To think that there is no hope here?

It is a bit because it’s hierarchical and salaries are based on rank. Theoretically everyone is deployable so subject to risk in a war situation.

Nor do I have a problem with either retiring on a percentage of salary after 25 years service. But if you did dangerous tasks, I'd like to think your pension was better than a military chef, or is that unreasonable!

Everyone gets “hazard pay”. They’re all trained for deployment.

Well that’s fine. The chefs are not abusing the system so no complaints, though in an ideal world there would be hazard pay for some.

I am left of centre but agree something is broken. Mental health claims have skyrocketed and I’ve seen up close that some are opting out of employment who might benefit from working at least part time.

I worry very much that tightening PIP will hit some of the wrong people, but I also think it will catch some who need a kick. However whether we have the work for them is a separate question. That is an equally big worry.

Actually they don’t. The military salary scale is rank based. So the sergeant who is a chef earns the same as the sergeant who is an ammunition technician. Of course not all ammunition technicians defuse bombs, some of them are essentially warehouse keepers.

And presumably a military chef and a detonations expert have salaries reflecting their skill sets and working conditions. I see nothing wrong wrong with retiring them both on the same percentage of final salary.

Napoleon was correct when he said that an army marches on its stomach.

And as middle income pensioners, that might just be the spur enough to tip us from the "we'll move within the UK" to "we'll move to North Portugal and take intensive language classes for a year." We are already well past retirement age; we can meet the income requirements, and 10% taxation on pension income is not to be sniffed at. We are not oligarchs, we have an SME that's done okay, well enough to employ six properly paid people, but we'd like to retire. Because we are 70. I like living in the UK or at least in parts of it but my niece would happily swap houses during the school summer holiday when it's too hot for old Anglos and she could probably negotiate six weeks remote work provided the broadband is up to it.... which it will be.

I wasn’t disagreeing with OP?

If you disagree you haven’t done your own research and you just believe what you hear. A PP has already posted the numbers in this thread but information is free to all.

So in my line of work I hear benefit claimants describe their financial circumstances on a daily basis. It is quite rare now to find a household that subsists off UC alone, and doesn’t claim some form of disability benefit on top of this. It really isn’t unusual to have a household which is claiming UC, one of the adults claiming PIP, and DLA for 2 or even 3 children. Sometimes more. All together that’s about £60,000 per year? It used to be very rare that a person would have 2 or 3 children so disabled they needed benefits; now it’s really really common.

The expectations continue to rise, the taxation continues to fall, so taxes go up. The expectations rise again. I think what will happen is Reform or similar will get in and just brutally cut all of them. It’s a shame but we’ve tried a softer approach with Labour and it’s just sabotaged by people who think the country exists as a welfare system.

Impossible to say at this point - I can give personal knowledge but that’s it.

Of note, Labour tried to water down the non-dom phase out, and the City has been very vocal about the damage done, so QED.

This was predictable with Labour. I agree with @JamesMacGillon benefits being the answer on here.

According to Gary's economics this morning Labour will increase taxes on middle earners at the next budget in October/November.

You’re not wrong OP and I say this as an average earner ie not a net contributor probably.

Benefits are wildly out of control, we have an addiction to spending, and therefore all that can happen is further squeezing of the taxpayer.

You see it on here all the time, the response to virtually any problem is ‘can you claim benefits’ and an assumption that the taxpayer should financially mitigate everything for everyone. And if you disagree you obviously love billionaires and want people to starve etc

Good question... I wish I had asked that.

I couldn't disagree with you, and it was an oversight on my part that I did not refer to pensions generally and especially public sector index-linked liablities. I don't have one personally so my SIPP is tucked into a commercial property that I control outright, but many of my friends retired from the armed services in their early 50s on two-thirds of final salary, annually reviewed. I know that several have gallantry decorations for defusing bombs during their service, but military chefs etc who never faced anything more dangerous than a sack of onions retire on the same basic terms.

What do you estimate the real loss of tax income from UHNW, non doms etc since Labour came in?

Ageing demographics, declining tax base.

Ask any actuary.

It was ever thus. The current generation of pensioners has funded the two generations that went before them.

For context.

The UK government currently has almost £5 trillion worth of pension liabilities which it will have to pay in the future (£1.2 trillion for public service pensions and £3.84 trillion in respect of the state pension).

Most of these are unfunded, meaning that they are largely paid out of annual tax revenues and the bill for them is being passed on to future generations because today’s government is not putting money aside to cover them.

Provided that there is acceptance that taxation is essential to kickfund starting big expensive but vital infrastructure (power systems, NHS and transport networks for examples), and to provide the necessary support for the very elderly and seriously incapacitated for the remainder of their whole lives, then after that I believe that 1) you need to have contributed to earn benefits like unemployment or UC and that they should be time limited.

I don't resent paying tax; I do resent paying when the money is badly spent. And yes, I know defining badly spent is tricky. On young male economic migrant chancers coming on rubber dinghies... no, but on the disabled children of previous immigrants encouraged into close cousin marriages? I think the Pakistani model of close kinship marriages to create clans and family wealth is understandable, but really unhealthy.

Income tax payments are concentrated among those individual taxpayers with the largest incomes. The 10% of income taxpayers with the largest incomes contribute over 60% of income tax receipts.

The OBR predicts that it will collect 37.1p of every pound generated in the economy in 2028-29 - the highest level in 80 years.

Its very simple - tax this cohort beyond what they are prepared to bear, and they will cut their exposure - via the methods I have mentioned.

Incidentally, Labour have belatedly seen this with the non-doms. I have sat on numerous round tables with family offices, UHNW, non-doms, tax lawyers. I can tell you all about this.

Well let's punish the working non wealthy and squeeze the unemployed, sick and disabled then to make it fair. For heavens sake where will it stop. The government just handing us pocket money whether we work hard or not.

You’re saying governments should only make policies that retain the wealthiest taxpayers.

We can’t build a functioning society on the threat that rich people will walk unless we keep them disproportionately comfortable.

Tax payers money has been allocated away from public services.

The issue isn’t that taxpayers like you paid — it’s that public money went into things like housing benefit to private landlords (many of them wealthy), or propping up a buy-to-let economy, instead of building homes people can actually afford. That’s just an example of redistribution upwards.

If you look into a little political history you’ll find these problems route back to the 80’s.