Who’s going to pay our pensions in 20-30years if the UK keeps its birth rate low and also restricts immigration?

I'm not confident on how to solve that problem or negate it but I can educate our children to understand that they will need to allocate funds for a private pension and the value of a workplace pension and how to make the most of that when that starts, the earlier they start the better.

Lots of children in the UK are not taught financial literacy, generations of families have a blindspot, there needs to be an overhaul in how we approach this as a personal responsibility because the state pension is not a reliable back up imo.

There just won't be state and public sector pensions as they exist now. Was never remotely sustainable and we should have been far more realistic decades ago.

That used to how it was 50+ years ago.

I am an OAP. I think the triple lock should stop now.

No because life expectancy is also increasing. Pension age should increase with life expectancy.

In theory we should be rolling in disposable income.

But putting £60k into a pension each year, overpaying every penny on the mortgage to be clear for uni fees, and me not selling my inherited house because we are trying to keep it rented out until teens need a house deposit means our standard of living is lower than our parents, on a much higher income.

They retired at 60 and 65, had smallish but enough fins salary pensions and didn’t need to give me much for uni or housing.

So to attempt to give our kids something close to the start we had we are looking at £200k NET per child (I got around £30k all in)
To have a retirement at anywhere near the same time and standard as our parents looking at pension pot of £800k-£1m

It’s a lot to find. But we have decided to take the hit for our kids. And in many ways feel “lucky”

We are 50 and have been in this planning for over 10 years now. So it’s not a surprise.

Our standard of living is lower than our parents, and our kid’s is likely to be lower still.

But what to do? Have to deal with the cards you are dealt. And we are doing our small bit for the population (although not sure how much hep it will be one wants to I’ve in Europe one in Canada)

They do. And increasing birth rate isn’t the way to go with AI and automation looming.

We can’t afford children now, paying for something in 30 years is not really on the priority list.

Many first generation immigrants move back to their home countries for retirement (where their UK pension goes s lot further). It’s actually a fairly good solution for many people, because they can afford to buy in help around the home which would be unaffordable (or paid for by the state) in the UK.

I agree our expectations are completely unrealistic, and have been for decades.

The only viable long term solution would be more fixed term working visas, which would contribute to the economy without burdening it in the long run.

Basically state funded retirement will be the absolute basics at an older age.

You want more money and/or more time you will have to pay for it yourself - which is already the case to be fair,.

Yes good point. The whole future looks so depressing tbh. Think people will be having to get used to living on a lot less. I am resigned that my kids are going to have a much harder time of getting on in life than I did. Super high house prices, fewer job prospects, massive student debt, climate change. It's depressing.

Isn’t that the aim?

I’m 46, I don’t expect to get a state pension when I retire. Anybody my age or younger should be paying into an employer pension scheme and/or a private pension.

That's true to a degree but it varies wildly particularly regarding how "fit" people are. Where I live healthy life expectancy for women is 56, and 58 for men (out of an overall life expectancy of 81f and 78m). In Surrey it's more like 69 for both (out of 83f and 80m).

Which is an interesting stat, places that are more economically deprived are likely to have lower healthy life expectancy so less people physically able to work longer but also less people economically able to retire early as they wouldn't have access to good private pensions / savings / high capital in houses etc.

If people aren't having children, what family will there be to 'step in more,' especially if we're all working two jobs just to pay for rent, mortgages and Uni?

Plus, it's nigh on impossible to get a decent job once you're over the age of 50.

You're all forgetting one thing - Immigrants also age.

If people don't have any means of supporting themselves though they will still have to be provided with money to live off and rent paid unless we are going to see large numbers of people starving and on the street. maybe family will have to step in more.
I see so many people currently trying to survive on very basic UC. The rent element does not cover their private rent, they need support with council tax etc. they can't find jobs, even graduates and healthy young people are struggling to find jobs at the moment let alone those in their sixties and if the pension age rises into their seventies.

It will clearly be the case that out of work benefits will be less and that fewer people will be assessed to be in need of them.

Exactly and people claiming universal credit, their earnings are taken into account after private pensions have been deducted to incentivize them and mean they aren't penalized for saving.

Oh yes definitely I agree. I did mention in my post that I was referring to those who have disposable income and not those living pay check by pay check. I do strongly believe that there should always be a safety net for those that struggle in terms of a state pension, pension credit and WFA for example. However there are an awful lot of people with disposable income who do bury their heads in the sand and think that the state will cover them in retirement. That is despite having had the means for decades in taking care of it.

I work in benefits for over 50's. There are so many pensioners currently who have barely worked their whole lives ( I appreciate things were different years ago especially for women). Many others retired at 60 and have been claiming state pension and pension credit, etc for 25/ 30 years.
I think it will get to a situation where the whole benefit system collapses eventually apart from maybe a very basic amount to live on if you genuinely have nothing else.
So many older people claiming Attendance allowance and all the extra pension credit etc that comes with that, so many people going into Pension age on PIP which can be up to twice that of AA. There just aren't the tax payers to fund it all for many more years. Add into this that many of today's young people will never be able to get on the housing ladder so unless we start building some more social housing pdq there will need to be funded with housing benefit when in their pension years as a modest private pension and possibly no state pension is not going to fund extortionate private rents for 20/30 years of retirement. Ticking timebomb unless someone makes some difficult decision soon.

It’s already incentivised through tax relief - still doesn’t seem to make much of a difference

@Whatshesaid96 You and your DH are in the fortunate position of being able to invest in your pensions. A lot of people don't earn enough to be able to afford to do that. They don't have any disposable income to lock up in long-term investments or pension plans, they need it to live on.

The problem with raising state pension age is that you will just have loads more people in their 50's and 60's claiming out of work benefits and disability benefits as they already do so still not really going to be affordable. I work in benefits for over 50's and there are already large numbers claiming because they have health issues or because they lose their jobs and can't find alternative employment at that age.

Why not incentivise higher payment into private pensions?

Not sure about means testing state pension but things can be done to motivate saving, through tax change

I agree with this. I don't believe that anyone has the right to sit around and be economically inactive for 20 odd years of their life just because they worked for 40 years or whatever. I doubt I'll have the stamina to teach until I'm 70 but I'm sure I'll have the brainpower to do a less strenuous job when I'm older.