The Pensions Triple Lock has to go

[Flammkuchen]

When it was introduced, the aim of the Triple Lock was to increase pensions faster than earnings as the state pension was low. The TL has been very successful: pensioners now have a higher standard of living and more disposable income than working families. A pensioner couple each getting the full state pension receive £20k per year, with any private pension income on top.

This is great for them, but it comes with a trade-off. In order to increase pensions by over 10% a year, there is less money to pay nurses, teachers or doctors. Highly skilled public sector workers have low pay and there is a recruitment crisis.

AIBU to think that now that on average pensioners have higher disposable income than those in work, a policy that aims to increase pensioner income by MORE than average earnings - and so keep increasing the income of pensioner households faster than working households - needs to be rethought? Even just linking the state pension to average earnings would be better.

I disagree at pension age if you cannot work, you cannot increase your income and are stuck. I wouldn't want to live on £10k.

I also wouldn't want it to be means tested otherwise there is no incentive for people to save for retirement.

We have to increase tax on those of us of working age who can work more and fund the NHS properly.

Fully agree and this isn't talked about enough!

Tories voters are largely in this age group though, so they wouldn't change anything when it comes to pensions

Why should pensions be indefinitely protected in a way that workers aren't?

This is also referring to a state pension so of course there's an incentive to work, many also pay into private pensions

Sick of this ageist crap and in particular the tired old tropes about old people all being Tories. Not all Pensioners are living the life of Riley and if they are finally being treated with some decency, then it's about time.
Tories love this Daily Mail looking over the fence at the nasty pensioners crap though because it absolves them of the actual responsibility.
Also , it really isn't as simple as taking money off Pensioners and giving it to the NHS - Pensioners pay income tax, and they spend money on stuff that has VAT and other purchase taxes levied.

It's not a race to the bottom!

This is what the Tories want, everyone fighting.
You do realise this will mean you get less pension, is that what you want?

YANBU.

My Grandparents retired at 60. They’re now 83.

Thats 23 years of state pension plus their considerable private pensions, investments etc. No mortgage (they’ve never had one, bought their first house outright aged 19).

Meanwhile, I’ll never retire, let alone spend 23 years raking in a state pension plus the other benefits they get simply for being retired.

A. I have been a highly skilled low paid public sector worker all my life.
B. Because of the above I don't actually get the 10k state pension in full.
C. It is 10.1% THIS year and ONLY this year.
D. My disposable income is negligible..
E. I am no longer physically fit to work to earn any extra to increase my income.
F. I have NEVER voted Tory.
G. I worked till I was 66 due to the changes in womens state pension age.

Oh goodie, another let's have a go at the pensioners thread. Haven't had one of those for a few days.

The TL has been very successful: pensioners now have a higher standard of living and more disposable income than working families

My income is £ 1,300 a month. That's after tax and before bills. You do realise people on pensions pay things like council tax and utilities, don't you?

Agreed. All pensioner benefits should be means tested. Just like child benefit and others.
Then redirect that saved from 'wealthy' pensioners, to those across all age groups who really need it.
Not all have 'worked hard all their lives'. My MIL gave up work at 26 to raise two DC and never worked a day again in her life. There are many thousands like her of that generation. PIL will freely admit they can afford to pay for their own bus pass, prescriptions, heating, etc etc.

YANBU to feel the way you do OP. My parents retired at 52, have hundreds of thousands in the bank from the sale of a house they bought for £36k and sold for almost a million quid, live mortgage free in a house that gets more valuable every month, and have state pension plus my dad’s incredibly generous occupational pension. My mum was a SAHM until I was a teenager and so worked maybe 10 years of her life. They spend like there’s no tomorrow.

Meanwhile I’m single and childless, work all the hours God sends to keep the roof over my head, and have no hope whatsoever that there’ll be a state pension or indeed a retirement age the good side of 70.

(I’m estranged from them, before anyone comes in with “you’ll inherit from them though”.)

The thing is, even if they got rid of the triple lock, they wouldn’t redistribute the money to working people. They’d just buy more missiles or a new Royal yacht. The problem isn’t that they care about pensioners (they don’t; they care about their votes), it’s that they don’t care about anyone in this country except their donors. So YABU to seek what you’re seeing.

Yabu. Of course pensioners have more disposable income, mostly because they have scrimped and saved and probably put some of their earnings by.
They don't have to pay for mortgages and childcare or help dc through Uni and should have a lifetime of savings etc. So the fact that pensioners are one of the wealthiest demographic is completely normal and how it should be.
They can't be made to suffer because of other people's choices.
These threads need to stop.

Define wealthy. I've asked this before and I never get an answer.

How much is means testing going to save as against how much it costs? and what about the people who need the pensions but are put off by applying for it if they have to be means tested?

Totally agree, although think there should be means tested help available for pensioners.

I don't know a single impoverished pensioner personally...I do know vast numbers of working people and families who are really struggling, including those who have had to give up work to care for wealthy elderly relatives due to pressure from family and society and are struggling to manage on the paltry benefits you can claim in these circumstances.

I agree that the state pension should continue to increase. Increasing by average earnings is reasonable and would maintain the living standards of pensioners relative to working households.

But the point of the Triple Lock is to ensure it increases faster than wages over time, so that pensioners get increasingly better off then those in work.

I think nurses pay should increase faster but that is unaffordable because of the TL.

Fine to increase the means-tested Pension Credit by the TL but not the flat rate.

Pension benefits are means tested,pensions are not.
You accrue pension over your working years-you can't means test something people are entitled to.

Fuck me....not this again🙄.... 10k isn't enough to live on anyway

But there is no pension credit with the new state pension .....only the old one.....so thats it ..
Just 10k....like I said before...its fuck all really

@AfterEightMintyCedric
And of course if you personally don't know any they can't exist, right? 🙄
More than 2M pensioners live below the poverty line. But let's punish them for being old, right. That's not ageist and repulsive at all.

I've worked as a nurse for 42 years, I need my pension thank you very much as I won't be able to work any more when I retire at 67 as my body is fucked.
There are loads of costs involved with being old, extra medical costs, travel costs, things that were free aren't any more like podiatry, or transport to medical appointments.
Not all retired people own their own homes they often rent like everyone else. I'm relying on my pension to survive especially as I live alone with nobody to share the costs.

There is an explicit policy designed to make pensioner income grow faster than that of workers. Each year it is in place, an increasing share of national income goes to pensions.

Discussing it is not an attack on pensioners, nor saying that they should get their incomes cut. It is simply saying that the policy has been successful in alllowing pensions to catch-up and now is no longer needed.

Do any retired people really think their pension should grow faster than nurses wage? Please do explain.

I think you are naive to suggest that the nurses pay rise is unaffordable directly because of the triple lock.
These monies are not interchangeable!!

The money is there for pension funds and the NHS and schools. It is a decision to spend it on Baroness Malones failed PPE project for example instead.

Lots people don't have private pensions. If your renting as a pensioner I camt imagine 10k goes.very far if your paying rent.

Lots people don't have private pensions. If your renting as a pensioner I camt imagine 10k goes.very far if your paying rent.

The triple lock must stay, lots of pensioners have no other income other than their State Pension, they get no reduction on Council Tax, most likely have higher energy bills. Our state pension is one of the lowest in Europe.