To think we can't afford the triple lock

Not enough for what they get.

The price of what? A fully funded pension?

How much should my sons pay in? The youngest currently pays 12% of his salary. The eldest pays 9.9% of his. Sorry, eldest isn’t LG it’s Scottish Teachers.

So £11700 and £4950.

A private sector employee with an employer contribution of 5% (which is the average for the private sector) would need to contribute 20% to get the equivalent to the LG pension. Ie 25% total contribution between employer and employee.

The public sector should not get more freebies than the public they are employed by.

Your sons should either be contributing 20% to their pension from their salary or else accept a much lower pension. Half of what it's currently set at.

Envy is a curse.

No it wouldn’t. The public sector pension would still be much higher.

But fairness is a virtue.

Race to the bottom.

And more importantly, a state which gives excessive handouts to powerful client interests strangles growth and success.

Past economic success doesn't stay with a country forever, regardless of how it's governed and how much gravy is extracted.

The UK is already significantly - and noticeably - poorer than it was 20 years ago, within a world ranking. I expect that to accelerate.

Actually, my arguments are an attempt to prevent a race to the bottom - the bottom of the global wealth index.

Oh and what happens to say 60 year old women when they come to retire in 7 years?
Many have worked all their life, maybe going part time to look after their children. They will be completely screwed over. No time to put away ££££.

How about cutting all the benefits which those who haven’t worked get? Such as pension credit, winter fuel allowance, housing benefit, benefits for having multiple children.
How about taxing billionaires and making all parents pay for their own children.
How about stopping providing completely free homes to those who do not work?
How about making everyone pay council tax?
How about stopping benefits for drunks, druggies and the bone idle?
How about reducing the level of care/service those who do not pay receive, for things such as care homes?
How about charging for all doctors appointments whilst reducing the amount of tax/NI contributions the average worker pays?

Many, many pensioners have worked their entire adult life, often making sacrifices to pay into a private pension, only to have that used against them once they retire.
Not all pensioners are loaded. Living in homes with millions. Sipping champagne and ordering their staff about.

PIP won't be cut at all. Maybe you're not claiming all you're enttled to ? PIP isn't means tested so if this is your only income then you clearly need to be speaking to someone about other benefits.

Agree about pensioners. But pitting different groups who live in comparative poverty against each other isn't the answer.

As a country becomes poorer, locally made goods and services stay the same price - because local wages reflect the lower wealth of the country.

But imports and travel outside the UK become much less affordable. And we import a lot.

In 2000, the UK's GDP per person was about 20% below the US, 20% above France and Germany and 50% above Australia.

It's now 30% below the US, 5% below Germany, 20% below Australia. Pretty shocking. We're still 20% above France (France has very similar structural financial problems to us). Oh, and don't blame Brexit for the drop compared to Germany - we've grown faster than them since then, the drop was before that.

If you want to imagine what it will be like for the UK in another 25 years - when your boys are whatever age they will be then - as this decline continues, think about how it is for people in Croatia and Portugal, or Poland 15 years ago. That's about the same amount of economic decline again.

I mean, it's not disastrous - but people have far less, and young people very often leave the country for better opportunities abroad. If you think we're currently in a COL crisis, that's the very start of this change.

If it becomes a spiral, the exit from London continues and London becomes a normal capital (rather than one of the great world capitals, with the huge inflows that come from that), then the impact becomes even stronger.

I don't want that. I'd like the UK to continue to be a good place for all our children and grandchildren to live.

😩i meant private sector!!
The public sector pension would be much higher than the private sector!

London isn't the capital of the UK. Just saying.

Yes it is. Just saying.

It also funds the whole UK. All 4 nations.

No it's not. It's the capital of England.

So what’s the capital of the UK?

in your opinion?

You know Scottish Independence hasn't happened, right? The devolved partliaments are subservient to Westminster.

Edinburgh is the capital of Scotland.

London is the capital of both England and the UK.

London factually is the capital

Rather a sidetrack though. Doesn't change the fact that the UK's economy will continue to decline as people continue to extract their gravy.

Nor does it change the fact that if that causes an exodus from London, such that it becomes a normal capital, that will accelerate the decline in wealth for everyone in the whole UK.

If you could just admit that you, as a ex-LA worker who was able to retire early, has a pretty good deal, it would do you more credit than arguing you have paid into your pension and conveniently forgetting how much the LA paid in.
I don't know what you did at the LA, but i would hazard a guess that unless you were very high level, you would have been paid at least as much as a comparable job in the private sector. If not more.
You obvioulsy have paid into your pension. We all do. But however much you argue, there's no getting away from the fact that LA and public sector pensions are WAY more generous than private sector. And as they are effectively funded by taxpayers, need a fundamental reform to bring them in line.
'Race to the bottom' doesn't adress this point.