Emergency Budget

[Wouldloveanother]

What are we all thinking?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-62920969

A discussion thread…

‘Comparatively generous’ doesn’t mean much unless you’re about to start comparing actual figures.

A low paying career is going to result in a low pension. That’s an issue when so many jobs needed for society to function are low paid. It’s not like the cost of living is (or has been for decades) low enough to compensate.

Bullshit - not all care workers are in public sector roles, and even those that are do not have pension provisions that would make a significant dent in their care bill. The same is true of nursing - relatively decent pensions for a low wage =/= adequate provision for their needs.

It hasn't taken long for this to become a pensioner bashing thread, has it?

Let’s watch how the pound reacts to the budget - currently at a 37 year low. Initial reports aren’t favourable, because it’s blindingly obvious it’s a shit budget implemented by a bunch of charlatans and dunces.

Pensioners are the wealthiest demographic in the country

Wealth isn’t uniform though is it? Much like the rest of the country, the gap between the richest and the poorest is huge.

This doesn't quite work, because one of the benefits of most of those lower paid public sector roles (and reasons people stay) is the comparatively generous pension.

Most carers don’t work in the public sector. Social care was privatised decades ago.

the average is less than 5 years for both sexes, at a cost of £35k per year.

£35k a year 😂😂😂

My parents paid £1k a week each and they both died in 2015. God only knows what that care home costs now.

I warn you not to be ordinary
I warn you not to be young
I warn you not to fall ill
I warn you not to get old

(Neil Kinnock, 1983 - but he could say the same today)

I am aghast and outraged by the comments above suggesting that means to pay should determine the care someone receives in old age. So what if Ken has worked as a hedge fund manager and has accumulated millions? Should he be entitled to better care than June, who cleaned Ken’s house (and those of other hedge fund managers) for the minimum wage. Is she less deserving because she is poor?

Sweet Jesus. What has this country become?

I was literally just thinking of that Kinnock quote.

@Ypsilanti hear hear. You put it perfectly.

Public sector pensions are enormous. Also public sector workers are not generally paid less for comparable jobs. I’ve worked in both- paid less in public sector but about the same once you take into account pension. There’s a lack of understanding of how much pensions are worth - eg a pension of about £20,000 a year would cost £500,000 or more if you had to save the money. No one in the private sector is getting those kind of perks.

No but as a whole pensioners are wealthiest. Yet their pensions (and benefits— level of pension credit being tied to pensions) increase by far greater amounts than non pension age workers. Even though pensions are universal and are thus (a) very expensive and (b) being paid to some very rich people.

Pensions have been mandatory for over 20 years. There is no one alive who spend their whole career in the uK at an employer who refused to let women join the pension scheme. It’s been illegal for many decades.

So when you said they were different scenarios and should be treated differently, you meant that they should be treated exactly the same as there was no different.

Gotcha.

Not really. Higher earners have been heavily subsidising everyone else, and will continue to do so, with their contribution just dropping a little bit.

Why should other workers spend more than five months of the year working to benefit other families before they start earning anything for themselves?

It’s not at all clear what your objection is here. Are you saying that someone with £10m in the bank should not be entitled to spend it on private nursing care in their opulent home on Sandbanks, or that the state should provide that same standard of care for everyone?

How can you make provisions for pensions when you can barely afford to survive week to week? I can assure you that those who are relying on the state pension aren’t happy about it and would love to have a private pension, but simply can’t afford it.

People suggesting "generous" public sector pensions are a meaningful contribution to the cost of elderly care do not understand the cost of elderly care.

This isn't about private vs public sector perks (many care workers get no public sector perks anyway - which is the original context of that debate) - this is about how to fund the cost of care. If you're on a low wage, your pension contributions will (likely) not fund the cost of your care, whether you're on a private or public sector pension.

Someone who spends their life on a low wage does not deserve to be relegated to second rate care just because their job is poorly paid.

Public sector pensions are enormous

Only if they’re based on an enormous salary. The average NHS pension is £7k.

Even though pensions are universal and are thus (a) very expensive and (b) being paid to some very rich people.

And those very rich people pay most of it back through taxation. Means tested benefits cost more to administer than they save.

Pensions have been mandatory for over 20 years. There is no one alive who spend their whole career in the uK at an employer who refused to let women join the pension scheme. It’s been illegal for many decades

How many decades? There are plenty of people alive who didn’t have access to an occupational pension for most of their working lives. Women are particularly disadvantaged.
www.closethegap.org.uk/content/resources/Pensions-briefing.pdf

So, OP appears to be arguing 2 things

1. IF you haven't saved for your dotage you are a fool who doesn't deserve anything but the most basic care, and even then you're lucky AND
2. IT's not fair to get anyone working now to pay a few quid per week to pay for elderly care by way of NI because they can't afford it and they're being squeezed too hard.

And doesn't appear to see any issue with those two view points

Correct. High earners work 20 weeks per year to subsidise those that don't work or on low salaries, and have done for years.
How's that fair?

My husband pats more in tax each month than I take home, is that fair? No.

There's too many people taking out of the pot and not putting in, the answer is to not make the ones contributing to put more in

Well it’s the eternal dilemma isn’t it?

I don’t know what the answer is, how to strike a fair balance between personal responsibility/ incentive; and a society which doesn’t punish the disabled/children/low earners.

I’m saying that we should use the taxation system to ensure that all of the population benefit from a minimum, decent, dignified standard of care in old age. The kind of care that all of us would want our loved ones to receive. Not the provision (not ‘care’) that exists at the moment, and which is only going to get worse through the removal of the NI increase.

Money might buy you fancier surroundings, but it should not be able to buy you dignity, safety, peace of mind or genuine compassion. And let’s not forget that care workers are atrociously underpaid and should be receiving a living wage that recognises their work and importance. Don’t tell me that staff in a fancy Sandbanks residential home are earning any more than in the local authority one in the poorest part of Bournemouth.

Don’t tell me that staff in a fancy Sandbanks residential home are earning any more than in the local authority one in the poorest part of Bournemouth

I think you might find they are actually. Or at least they would if local authority homes still existed. I know my parents’ care home paid better than most others because the staff told me.

Many of the low wage earners your DH is 'subsidising' will be key workers providing services that are essential to your DH, even if he doesn't realises it, and this includes services not easily buyable no matter how wealthy.

And when you say "it's not fair", I may be a lowish earner (under the higher rate threshold), but I have personally saved someone's life, who was moments from death, in the last few weeks, my 12 hour shift yesterday finished 2 hours late (which is vastly better than 2 of my colleagues who finished 5 hours late at the weekend). So frankly it all depends on your definition of what is "fair". Why is your DHs time more valuable than mine? Is that just because historically that job has attracted a larger salary? Could that be because it is historically a male occupation? Or because you think he studied harder? Because I hate to break it to you but even poorly paid HCPs(band 5) are degree educated.

Your DH may think he's better than the zero hour contact minimum wage security guards, sub contracted by the NHS to keep the peace in A&E so that you, or your DH or your kids can safely received emergency care that you would struggle to access privately, but I disagree.