To think pensioners paying NI is a step towards equality

[jnfrrss]

Apparently it would raise 2 billion a year and help cover social care.

Mail comments are furious people, but isn't it a step towards a more equal society and taxing everyone more similar regardless of age?

Ni just seems like such an outdated system and in an ideal world it would all be rolled into one tax with income.

Actually I don't work because I don't need to, but I am sick to death of paying tax which pays for people's childcare. I'm sick to death of paying tax for other people's children's schooling because all 3 of ours went to private school. I'm sick of paying council tax because I'm travelling for 9 months of the year so don't use the refuse service or any other council services. I don't see why I should pay tax for the nhs because I don't use it. I don't use the roads for 9 months of the year. Why should I have to do that? Why do I have to pay toward tax credits and welfare benefits? I don't use them. Getting the picture? Why? I'm sick of the attacks on pensioners.

I think this country is becoming a place where increasingly those who are okay don't give a damn about those who are not.
I am mid 50s and have a chronic illness that I have had for over 35 years. I doubt I will be able to work till 67. I may die before then anyway. I expect my last years to be lived in poverty and am seriously worried about my future. But I suspect that nobody except those I ma close to will give a damn.

Well said, BishopBrennansArse.

If they looked at the big businesses and made sure that all loopholes were closed, deals could not be agreed to allow them to pay far less tax than due and that they paid a living wage to their workers we would not need to have this conversation...

There haven't actually been any "attacks on pensioner's" they've been protected above and beyond every other generation.

Every time an idea is mooted that would get them to shoulder their fair share it's shouted down.

Like the "dimentia tax" that's actually better than the system we have now, but once it's got a snappy name it's irrelevant if it's actually good for society.

Perhaps the OP would just be happy if the age group she hates so much was just subject to compulsory euthanasia at the age of 70.

I am never quite sure if I am old enough to be a boomer but I have 5 millennial children.

I will work until I die (as I gave the children my pension for housing and the state of 45% of 75% of it in tax - spend all that money wisely HMRC....) so would be someone caught by the extra NI.

At present if I live to 67 (my family all die in their 70s so I probably will live until then 67 being my state retirement pension age) I would stop paying natinoal insurance contributions on my wages at age 67. I will by then have been paying them since 1983 without a single break and also no claim - I am one of our hated 1% massive net contributors, only ever been to the GP once in last 12 years, etc etc etc.

What I do feel is that compact or agreement between those of us who just pay in all the time but rarely take out that we were all in this together because at least we got the universal child benefit, state pension even though it's taxed at up to 45%, etc etc. The more we remove those universal provisions and just have state provision for those who are destitute the more we lose that agreemnet or social understanding that those of us who pay a lot in are part of it all, appreciated, cared about, loved almost. I don't really feel loved by the state. HMRC could easily thank us all in an email when we pay our tax and if we pay say over £`100k that year invite us to no. 10 or just other things that don't cost much to show that they do appreciate those of us who work 6 or 7 day a week (and I include of course those who work full time as cleaners and anything else in that category too) and the effort we put in. Instead I feel like some kind of pariah at the moment - everyone assumes because I am self employed (sole trader) I pay no tax and secondly that I am some kind of magic money tree.

The position we have of being a pensioner for 30 years is very unsustainable

If we assume a retirement age of 67 you seem to claim that a large proportion of pensioners live to 97. As you think that thirty years of retirement is unsustainable you must think that people should work well beyond 67. What age should people work until? 77? 87?

I am not at all certain that every or even most people in their 70s will be fit enough to keep working in any capacity beyond a local part time job. Nurses, teachers, HGV drivers, refuse collectors, plasterers, plumbers, gas engineers are just the start of the list of jobs that we would be unreasonable to expect people in their 70s to hold.

Life expectancy may have improved but that doesn’t mean 70 is the new 40. It means that improvements in medicine is sustaining people into very old age who have life limiting or previously fatal conditions. Just because someone who has emphacima (sorry for the misspelling) or angina is being kept alive it doesn’t mean they can do a 40 hour week of work.

Average life expectancy for people my age is 82 for women and 79 for men.
I am not sure many younger people realise this, because predicted average life expectancy for someone in their 20s is much higher than this.
So the issue of whether someone is capable of doing a job say in their 80's, is largely irrelevant. Of course average means that some people die in their 60s and younger, and some people die in their 90's and older.
But on average women have their state pension for 15 years, and men for 12 years. So lets start from actual facts please.

But we could all afford a penny or two on our income tax...

I think this is a common misconception. Marginal tax rates for the roughly 50% of parents raising DC on tax credits are already 70%+ and closer to 100% if they are on universal credit or housing benefit or have out of pocket childcare costs. It is even possible to be at 100%+ if you count pension autoenrolment or are unfortunate enough to have an old style student loan.

mother a single parent does not have the luxury of choosing not to work due to high childcare costs - they are now more or less forced to work for benefits.

There is no 2 child restriction on child benefit or indeed childcare tax relief for 2 earner families or free childcare for 3 year olds. The income limits are £60k and £100k per HH earner before restrictions apply. I agree CB should be universal, but taxable.

The 2 child limit only applies to TC / UC.

NI on earned pension income would only apply to pensioners with pension / earned income of about £16k with no housing costs since pension credit / HB makes working in retirement not worth it.

And not everyone wants more state provision. Plenty of people in the UK want much less state provision and much lower taxes.

I am a baby boomer and have another 10 years until I can retire.I do not have a big house and am saving to help my DD through higher education.Due to divorce I am still paying off a mortgage.
Please don't lump all baby boomers into one block.
At least if I need to go into care in the future it can be funded by the sale of my house but I would like a few years when I can spend money I earn on something for me and not doing without to make ends meet.

We are giving money to FIL to pay for care. And are earning below average wage.

I am wondering where people over state retirement age are going to find jobs. I know a few people who have reached state retirement age who asked if they could stay at work doing their job and they had to retire (even after the law if no retirement age). Secondly, as people age their health may deteriorate. There are opportunities to volunteer to keep active in retirement.

I doubt if large numbers of 20/30/40 year olds will live to 60, because they are so fat. They will succumb to diabetes, heart problems, etc before that age. Many pensioners of say 70 are actually slimmer and healthier than people half their age.

Although smoking has reduced, many younger people still do so and we do not yet know the side effects from the now high rate of consumption of illegal drugs.

Why does everyone always jump on this idea about people having worked all their lives etc? Many women who are now retired didn’t work outside the home after they are married. Many men took early retirement on very genorous pensions the like of which simply didn’t exist now. Pensioners are not all eating crusts and struggling to heat their homes. That aside, I think NI is useless and should be combined with tax.

Spring, I think you're thinking of the generation who are now very old. All my female friends worked to retirement age, many of them don't have children and those who did stayed at home for a relatively short time when they were small. The earliest retirement I know of in my peer group was at 62 due to failing health.

Many women who are now retired didn’t work outside the home after they are married. Many men took early retirement on very genorous pensions the like of which simply didn’t exist now.

I too think you could be thinking about the very old, rather than say, my parents generation, in their 70s. Both of them worked and have 40+ years of full NI payments, retired at 63 and 65 with small personal pensions and no other assets.

Women in that age bracket usually worked before getting married and went back to work as soon as the kids went to school, definitely by the time they went to secondary. They had to, money was always tight and there were few benefits. Family allowance and Child Benefits weren't as valuable as they are nowadays.

Just thinking about that, both my grandmothers worked too. One always had a part time job out of the house, went back full time. The other (7 kids, 2 with severe disabilities) took in washing and ironing until people go their own washing machines, then continued with the ironing until she died, in her 80s - again out of need.

Yes my mum in her 70's worked most of her life. It was my gran's generation where more women did not work outside the home. Remember as well that in the past many jobs were not open to married women, so they had to resign on marriage, whether they wanted to or not.

The rich get richer, whilst the rest of us set about trying to cut from each other.

In many areas the average income of pensioners is £12,000. They are not all very well off. My state pension (only pension) will be about £7k a year when I am nearly 70 not that I will retire I hope.