Pensioners now better of than working families - is this right?

[TeaCake5]

www.theguardian.com/money/2017/feb/13/pensioners-now-20-a-week-better-off-than-working-households

What do you think? I think that this is going to cause more resentment in the medium term.

Just an anecdotal but for my grandparents both my my granddads worked for 30-35 years as the single breadwinner and their household incomes are 34k and 41k approx as I've helped them out with paperwork. They still have to pay income tax on this, including the measly state pension. They both needed new cars for the safety features and these are costing almost 300 a month! The buses are 12 times a day where they live just into town so half the time they drive in and still have to pay for parking even with a blue badge.

Hardly a fortune seeing as the average couple are on 50k. True they don't have mortgage payments but even still they aren't going to london 5 star hotels and cruses 4 times a year.

brasty is right. My father (psychiatrist) worked in the 1960s to ensure disabled children could be given proper attention and care and so grateful were those people that when he retired from one centre they made my little sister and I an enormous wonderful doll's house which I still have and in the newspaper after my father died the obituary specifically mentioned my father's work in helping make those important changes for disabled children and young people. Life was not easy in the past.

However I don't like the divisions we now have - older people saying young people don't know they are born or younger people saying all the old are on cruises. Nor indeed the division between brexiters and remainers and pro and anti trumpers. We always do a lot better in society if we can come together and find common ground so I never really like generational divide threads.

I think the hardest stage for most people of all their lives has always been when they have a young family (except perhaps your last 2 years of life in pain and ill and dying which is possibly the worst of the worst). My life as a full time working single mother is dead easy now I just have teenagers. It was not easy working full time whilst breastfeeding a 6 week old baby with a 1 and 3 year old and the baby in very expensive day care. When you are exhausted from being up in the night and then at work being all bright and breezy or trying to appear so and with all the expenses now and in the past people have of child care (or a lost wage) plus as soon as you are home the children are there needing attention when you'd rather tidy the kitchen or just sit....it is not an easy stage. OAPs who sit doing nothing may well deserve their peace but they cannot claim that life stage is hard until they get sick. However loads of them help their children financially (I just gave all my private pension in cash to the older children and will give the younger ones a similar sum once I have it and they are in their 20s) or help with childcare so it is not a one way street.

Its not even large age gaps

28 year old cousin cant figure out why ds1 says he will be in debt after uni because none of his freinds were

Might be something to do with the fact that some of your friends only paid 1k, some would have been caught by 3k

Ds1 is caught by 9k

Yes I agree that divisions are false. Some people have a hard life, others have it easier. We should be fighting for all of those who need a helping hand at the moment.

madein1995 it is £20 in favour of old people but 10 years ago it was £70 in favour of working people. It is not the absolute amount if any that I have concerns about, but more that at a time when in-work benefits and safety net are being continuously cut the reality is that there is a redistribution to older people. This will in turn increase the wealth divide as the wealthiest pensioners will pass on support down the generations but the poorer pensioners will be unable to do this.

My own DM would not have been able to afford to give up work to help with childcare when my DC were little for example.

jdoe - those are very decent incomes for your gp. £34K and £41K for people who are not supporting a family, just themselves... fancy moaning! I think that's exactly what people on this thread and in RL are grumbling about - those incomes for a working person are not too bad, but are absolutely out of reach for most future pensioners.

The issue for me is not that so many pensioners are better off than working families but that so many working families are worse off than pensioners. We need to raise the floor, not lower the ceiling.

Todays pensioners didn't fight in the war, really, depends what war, Falklands, Northern Ireland, both horrendous with many being killed or maimed.

We need to raise the floor, not lower the ceiling.

Agree completely, HerOtherHalf. I can't help wondering whether the fact that people of pensionable age are far more likely to have been in a union and pushed for higher wages, whereas today the idea of organised labour dismissed, and employers take a divide and conquer approach.

those are very decent incomes for your gp. £34K and £41K for people who are not supporting a family, just themselves... fancy moaning! I think that's exactly what people on this thread and in RL are grumbling about - those incomes for a working person are not too bad, but are absolutely out of reach for most future pensioners.

That's per couple not individual. While they do allow a reasonable quality of life, they are not the kind of wages that allow for many luxury. Especially as they own their own home and need a big slosh fund.

Resenting people with a very average existence is beyond sad. Would people prefer if it is like Russia with starving pensioners begging in the streets?

That's per couple not individual. While they do allow a reasonable quality of life, they are not the kind of wages that allow for many luxury.

Yes it does. Many earn that and still have a mortgage to pay. I think you are being a bit disingenuous tbh.

with a very average existence

That is above the average wage. Plus it is worth more as they have no mortgage to pay!

I think jdoe you must be absolutely loaded yourself if you are feeling sorry for your gp! "Especially as they own their own home and need a slosh fund" - I wonder if it's the roof that's the problem or should they reduce their trips to the off licence?

We've got (or rather had) a model of retirement that came from a time when many people died in their 60's. There are more and more people retiring in their 50's and 60's who will live into their 80's. My problem is that those assets (mostly housing and for some people good final salary pensions) that allow that to happen are unobtainable to even above average earners now. Both dh and I are on professional salaries and there is no way we can 'retire' in the way our parents generation did. Saving huge sums enough in a private pension pot, paying for a larger mortgage, contributing to university fees (if DC go), never mind the costs of an eroded state (tutor for DC who has additional learning needs, funding dentistry and increasingly some healthcare) .....
I'm never really going to be able to give up all work. I'm fine with that, because I know and I'm planning for it. But I don't get the "worked hard all their lives so deserve it" rhetoric. I will have worked hard all my life by the time I'm 70, but won't be able to retire- don't I deserve it? I'm just a different generation, so at the mercy of my demographics ecenomic reality.
One thing that will hugely piss me off is off we haven't changed legislation on assisted dying. Because if I have to pay to go to Switzerland because I don't want the option of run down sub standard 'state' care in my last years that will be the icing on the cake

Jdoe - they are good incomes in retirement.

Mismo- people who fought in the Falklands and N Ireland knew the risks when they chose that as a career. People in WW1 and WW2 had no choice.

Not that wars influence this argument though. I think many people who are in the 60-80 age group are very aware of how fortunate they are but they did live through some tough times in the 50's/60's and 70's.

For me, anyone who lives in this country and has their health are fortunate regardless of wealth.

But I don't get the "worked hard all their lives so deserve it" rhetoric. I will have worked hard all my life by the time I'm 70, but won't be able to retire- don't I deserve it?

^This!

I'm 62 my pension age has gone up to 66 even though I worked from the age of 15 and have 41 years worth of N.I contributions, I come from an era where there were no equal rights, work place pension for women, child care vouchers, maternity leave, tax credits, I had open heart surgery last year, I have osteoarthrititis in my hip and spine, and cataracts, but I'm deemed fit for work, I am claiming £73 a week JSA, I have no partner and no savings, I pay a percentage of council tax, bedroom tax,( I've tried to downsize,0 water rates, gas, and electric, I'm lucky if I can eat, I brought three children up on my own after leaving a violent marriage, I did all kinds of work, cleaning, care homes, before marriage I worked in admin, this is reality for many.

jdoe

So both your grandads only worked for 30-35 years, so that's start work at 21 say and retire at 51 (so I am also inferring your grandmothers didn't work either during this time) and they still have 34k and 41k per year each couple?!?! With no mortgages. Lovely brand new cars at £200 and something per month out of the £1800-2000 per month income they have, so no repair costs, low road tax, no MOT and a trade in every three years. It's laughable that you are using this analogy to say that they need sympathy

My overall retirement income is £41k and we live very well on It! We have no mortgage and when I retired I looked at all our monthly outgoings and eliminated those we really didn't need ( for example an M&S budget account that we opened in the 70's when we couldn't afford to just buy clothes as we needed them).

I changed jobs at the age of 46 and the pension I had then built up was not spectacular, so I started to save hard for my retirement. I worked in the pensions industry which meant that it was not difficult to keep the retirement goal in focus. During that time I also paid a mortgage and put three sons through university. We didn't have foreign holidays or expensive cars and yes it was tough. I was resigned to having to work until age 65, but due to a bit of luck with the funds I invested in for my pension, I found I had enough to retire on at age 63.

The message these days is that if you want a decent retirement income, it really is down to you to do something about it. I think the message is slowly getting through, but there are still too many people who adopt an ostrich attitude and realise too late that they have insufficient to retire on. If you are in a workplace pension scheme, throw in as much as you can because the payments into modern pension arrangements are token amounts. Pensions are expensive and for a decent income you need a far bigger retirement pot than you would think.

I am a retired boomer myself, but it does irritate me when some of my generation imply that they are only better off than younger people, because they worked hard for what they've got.

I'm not disputing that they did very likely work hard, but working hard nowadays doesn't guarantee the same advantages it did then, crazy house prices particularly in London and the SE, being just one example. Even taking into account the very high interest rates at some points in the past, housing was generally much more affordable, and of course we had no student loans to pay off.

As for 'higher expectations' than in the past, well, unless it's the dafter kind of extravagance, I think that's a normal generational thing. My mother (born 1918) took it more or less for granted when we were small that she'd have a washing machine (not automatic), a vacuum cleaner, and a phone, none of which her own mother with 5 children had for many years.

My great-granny, who had 10 children, all of whom survived, and was not really poor by Victorian standards, didn't even have a pram.
My granny who had the 5 children once told me she'd asked her once how on earth she'd managed without one.
'I used my arms.'

Can we please just bin the 'worked hard all their lives' as if this is some extraordinary thing. The generations below will also have worked hard(er) and most likely for longer. Also many women of this generation hardly worked at all, the same can't be said of younger generations many more of whom will have no choice in this, even if they'd prefer to stay at home with their children.

I agree that 'worked harder' is misleading. Likely to have done manual labour - yes. Had a harder life if one looks at medical care, maternity care, education, career opportunities, especially for women, housing standards, pollution, industrial accidents, people killed and maimed on the roads etc.

It's a pointless comparison as we can hardly put the clock back, however I think its fair to say that many pensioners had a tougher life than many younger people today.

Of course pensioners get off their arses and vote.....

jdoe

Thats an awesome retirement fund

Dh has worked hard all his life so far and will continue to work til he is 67 at least (i dont really work)

And his pension will be 15k if he is lucky

I've just deliberately deleted the epic post I just wrote explaining why I don't begrudge pensioners like my mum, whatever we give them. And then I realised it was pointless. Those who know pensioners with a similar background will already understand. Those who don't, or who won't / can't understand that, for example, 12% interest on £5000 mortgage WAS a lot in relation to income back then, will continue to believe what suits them and their narrative that all pensioners are somehow stealing something from them.