Means testing State Pension

[CuriousMariette]

Do you think the time has come for this to be introduced? I don’t think the current system is sustainable as many people are living too long. I know it’s not fair and would be political suicide but Pensioner’s didn’t even suffer a 80% furlough during lockdowns. I say this from a place of having “paid in” as people say for 30 years plus already and would likely not receive a State Pension in this scenario.

@FruitMelange

The majority of the population "take" more than they give

In my own experience, quite a lot of my friends have died quite young. Before they even stopped working.surely it must balance out.

Nope. It doesn't. Plenty of studies. Unless you earn very significantly over the national average salary if you have a family, or have no children and still earn a decent salary, then statistically you are very, very unlikely to be even covering your own expenses.

I was giving the opinion that the levy would not be ring-fenced to social care and health, given the government is what it is. I need to express my self more clearly.

@monfuseds

Any social care reform needs to tackle staffing which is already in crisis & we’ll need another 488,000 health staff and 627,000 social care workers to meet demand over the next decade, research from charity The Health Foundation suggests.

How many people are currently unemployed? What I'm really saying is we can train people or but do we have enough people

@echt

I was giving the opinion that the levy would not be ring-fenced to social care and health, given the government is what it is. I need to express my self more clearly.

Ok. Say this tax hike was ringfenced for social care. Do you think it would fix the problem?

I refer you back to Gordon Brown and his "once and for all" stuff.

With an ageing population, it simply won't. It might temporarily make things marginally better yes, but the idea it will fix the system is farcical.

I wasn't offering a solution, only that I didn't think it would be ring-fenced. The system is fucked, and the government is pointing the finger at scapegoats.

Worth looking at the video I put up on page 16.

Sorry I am on the app so not going to be able to find something on a specific page. If you want to post it again I will watch it if you think it actually moves the discussion forward in a useful way.

@SquidMonkey

Sorry I am on the app so not going to be able to find something on a specific page. If you want to post it again I will watch it if you think it actually moves the discussion forward in a useful way.

Your sentence was good. Your second pissed me off; fucking patronising.

Just keep scrolling back, it's the only video posted.

Nah sorry, I am not going to spend ages searching for it.

I'm not sure what you thought was patronising but sorry it seemed that way.

Then you'd get all the Mumsnet posters in 20+yrs time moaning that 'my pension is means tested and it's not fair because other generations got it anyway' 🙄

No, it should be universal. But perhaps pensioners should continue to pay pay national insurance (or some other sort of tax). pension is taxed already.

@Swonderful

This would hit women the hardest because presumably it would be means tested by household. That means women missing out if their husbands are wealthy.

Women are already massively disadvantaged in terms of pension wealth. The average women has a much lower private pension than the average man.

Lol! This is ab absolutely ridiculous post.

90% of single parents are women.

60% of the children who grow up in poverty grow up in those households.

Setting tax/ benefit thresholds per person rather than per household directly causes a large amount of that poverty.

Why should a couple with kids, two people to work and share childcare, get to earn £25k tax free when a single parent (almost always the mother) can earn only £12.5k tax free?

Why can a couple each earning £49k and having two people to share childcare get child benefit and a single mother on £60k gets none?

Same thing with 30 hrs funding, tax free childcare etc. Single mothers are both villified and discriminated against financially at every turn by the fact that the tax system doesn't set allowances by household, but "per adult", and women and children suffer immensely as a result.

If the price of rectifying that is that some women who haven't bothered to build their own career and financial security but have a wealthy husband funding them feel hard done by then I'll go and try to find the tiniest violin in the world. Honestly, are you for real??

@FruitMelange

Hi. Just wanted to share. My daughter married at 35, now 38 and still not pregnant. She is really gutted. Just sharing

Sorry to hear this but presume this was not the thread you meant to post on?

Yus, now struggling to get it deleted🙄

You can be damn sure if you're buying a house alone you're still expected to pay 100% stamp duty. And the same VAT on all the goods you buy as well. You get a measly 25% Council Tax discount. Wow. That will make up for supporting a household financially and doing all childcare etc alone. Not!?

I really can't believe a poster has come on here pretending that the idea of assessing individually not by household is detrimental to women when it's so obviously the case that the opposite is true and this is one of the main causes of poverty for women and children who've been treated appallingly by men.

@FruitMelange

Yus, now struggling to get it deleted🙄

Lol! 😂

Mods must be asleep @FruitMelange but I am sure they'll fix it tomorrow.

@echt

I don't know what they can do about it apart from hugely drastic measures such as DNR for anyone over a certain age

And that age would be? if you're up for putting forward such a disgusting scenario you, it would be more honest to put a number on it.

While you're there, why not DNR those with terminal illnesses? There doing fuck all.

I'm not up for it, obviously . Thats why I'm calling it "hugely drastic measures". I don't know what they can or will do about it - do you? But they will have to do something.

@TheHateIsNotGood

Anything above State Pension is 'means-tested' eg Pension Credits. I say lets really start Means-Testing, not just randomly here and there.

Pensioner Winter Fuel Allowance, Means Test.
Any Pension-aged Benefit. Means Test.
Nothing automatically given because of Age. Means Test.

Any Child-related Benefits. Means Test
Cut off £35k - no entitlement to anything above that
CTS - Means Test. Max 10% Deduction from any Award.

Shall I go on? There's loads more.....

I am sure I read somewhere that for certain benefits it is actually more expensive to make them means tested, due to the admin and workforce required to carry out the means testing process. I think it was the fuel allowance? Because its not as straightforward as "what's your salary?".

@londonmummy1966 I DO pay extra as a working pensioner my state pension is deducted from my tax free allowance so I pay more tax on my wages - no-one on working age benefits tax credits or UC has to pay more tax on their wages as their benefits are tax free, yes (after nearly 51 years of paying it) I no longer pay NI (until the levy kicks in) but I pay far more in tax alone than I did tax and NI combined when I was working age, tax that pays towards the NHS - how much more do you want me to pay?

How many people are currently unemployed?
What I'm really saying is we can train people or but do we have enough people

I'm not sure we do, loads left the care industry & went into retail/delivery work. Why wouldn't you?

I'm sure they will, they have already done it with disability benefits.

Because I'm disabled I claim ESA, because when I was working I paid into a pension I started to receive it early.

My ESA, which is contribution based, not income based, is reduced by the amount of my pension.

So I paid into a pension, I paid NI and now I'm penalised for doing the 'right' thing.

No!!! Those that have contributed have as much right (if not more) to the pension pot! Those that don’t work still get a state pension.
I keep seeing idiotic suggestions on MN where the working MC get penalised for owning their homes and working!! Madness.

I honestly believe by the time our current primary school children become working age, it won't be within reach of claiming. They are already extending the age to claim it, that will again be extended and then extended, so will probably have to work until they are 80. On top of that Uni fees if they are fortunate to go, will increase, increase and increase through time, so will be so in debt, throughout their life, the stress that Debt brings, also makes you age. I see it, that everyone pays in, yet at this current time, the workers are having to pay in their tax & NI contribution and pension contribution and an extra thrown in on both council tax and NI, increasing shortly. So in reality a double tax to top up the social care that currently doesn't cover what the people have already paid in. Which is only going to be increasing year on year. So what will it be like in the future. People dying before they reach pension age, never actually benefitting from it at all, but paying in for the people before them.