What is the point of paying NI for 35 years to get a full State Pension, when people who have never worked receive Pension Credit anyway?

What do mean 'what happened to it'?
It was a large bill that was very slightly reduced.

There wasn't a bank account with lots of money sitting in it, waiting.

@Badbadbunny, you said it! The ‘saved’ money did not get ‘saved’, it was a matter of ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul’. But let’s take it one step further, Peter had nothing that could be robbed to pay Paul.

The money was never there. By not spending as much it just meant the UK didn't need to borrow as much. We've been running an annual deficit for something like 28 out of the last 30 years. The cumulative debt is around £3TRILLION which means we spend more on interest on the national debt than on education! If the pension age hadn't been put back, we'd have had to borrow even more, meaning even more paid out on interest. It's all very bleak.

No it wasn’t about saving money -but what happened to it - all those people born in ?1952 who waited another year, surely it was millions but never mentioned

People live longer in our ageing population, we having fewer young people paying in per retired person claiming. The raise in retirement age was not about 'saving' money that could be spent elsewhere, but rather about cutting the costs of something very expensive.

I sometimes wonder what happened to all the thousandsj of pounds saved by the treasury by not paying pensions due to the increase in pension age. There should be something to show for this huge drop per year in those receiving pensions but it must have been used up as I've never heard it ever mentioned.

I think it's largely people who have never had to navigate the system themselves. It feels to me like they're talking about a different world.

The DLA and CA we receive don't come close to making up for the loss of household earnings.

If you want to have anything approaching significant savings, you need to be working and not claiming UC. It's why I gratefully jumped at the chance of a part-time job. I want savings and the extra bit of security they bring, saving the majority of my redundancy payment is the best option for that given our low income.

Well, NHS pensions and teacher’s pensions cost us a fortune as well, Do we want to curb those as well? 🤷‍♀️

Yes, unfunded liabilities are estimated at over one trillion.

Interesting
But we also have to pay all those civil service public servants’ pensions —that’s going to be huge too so it will probably happen sooner rather than later.

The issue with pensions and benefits when looking at it overall has been the expected social contract between the state and individual changing.

People do not like the contract changing it brings uncertainty. To see why it’s gone badly you have to look way back when certain policies were introduced. Society constantly changes and evolves. What has happened over the last 50 years are the most rapid societal changes in a short time.

So what we have is a society that conceptually is doing far better overall, more rights for women, longer lives lived, the push for inclusivity in society, better medical care. Our own success will be our demise. It’s the unintended consequences of becoming more successful at being civilised. Just like the very obvious loss of the value of a degree when there was the push to up the numbers back in the 90’s.

Most of the posts on here when it comes to benefits are anecdotal and driven by emotion and it’s why any benefit thread always descends in to personal attacks and sweeping statements about how things should or could be.

Well, it doesn’t seem fair, but that’s always been how it is. Even those younger, that never have never worked, get means tested benefits.

But, I paid in and got my pension via contributions. It’s topped up with private pensions, and savings, and I get no ‘extra’ help, with rent or anything, And I still pay quite a bit of tax. But, I’m quite happy that I don’t have to justify and prove things to officials because I need means tested top ups.

Plus, governments change, and I wouldn’t be affected if the rules around means tested benefits change.

When I got UC I got £864
Sure my rent was paid but I still had £205 worth of council tax to pay and 4 kids to feed. People really arent raking it in on uc

But we can’t switch their health for the benefits, so there has to be a conversations about the affordability of those benefits especially as the number of people claiming them is through the roof and steeply rising. This ‘oh they’d rather be well…’ is utterly moot and merely a thought terminating cliche.

This.
I hate the misconception on here about how anyone on DLA/PIP/UC is just living their best life on those benefits. There is a reason they are claimed... illness and disability.
I know a guy who is on the highest rate on both elements for PIP. He works full time in a job that works round him and his health. But he would rather he did not have the reasons to claim to begin with.

Read my post again. I didn't say it wasn't an issue.

And around here £16800 minimum of that would be on housing benefit which leaves £10,000 for expenses plus additional disability costs.

Just wow, do you know how bad your disability/health has to be to get high rate mobility and care? I'm absolutely sure those people who have to claim benefits due to disability/health would much rather have their health.

The ignorance of some posters on here is off the scale.

I’m believing PWC.

https://www.peoplemanagement.co.uk/article/1942989/uk-economy-losing-26bn-year-youth-unemployment-pwc-research-finds

What does this have to do with your £200k comment?

Sure. It's all those disabled people and their carers' fault the economy is shitty.

Criminals.

I would say your grasp of economics is very weak if you think welfare is the sole issue here. And possibly your memory is a little short.

Don't believe everything the likes of Farage and Badenoch tell you is my advice.

It’s the ‘maybe’ that’s the key word. Poster didn’t say you were…

Now you are just proving the point.

Oh my bad you said stupid or ignorant… like that radically changes the nature of the comment!