State pension

[Brexitstolemyfuture]

People are being lied to about their chances of ever getting it imo. So they are going to raise it another year. I'm still 25+ years off it. Aibu to think I'll never get it?

just remortgaged here lol - although just to get lower interest rate

Actually you do have a bit of a point there. We do like to save up for things before we get them where we can. We've not been too Disney since before the kids came along. But that's more through choice. Some people do spend well beyond there means.

I have been talking about getting a Disney savings pot together though!

Cars run until they get to the age they will start to cost a bit of money.

We are actually really boring with money lol.

No, everyone where I work.

I think people of my generation who went to university (I am one of them) have been largely fortunate in life. But we were in a small minority - I remember being told, circa 1976, that we were the 6%.

Most people my age went to secondary modern schools and left at 16 (15 until 1972) It was an ok lifestyle to begin with but less so once manufacturing was wound down here. You may not know them personally and they don't tend to hang out on Mumsnet very much but some of them have had pretty hard lives under both Tory and Labour governments butonly people weren't that interested in them until UKIP and Brexit.

Yes, so you only know that you weren't paid less than a man where you work, not that you weren't paid less than any number of men in other places.

Any of you on a pension ( like LGPS or teachers NHS etc ) which allows salary sacrifice/ AVCs its a really good idea to do it (even if its just a small amount each month.) - as early as possible ..

I am just about to retire at 60 although my actual retirement date is 67.
But i have 10yrs AVCs in the pot now ( I built it up slowly but now save almost third of my wages each month) and so its made retirement possible although I am not going to be rich, but better off than I was . - I wish I could have started it earlier , but as a single parent it was pretty impossible..

However for the last 10 years ive put every ( paltry) pay rise into AVCs

. Yes its not easy , but if you can do it , do! ..

I remarried and my DH doesnt have a works pension at all. We also have parents aged 90+ and grandchildren to look after when we can,.. We could downsize but quite honestly the price of a decent flat where we could move to be nearer our family is the same nearly as our 3 bed family house here. we would rather keep it in the hope that if we dont need to fund care, it will be an asset we can pass on

Many of our friends are retiring in the next couple of years with huge pensions and savings. We didn't become very high earners until a bit later but will have a very good pot in around 5 years. We'll probably continue working though because we enjoy our jobs and don't necessarily want thirty plus years of retirement. We've a few properties we could sell, if essential to survive but rather hope we can keep those for supporting the children with grandchildren's school fees etc.
It certainly isn't going to get any easier.

I'm in LGPS but decided against AVCs. My pension is good and and if I did youngish my children wouldn't get the AVC pot. Grown up DC now.

It is good to see so many people on this thread giving opinions and asking questions. In my real life most people have their fingers in their ears and are going lalala!

I was disappointed to read that somebody upthread thinks that all the private pension schemes are going to collapse and that it's on a knife edge, etc.

I hear this all the time from people who don't want to contribute to their own pension. They tend to say, "it's just a Ponzi scheme". I'm sorry, but that is bollocks.

Actually, contributing to your own pension is one of the smartest things you can do.

If you can join an occupational scheme, do it! Your employer is required to contribute to it since the rules changed.

If you're not eligible, get a SIPP (self invested personal pension). You contribute to it, choose what to invest in and manage it yourself. It's all yours, just as an ISA would be.

I've got both: I contribute to my occupational pension up to 5% of salary - the maximum my employer will match - then put as much as I can into my own SIPP. I invest in shares and trackers. I get tax relief on that, half of which is claimed by the SIPP provider and half of which I get from HMRC after I submit my tax return.

I top up my retirement provision with ISAs, into which I put as much as I can each year. I don't bother with cash: the returns are crap. I buy cheap tracker funds. When I choose to retire, I can use the ISA dividends for extra income or sell shares when it suits me, tax free.

I'm affected by the recent change to state pension age, but I'm not concerned. I have a decent public sector pension (I don't work there any more) which I'll now get a year later, because it's linked to state pension age, but it's only one year. I won't be making retirement decisions based on state pension age. I'm 45 now, and my investments have 15 more years to grow before I'm 60, at which point I might want to retire, or go part time.

I know that not everybody has much spare cash, but anything you can put away will make a difference. DH and I don't have flashy cars and we bought a cheaper house than we could have afforded, because we didn't want to be paying a big mortgage for years. We wanted to have choices, and I'm glad that we've never mortgaged ourselves to the hilt or got car loans to drive a Range Rover, etc.

No flashy cars or houses here and still no pension!

If I get a job now but it might only be for 2 or 3 years with that company is it still worth paying into that pension or best to just privately pay into an isa?

Pensions are more protected now than they were.I wonder if past collapses is why people consider them Ponzi schemes? Because before the law changed, pension schemes did collapse and people lost all their money.

Pay into the occupational pension, Flower. Your employer will add to it.

Not being condescending about houses and cars BTW, and sorry if it sounded that way. I was trying to illustrate that making a few savings here and there if you can, and taking the long view, is a good idea.

Yes, Brasty, I think people still look at what happened to the Mirror Group scheme and Equitable Life and think that all pensions must therefore be risky.

We decided on a plan in our early 30's and that we wanted to retire at 55. At times it seemed not worth it as at first we couldn't spare much and for something years away takes a bit of discipline but soon you get into a habit.
We didn't want to just rely on pensions, we both have work pensions and private. We also have savings, rentals and a small business we can continue with when retired. Next step is pay off mortgage and then save up as much as we can in the last few years. Eventually we will downsize and make do with one car.
Inheritance is not and never been part of our plans. It's not guaranteed and we will probably pass any on to DC.

OhTheRoses you seem to think you have taken sensible decisions and will reap according to your sewing. Which is great.
But life isn't like that. You can't plan for everything. I have done pensions since I was 21 and a new graduate. We have a nice house. We have savings.
But life happens while you're busy making plans and you can't future proof for all the humps in the road. Our plan for 2 professional careers, 2 dc and a nice house have taken a right battering in the last 3 years. The plans to force the LGPS to invest in government projects rather than trustee chosen vehicles should concern you. Plenty of pension funds have been less than ideal.

This move was ultimately a devious play by the government.
It is mainly to save billions on ex public sector pension payments, predominately the Nhs and Lgps schemes.
The Nhs is the Uk's largest employer.
These schemes were historically payable at 60 years, reforms within the past few years saw this now payable at state pension age.
Now the state pension age has been pushed back, a year, for now.
It is plainly obvious that the Government sought to link these schemes to SPA to save billions, questions need to be asked from the members of the unions involved in the negotiations, a pup has been sold.

Exploded cloud that's why I have always had contingency plans. Indeed a contingency plan that was very useful when ds1 was a very poorly baby and I had to give up work.

I do know that life hits you when you least expect it. That's why I am, we are very cautious and our risks have been carefully calculated.

I don't understand the resistance to women working until they are 65. If there is an argument to be had It's about whether women and men should work between 65 and 68 or later. But my family always have so perhaps for me it isn't such an issue. As I have said earlier in the thread my parents and grandparents' generations often started work at 15. My son who graduated last week is unlikely to start work much before 25 like his father before him.

I will look into the points that have been raised in relation to the LGPS and if they are as serious as has been raised above then I will consider further. If that is the case I'm surprised I'm not more aware of them and that my industry hasn't made more noise.

I work at a university which has a mandatory retirement age of 67. It seems like employees could be forced to retire before they are eligible for their state pensions.

thereinmadnesslies there is no longer a mandatory retirement age and that is illegal. Employees can no longer be forced to retire. Even if that is written into policy the legislation would prevail.

Mandatory retirement is no longer a fair reason for dismissal. which university is it?

OntheRoses don't want to name, but it's a famous old university and at present they are enforcing the contractual retirement at 67 rule. I believe there's a test case from academics at another university in the same position, so the policy may change based on that. Our occupational pensions pay out from 67, but potentially I could have a gap from 67-70 if the state pension age rises as predicted.

You won't have the gap because what they are doing is illegal. I cannot believe this has even gone to a test case.

People just don't grasp that we live longer, we are healthier.

Not everybody is though, if you are in poor health wouldn't it be better to put you on a pension at 60 rather than make you jump through hoops for 18 years (if you live that long).

The university doesn't have a leg to stand on. It is illegal.

Sashh That's what Ill Health Early Retirement is for. It can and does happen.

Onthe roses

Not with state pension, it does/can with private.

Isn't that where welfare benefits wold come into play though?