to resent paying Ni when my generation won't get a state pension

[clutchpearl]

Just about every think tank that does a report on the state pension says it won't exist for people under 40 and we won't have the luxury of a couple of decades supported by the state. Aibu to feel like its all some ponzi con?

Yabu

Who said there won't be a state pension?

Also as a child, you didn't pay taxes yet benefitted from the state. Should the adults who paid taxes for you as a child be stamping their feet?

Paying taxes isn't a commercial transaction. It is a contribution to a decent society.

Also NI doesn't directly fund pensions. It gets swished into one pot with all taxes.

FFS you name changed for this and a row over tinned beans?

YABU, I pay national insurance to cover people's pensions now, benefits if I lose my job or my health, and in the hope that one day people will see sense and have a citizens income for all, including elderly people, so we don't need pensions. I wish they would put it up so we could have pensions, but a couple of decades is just daft anyway, and not something most people in history have had at all..

Your great grandparents may well have benefited from a pension they hadn't contributed to. Swings and roundabouts.

I assume you use the services provided by the NHS?

Where did you get your crystal ball? It would be just the thing for my friend for Christmas. She's in financial planning so an ability to see into the future is very beneficial.

It's for nHs too

NI is just tax.
They'd merge income tax and NI but it's complicated as they are calculated differently and of course who ever did it would look like they see massively hiking tax rates - not good for votes!

It's a tax. It pays for the things that tax pays for. Future generations will also pay tax, but they won't be able to afford to pay for a couple of decades of pension. The pension age is already going up, and it will go up further.

Not sure what there is to 'resent' about paying this any more than paying tax in general.

YANBU. You are quite right. We are paying for our parent's generation to retire at 60, whilst we will not get to retire until about 80.

Thanks pony, at least one person sees the unfairness of it all

What makes you think we're going to be able to retire at all, Pony?

I'm beginning to think I'm going to drop dead at a desk somewhere (assuming of course that I still have the mental capacity to work)

Sorry yabu but I do see your point.

The introduction of NI and the universal pension was never meant to pay for everyone to have a couple of decades of retirement. Retirement age was set at an age not much less than life expectancy at the time. They made a serious mistake in not legislating to tie retirement age to life expectancy at the time. People currently aged 60+ benefitted from that mistake hugely. Some of them are getting almost as many years of paid idleness as they ever spent in the workforce. That's got to be stupid.

However, the system is now being put right. If you look after yourself and are lucky enough to have a longer-than average life expectancy, you will get a state pension. You will also benefit from a welfare safety-net of some sort, and health and social care as and when you need it.

Complaining that you missed out on the stupidly over-generous deal that is being discontinued is like moaning that you came too late to the broken cashpoint that was doling out free money, and claiming the bank should pay you.

Fil has been retired for 32 years, on a very generous public sector pension. It just doesn't seem right. In Europe the situation is worse. In Italy you can retire (or at least you could) after 25 years' public sector service on a full pension.

Were there no actuaries in decades past?

NI does not pay for pensions, or anything specifically. It just goes into a general pot like other taxes.

YANBU.

Theoretically NI was in part to cover pensions and this still seems to be the rhetoric. The reality is that a NI is just another form of tax.

What's really unfair is that pensioners don't pay it.

A young graduate on 22k has a higher marginal rate of tax (including NI and student loans) than a pensioner with an index linked pension of 4x that. Massively unfair especially considering that the pensioner's age group never paid their way when they were working.

Oh dear HedgePony - better get your facts straight. National pension now doesn't start for a lot of people until the age of 68.

Where do you get age 60 from??

Age 60 was true until 2010.

Plenty of people could have a mother 35 years older who has recently retired and expect the already announced age of 68 to rise further in the next 40 years

That's another gripe Ni not being paid by pensioners. As it is just a general tax it should be paid.

I'm not saying I want to be funded by the state for a few decades, I'm resenting that I'm paying for other people to do this!

Isn't over 25% of council tax going purely to pensions? Many of which are final salary.

So NI JUST covers pensions does it?

And when did anyone say you wouldn't get a state pension?

YABU.

By your calculations people with no children shouldn't have to fund education or child benefit etc. Or those who are never ill won't be needing the NHS either...

It's a bit of a "pay as you go" attitude, isn't it?

It is a Ponzi scheme though, which is why I pull the face everytime someone says 'we need lots of children to be born pay for older peoples' pensions'.

Who is going to pay for their pensions? Lot and lots more children? Classic definition of a pyramid scheme, that is starting to fall apart.

The fact is that, due to increased life expectancies, the past pension model was unaffordable. People used to start work at 15/16 and only have a few years of retirement after 60/65.

Now, far more people go to university and don't start full time and hence taxpaying work until 21 or even older if doing a Masters or Phd and have a much higher life expectancy. Hence it is unaffordable for the state to pay a pension from the previous retirement ages.

I read something yesterday that said that it could no longer be assumed that pensioners were generally poor, and there were more poor young people than poor pensioners and that cuts would start have to affect pensioners that have been insulated from a lot of them up to now (pensions have not been held back as much as working age benefits and public sector salaries for example).

Jeez OP you again? Don't you have some research to to on tinned tomatoes?

What makes you so certain that you won't get a state pension?

And why is it just pensions that you have a problem with? I'm never going to get child tax credits but I accept that my taxes will go towards paying them for other people. I will benefit from living in a civilised society in other ways.

I'm not saying I want to be funded by the state for a few decades, I'm resenting that I'm paying for other people to do this!

But why pensions? People can't help getting old. You could direct your issue at people who have children they can't afford, at least they had some choice in the matter unlike people who just age. Both groups of people could have planned for their own expenses better, I really don't understand why you are worried about unfairness with regards to pensions while ignoring all other benefits.

Isn't over 25% of council tax going purely to pensions? Many of which are final salary.

You. Are. Idiotic.

Different councils have different pension schemes, like any other employer. If it is any consolation, I doubt final salary schemes are a long-term option, many are closing to new members and are likely to become unsustainable.

We all want to enjoy services provided by the state, but those have to be paid for. Those above who pointed out that the state pension age was originally set at a level many would never reach are right. Yes, some generations have benefited. But what about elderly people with no children, whose tax and NI has helped to build schools? People who don't drive paying towards new motorways?

What is unfair is that successive governments have ducked the question of what people want provided by the state, and how much they are prepared to pay for it.