I’ve easily found £30bn of savings, so why can’t the government do this?

Soon, a good chunk of it will go on euthanising the sick and elderly.

Are you really resentful of people on a pension being able to afford “luxuries”? How are you defining that?

Yes but for the vast majority, £12.5k is the difference between living in poverty and being able to visit children and grandchildren a couple of times a year, being able to buy new clothes instead of second hand, running costs for a car and a home, being able to afford a bit of help as old age sets in with cleaning and DIY.

Otherwise what are we all working for? The social contract is work hard, save and you can enjoy some active years of retirement. You can’t enjoy it if you have less disposable income than a 16yr old with a Saturday job.

Does Chat GPT vote Labour then because this is their idea.

No, fuck off OP. I’ve worked hard and paid into pensions precisely so I can enjoy some luxuries in retirement. It’s not a race to the bottom.

Why single out pensioners? Pensioners are probably the least entitled and have the most reason to feel entitled having worked hard all their lives. There are a lot of entitled people on benefits who have never worked a stroke, parents expecting hugely expensive special education for their children for free, expecting instant expensive treatment from the NHS for free, free nursery places, free immediate GP appointments. All very desirable stuff but there is no money.

Sheesh. Ideas like this piss me right off. I’m late 40s. Have been paying as much as I can afford into a pension since 2002 (the first time I was offered the opportunity and had the means to contribute). My DH and I have struggled, still struggle. Doing our best to be mortgage free (19 years to go), have paid over £75,000 for childcare, supported family members financially not lived extravagant lives at all. No holiday since 2023 for example and you suggest this??

the state pension is an important part of our retirement plans. Given we’ve tried to save we will pay tax, but losing on top of this would have us in a very restrictive retirement.

based on estimates we’re going to have to have a frugal retirement as it is…and you suggest penalising us even more?

off you fuck please.

"households with more than £12,000 a year from private pensions, work, or investments have 50p of SP withdrawn for every £1 above that level, up to the value of the pension itself"

When you say households do you mean households or individuals.

Your plan removes the incentive to save.

Retirees already pay tax on any income over £12,570. Will they not be paying twice using your scheme.

They may well be legitimate sources but the data is then taken out of context. It will have pulled a mishmash of stats from various studies and research by the DWP, totally ignored the context, data limitations and caveats, then served it up to you in a convincing manner. It's in no way reliable.

so yet again, those who work and save get bugger all while those that contribute nothing get it paid. Typical Labour voter mentality

I would not, but then I am neurodivergent. Shared housing would be a complete nightmare.

The thing is that most pensioners are only just achieving the lifestyle people think is their right and you want to snatch it from them

they played by the rules and you want to upend it because you want more than they had or dreamt of at your age

stop focussing on hate and jealousy and focus instead on how to turn this country around so that living standards can start to rise again - and that isn’t dividing society which is what you are doing . That is not building more distrust of the state by encouraging theft and breeding a benefit culture

This would be electoral suicide if done retrospectively, and unfair on the young if not
What we could do:
Stop higher rate relief on pension contributions
Charge pensioners national insurance,rather than stopping at state pension age
Make all the little age based allowances means tested - pharmacy charges, bus passes and the like

Im 60, expect to have a private pension of about 1/3 my salary, so would get very little state pension under your scheme, but would probably be OK with the points I've suggested.

What ChatGPT hasn’t factored in is behaviour change. This isn’t so easy to predict.

how will this affect behaviour? It is very easy for ChatGPT to trot out a survey that showed X% of people would support Y,Z policy. But quite another when voters are faced paying more to get less. Almost everyone would say they want a fairer society- but very few would want to lose the privileges they have.

look at increased national insurance = staff losing jobs, small businesses struggling, or not growing.

increasing tax on businesses = moving to lower tax jurisdictions

VAT on school fees= parents who struggle to pay fees now taking kids out of private sector and into school system. These small businesses ( which private schools are) going out of business and taking jobs with them. It might not affect huge numbers, but it all adds up and hasn’t achieved any positive goal ( such as greater equality)

Thing is, if you don't qualify for a state pension, you get benefits instead, you're not really in a much worse position. If all you have is a state pension are you actually any better off financially than somebody who worked abroad their whole life then came home to retire with no money, assets or pension and claims elderly benefits?

So you want to reduce the cost of visas, with this reduced cost how would you make up the shortfall in funds?

Younger voters voting to cut state pension are voting against their future selves. The UK state pension is already too low. I wish more understood that any pension cut now they vote for will be x2 for every 20yrs they are from pension age. So a 48yr old voting to reduce pensions by £500/yr is voting to cut their future pension by £1000/yr. A 28yr old voting to reduce pensions £500/yr is voting to cut their future pension by £2000/yr
(Present values of money, actual figures will be higher)

How do you know this? because I do not believe it

All that would happen OP is that people would work out a way to get under the threshold be it taking a bigger lump sum out of pension or greater charitable donation.

Just take a look at the figures foe the Scottish govt tax revenue - what they predicted versus what they are actually getting as people work out ways to offset it.

The very wealthy are hardly drawing state pensions!

They already exist in various forms of residential care. You will prise the key to my house where I live alone out of my cold dead hands and even they I would come back and haunt you.

Bur surely if that’s the lifestyle they were able to afford pre retirement because of their work / qualifications / income, and their pension (to which they and the employer) has contributed along with their savings affords them the same now they’ve retired then there’s no issue. They’ll already be paying tax at 40% I suspect on those pensions, and when the state pension is paid maybe they’ll be paying 45%

And that’s the point no they didn’t work any harder than anybody who isn’t living that lifestyle.
They were born at the right time
They had the right parents, maybe
They didn’t do anything special they just turned up

@OwnGravityField

households with more than £12,000 a year from private pensions, work, or investments have 50p of SP withdrawn for every £1 above that level, up to the value of the pension itself

Do you honestly think that a household of 2 people should start losing their state pension entitlement as soon as they receive £6k a year each? So you think that a household of 2 should start losing their state pension as soon as they hit £1k per month?

The state pension is based on a contributory system. Apart from NICs paid through employment etc, many people have paid voluntary contributions to buy extra years where they had missed contributions in certain years. When they paid those voluntary contributions, they were told they would receive “x” amount of state pension. I’m not convinced of the legality of a government then turning round and saying “oh actually you’re not going to receive it after all, despite paying voluntary contributions and being told you would be entitled”

I think the pension idea might work in the long term but it would need a very slow start. Those in their 40’s/50’s onwards MH at have already made plans that rely on a full state pension.