The Elderly. Try and put yourself into their shoes.

/////////mamatomany Tue 25-Jan-11 14:10:11
Every 8 weeks you post the same points and then ignore everyone who attempts to discuss the matter////////

Pardon ?????

///////Portofino Tue 25-Jan-11 14:02:32
//////Oh God//////Not you again/////////

Well, you dont have to stay here, you could always go elswhere, or would you be the type why watches and moans without a credible brain cell to respond ?

////////The people I genuinely feel sorry for are the ones who were sold the 'cradle to grave' myth in the 1940's & 50's, saved nothing and then found themselves in difficulties. But younger people... those born post 1960... have, for the last 30+ years, had every opportunity not to fall into the same trap.

You don't mean Northern Rock btw... the (often elderly) savers at Northern Rock queued up patiently enough to transfer (often not insubstantial) funds to other banks. The Equitable Life customers had the worst experience but, even there, one case does not mean we should abandon private pensions as a lost cause.//////////

Yes I meant Equitable Life.

And as stated, private pensions are totally insecure.

It is only "The State" which is secure, but it is demonised.

//////But younger people... those born post 1960... have, for the last 30+ years, had every opportunity not to fall into the same trap. ///////

Please elaberate ?

//////Your ideas are not wrong but they are idealistic//////

So, in your later years you could so easily find yourself having lost everything, there are no securities in life, all plans can so easily go wrong.

So I see you lying there in the gutter begging for money, and I looked down at you and I say this.

You expect me to give you money, you are being very idealistic there arent you.

Here's some more information for you all. And the reason they refuse to claim is being the system humiliates them.

Britain's pensioners are missing out on an estimated £5.4 billion in unclaimed benefits each year.

The National Insurance fund system has a ?surplus? of ?£40 billion?, but is being used by the government for things it was not intended for.

Means testing is costing around 10 times more to administer, than a decent State pension linked to national average wages would cost.

It costs rough £5 per person per pensioner to pay pensioners a decent State pension, and it costs £54 per person per pensioners to run and administer the means test system our elderly / older people have to endure for state handouts.

Add all this information to the money we spend on overseas wars, illegal or otherwise, plus money that upholds third world countries.

Plus we send £50 plus million every day as our funding into the EU.

Im saying that we could easily pay out a decent State pension for our elderly people, without even increasing taxes.

////////So if you agree that there will be no state pension for my generation, then how can it possibly be "fair" for us to be paying in and in and in and in and ultimately never getting anything back?

I pay into a private pension, I can ill-afford to do so, but I do it anyway.////////

Another aspect of this is the basic insecurity and expense of the private pension, I bring to mind Northern Rock so years ago.

The role of the State in Britain is demonised, there is no doubt of this, and our grandparents are on the receiving end of this demonisation via their low State pension.

//////I think you'd also find that with the demographic/life-expectancy changes a 3x increase in the pension would cost a lot more than 5% of GDP and the retirement age would have to go up to about 75.//////

Im repeating my initial postng for you to read,-

The beaurocracy behind Means testing pensioners is costing £15 per person per pensioner.

Restoring the State pension link with national average wages would cost £5 per person per pensioner.

Conclusion ?. Means testing pensioners on a miserly £97 a week is costing more tax payers money than the restoration of the earnings link would cost.

Conclusion ?. The media and the politicians are keeping us in the dark.

The reason ?. Because right wing politics since Thatcher, ensures the demise of what the State provides, including a "State pension".

Fact. The Tory lead coalition are sitting on a National Insurance "surplus" of "£40 billion" but the coalition are using this money for other things, other than what the NI fund is meant for.

So, including foreign wars, upholding third world countries, funding into the EU of £50 million a day, Britain is a very wealthy country.

/////Your ideas are not wrong but they are idealistic. I think you'd also find that with the demographic/life-expectancy changes a 3x increase in the pension would cost a lot more than 5% of GDP and the retirement age would have to go up to about 75.////

So, wat is wrong with idealism ????, based on the fact that millions of younbger people today are facing the same impoverishment in their old age, just like their parents and grandparents today

///////So if you agree that there will be no state pension for my generation, then how can it possibly be "fair" for us to be paying in and in and in and in and ultimately never getting anything back?

I pay into a private pension, I can ill-afford to do so, but I do it anyway.////////

An excellent question. And your private pension contributions could so eaily dissapear the markets the way they are, they go up, and they go down.

Basically all "younger" people are indeed paying into a system that when pay out time comes, what comes forth wont be worth a light.

Which is why I have been saying for years, that the younge generations should stand and be counted with the older generations for a decent State pension on retirement.

Since the 80's, both the State and the State pension have been demonised by right wing politicians.

The only way this demonisation will change, is by the British standing and being counted against it.

But we British being largely what we are, ie politically docile, this just isnt going to happen.

And so, with the demise of the State and the State pension, the younger people of Britain, are heading for the same impoverishment in their old age as millions of their grandparents today.

So, we either stand together, or we perish apart.

////////Can we argue the point about 'millions' of improverished elderly people? I'm not having a go for the sake of it, but are there any statistics to back up how many people of retirement age are actually impoverished? Is it really 'millions'? I realise that there is a perennial problem with some older people not claiming benefits to which they are entitled & some who even see the pension itself as 'charity' and refuse to accept it, but is that a question of the amount of money available or is it more a question of culture & education?

And did anyone retiring today who would have been in their late thirties/early forties when pensions started to be reformed and the link with average earnings/inflation was changed.... did they genuinely 'rely on their NI contributions' to give them a decent retirement?////////////

With all of your retorich, you are not splitting hairs as they say.

We British either have a decent State pension on reaching retirement, or we dont.

I believe as a person not yet of pensionable age myself, that we should have a decent State pension on reaching retirement age.

What is so wrong with this ?

Why dont you think it's fair ?, incidently may I know your age ?

///////Go on Ivanhoe... have a go If you can explain why my good friend Mike, a retired director of an engineering firm with a five bed detached house in Surrey, motor-launch, Mercedes and fat company pension could do with having his state pension trebled, I'm all ears.///////

Because your friend has also paid for the State pension via his working life of N.I. contributions.

It is his "right" to receive a decent State pension.

Cant you even understand that ???????????

////There won't even be a state pension for my generation/////

No, there wont.

I find it utterly amazing that a nation which can afford to spend money round the word like a bottomless pit, and in the name of so-called "GREAT BRITAIN", can have people living in this country who when it comes to the civilised and fair livelyhoods of millions of impoverished elderly / older people, suddenly these people come out and bring every trick in the book to try and convince others to the contrary.

Self interest is what this is called, narrow minded self interest.

Since the 80's the basic State pension has increased with the lower inflation rate rather than British prosperity through an earnings link.

Since the 80's the basic State pension has been reducing in value, with means tested handouts as the only rescourse for millions of pensioners who through the years could not save for their old age, they relied on their NI contributions to secure them a decent retirement.

I cannot understand why anybody would argue with what im saying ?