire?
You know on the pension that were offered and they have worked for?
Yeah I'm in this situation
40 years in public service-I got what was offered to me

No more no less

Why do you think others should continue to work really hard to pay pensions for you because you work hard, when they will never be able to earn such a pension themselves even if they contribute MORE than you to their pension?

Who is this aimed at?
Workers don't choose the scheme they are in, it's offered to them
Are you saying you would go no thanks then?

And yes, people who pay a lot of tax in the UK (in some tax brackets they are paying the highest rates in the world for their level of earnings) are completely right to then be miffed at the third world level of services they receive in return

Ah only people who pay lots of tax are entitled to a decent service?
The poor, average and disabled don't deserve it then?

Nice

And yes, people who pay a lot of tax in the UK (in some tax brackets they are paying the highest rates in the world for their level of earnings) are completely right to then be miffed at the third world level of services they receive in return. They pay more than those in Scandinavian countries and receive services worse than those in Albania. Of course they're not impressed, and rightly so.

And you don't think that applies to the private sector also? Why do you think so many people are slackers and don't bother to do their jobs properly in those jobs as well or opt out entirely and live off the rest of us just like public sector retirees do?

Why do you think others should continue to work really hard to pay pensions for you because you work hard, when they will never be able to earn such a pension themselves even if they contribute MORE than you to their pension?

It's just not sustainable, I'm afraid, no matter how much you think you "deserve" it, unless a funding model that actually funds it from your contributions is put in place like has to be the case by definition for all of those with DC pensions.

If the salaries and pensions are too low across the board in both public and private sector (which in my opinion and based on international comparisons they are) then the only sustainable answer is to raise productivity so that living standards can rise without salary increases simply fuelling inflation that cancels them out and makes us all even poorer given our dependence on imports for essentials like food and fuel. But apparently getting people to grasp this basic economic fact or expecting politicians to implement policies to achieve this is too much to ask, you'd rather continue to scrabble over your fight for redistributing the crumbs of the wreckage.

I’m in public sector and if they slashed our pension I would be leaving in an instant as would many others. For what I do the wage isn’t great but i offset that because of the flexibility and the fact my pension is half decent. So by all means we could save your money by cutting our pension although bare in mind we also pay tax etc. However don’t complain when the NHS, police and all those other public funded services you use free of charge are in an even worse state than they are now because the staff are leaving in droves. I always find that baffling how private sector worker feel like they are the only ones that pay our wage and say we should be paid less or have worse benefits but are usually the first to moan when th service they receive from public bodies isn’t top notch. You can’t have it all ways pay people peanuts, get monkeys!

Have you actually had people who work in the public sector tell you they believe private sector workers are better paid?
Or is it just your perception?
I have worked in both private (banking for 10 years) then public (teaching for 15 years).
In banking people were convinced public sector workers had it better (they don't, I can assure you).
In public sector I haven't come across people speculating in that way, but certainly in education which is my field, people are less money driven.

I have seen posts on here about nurses who can't afford their HA rent or food on their salary. I work in education and there are drastic shortages of teachers (especially in more senior roles than require substantial experience, which can't be fixed with recruitment initiatives). In my LA we have 3 schools that we can't recruit heads for. I don't think we need to be making those roles even less attractive right now, that's not in anyone's interest.

I also get very irritated by the 'well we pay your wages'. Well we all pay tax and NI so we pay ourselves. We make purchases at shops thus funding their workers' salaries. We drive cars and pay for all the services etc that requires this funding other business' employees. Pay insurance, have building work done etc etc. It is a very childish viewpoint.

Of course the DB isn't part of the estate - there IS no remaining fund as such. When you die, depending on the conditions of the fund even as little as 5 years after retiring, any surviving dependants/widow/widower may get a reduced amount for a length of time, but for someone like me who is single with no dependants that's it - nothing. That's why I worked on so many DB to DC transfers of people with life limiting conditions, at least that way their spouse would get a decent chunk of money whether taxed or not.

@envbeckyc Your pension will depend on your future salary growth, and future inflation if it's a CARE scheme. So pension projections have to make an assumption for these which will vary over time e.g. following the financial crash, they may have assumed (correctly as we now know) that future salary increases would be lower and therefore your final pensions is expected to be be lower. But the general promise - what % of your salary you have earned each year as a pension didn't change.

You linked to an investment report upthread and said this is how the West Midlands pension scheme invests your contributions. In fact, they take all the employer and employee contributions and invest the whole fund as described in this report. The aim is to achieve enough returns on the funds to cover the pensions promised. But if that doesn't work out as planned e.g. investment returns are lower, inflation is higher, life expectancy increases etc then the employer i.e. the council, has to cover the difference because they still have to pay out the pensions promised. So yes they're funded in advance, but that doesn't mean there won't be a need for extra funding in future.

Here's the most recent valuation report for the West Midlands pension scheme. This compares the assets held against the expected pension costs.

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=www.wmpfonline.com/sites/default/files/2023-04/230331West<a class="break-all" href="https://www.google.com/url?opi=89978449&rct=j&sa=t&source=web&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.wmpfonline.com%2Fsites%2Fdefault%2Ffiles%2F2023-04%2F230331_West_Midlands_Pension_Fund-2022_valuation_report%2528Final%2529v3.pdf&usg=AOvVaw0lZeUXhP2ssqB8stweczFN&ved=2ahUKEwiS6aLhk-SJAxUXBdsEHS-WFLUQFnoECAsQAQ" rel="nofollow" target="blank">MidlandsPensionFund-2022valuationreport%2528Final%2529v3.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiS6aLhk-SJAxUXBdsEHS-WFLUQFnoECAsQAQ&usg=AOvVaw0lZeUXhP2ssqB8stweczFN

On page 3, it shows the primary employer contribution rate as 21.8% of pay. This has increased from the rate of 20.4% of pay calculated three years ago, which it says is due to the recent high inflation. Employee contributions are then in addition to this. I don't know what you have to pay as a pension contribution but if it's around 10%, then the pp's comment that the employer meets about two thirds of the cost would be about right currently.

Apologies for the long post - pensions are complicated!

Mine was worse than minimum maternity pay provisions because the government has one rule for private places and loads of ways to reduce costs when they have to foot the bill. I didn’t get the 4 weeks full pay everyone is entitled to. My point wasn’t about maternity pay - only that I couldn’t afford my pension during maternity leave as they were going to take 11% of my £184 a week and no option to reduce the %. I’d agree with reducing sick pay in the public sector.

Annuities are subject to market changes. But the amount of pension pot you have - the actual pot itself which would be used to buy an annuity - is not subject to market forces.

E.g. a public sector pension pot of £100k would always be £100k regardless of what's happening in the markets. Whereas a private DC pension would be subject to market forces - so it could be £100k on Monday, and then a Liz Truss mini budget could see it valued at £89k by Friday.

Even with worse annuity rates you are still better off IYSWIM, as you have more money in your pot to buy the annuity (if an annuity was what you wanted to do).

Believe what you like but I work within the LGPS so I know that what I have said is correct.

Once you have accrued your pension, it cannot be taken away. Projections are always based on assumptions e.g. that you will continue working to X date on X salary so yes those will change if you leave earlier/your pay changes.

Posters keep saying that public sector salaries are paid for by the tax payer! Yes they are but we do actually have to work to earn the salary! Some of you seem to think it’s free money just given out to the lucky ones ! And we are also tax payers🙄🙄 My NHS pension to which I contribute over £300 pm is currently forecast to be less than £6k a year! Can’t wait to live it up on that bloated pension 🙄🙄

When the financial crash of 2010 happened it did affect my pension as my projected annuity decreased by about 25% - with my previous public sector pension.

I don't think it’s 100% protected which is why you get a projection of annuity when you retire, rather than a guaranteed income at retirement age when you look at your annual statement.

If you suggest that my employer is covering two thirds of the cost of my pension, I also don’t think that’s completely true either!

I also highlight that not all public sector income comes from the tax payer, rather councils hold shares and investments (such as shares in the local airport) and other projects and has a substantial land portfolio, and secures income from car parking, licences and other services.

I would wager that every company also therefore is funding pensions as ultimately every one who purchases goods or services from a private company is a tax payer and they will each be paying towards a private pension as part of the price for services or goods.

No, you would not lose your pension. The issues West Midlands pension fund is having paying people is due to a change of administration system, nothing to do with how much money the fund has or how the investments have performed.

The contributions you pay in cover very roughly a third of the cost of the benefits that you are promised. Investment returns make up a bit of the rest, but largely the remaining two thirds of the cost of your benefits is funded by your employer. And largely, the employers that participate in the Local Government Pension Scheme get most of their funding from central government one way or another. So yes, even in the LGPS the ultimate risk of paying pensions due lies with Government. It’s just not as stark as it is for the other public sector schemes which are unfunded.