To think we are becoming a much poorer country?

[Felixss]

I keep seeing on threads increase taxes on the rich , increase salaries, increase nhs spending and increase benefits. People are acting like we are still hugely wealthy and everyone wants to come over. Poland is predicted to overtake us economically. I can earn twice my salary abroad and I'm thinking of leaving. Where is the money going to come from with a shrinking work force and low investment in new technology? AIBU to think the UK is hugely declining ?

Maybe aligning benefits including pensions with public sector pay rises would be a good place to start. NHS got 5% vs pensions at 10.1%

I'm afraid you are right about FPTP being around for the foreseeable. It's a hard sell to MPs who have been elected in a landslide. I always voted Labour when I lived in UK. But Blair had no right to a 60 seat majority in 05. Labour got 35% of the vote.

I remember not long after my brothers house had been repossessed we were watching a debate about electoral reform.
'PR leads to weak government ' said some Tory.
To which my bro shouted ' Thank fuck for that - bring it on! '

As for the NI contribution having a cut off point above a certain level of income : what is the reasoning ? I've never understood it.
For the full story on tax fugitives and offshore havens I recommend Treasure Islands by Nicholas Shaxon.

As for the NI contribution having a cut off point above a certain level of income : what is the reasoning ?

I didn’t know about that so I checked it out and found this. I had absolutely no idea that the most highly paid only pay 2% NI on everything they earn above £50k. So people on six figure salaries pay proportionately less than the worst paid workers. Now that really is scandalous. Thank you for exposing that little known gem @Abhannmor.

• There is no contribution for pay below the Primary Threshold of £242 a week, £1,048 per month or £12,570 per year.
• For payments above the Primary Threshold and up to the Upper Earnings Limit of £967 a week £4,189 per month or £50,270 per year NICs of 12% are payable.
• NICs of 2% is paid on any earnings above the Upper Earnings Limit.

People who work full time in this country are unable to turn the heating on, are choosing which meal to skip today etc. working age people have far, far less disposable income than the average pensioner, and yet it’s the pensioners who get the freebies. It makes no sense.

Facts are always useful.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/824464/mean-disposable-income-per-household-by-age-uk/#:~:text=Average%20annual%20disposable%20income%20in,2021%2F22%2C%20by%20age%20group&text=During%202021%2F22%2C%20the%20highest,those%20aged%2085%20and%20over.

People that are anti pensioners, do realise that you will be a pensioner too at one stage in your life, any rise in the state pension should be index linked at least, perhaps the government should introduce a policy that from next year anyone born after the 1/1/24 will not be entitled to a state pension.

What truly amazes me is that you don't realise how ludicrous that idea is.

Let me lay the facts of life to some of you folks because it seems that none of you have interacted with the globally competitive real world.

Your entire GDP is also your entire national income. That is £2.4T

Your tax revenue now sits at about £1T (highest burden in 40 years)

There is no magic money tree now beyond that £2.4T of national income as you cannot borrow more. The market has empharically said no.

If you want "higher pensions" you need to grow that £2.4T

Without doing so (what you are doing now) you are robbing Peter (taking from younger generation and future) to pay Paul (pensioners).

This makes the UK POORER because pensioners consume, they are not productive like the working folks, so that £2.4T simply doesn't grow.

Thats precisely one of the drivers of WHY you are seeing 0% real growth right now vs EU/US (which are growing based on pre-pandemic level of Q4 2019).

And the trend will get worse as rhe bulge of baby boomers retires and keeps asking for the same benefits (and yes, the state pension is a benefit the qualifying years formula does not change this fact).

Current long-term UK GDP growth sits at 0.8%

In order for the UK to be on a sustainable demographic footing it needs to be 2-2.5%.

What the pensioners don't "see" is that eventually they will kill their golden goose (the Greeks found this out the hard way).

Wait till State Pensions start getting to 15% of all public spending (£150bn of £1T it is £120bn now), and you will see how much worse public services (NHS and Education) will get.

At the end of the day, if national income does not grow (same pie), you simply make some people poorer and others wealthier to the long-term detriment of the country as a whole.

Don't be ridiculous- some of us having been saving for our own pensions since we started work. We know that the state pension is not enough to live on comfortably. Uprating by inflation or wage growth can be addressed immediately by not doing that and investing in education.

I’m 40. I very much doubt there will be a state pension when I retire and am making provisions accordingly. Anyone that thinks otherwise is a fool.

People were saying that 20 years before you were born, yet here we are … 🤷‍♀️

I sometimes think that, but when i realise the vast sums people need to put by to equal the state pension, i cant see how many lower paid people can do it.

TheThinkingGoblin
pensioners consume, they are the ones with time to spend their money in the local economy, they don’t usually save it, if they do it’s passed on to the next generation, so win all the way round really, I can’t believe that people think the state pension alone is enough to live on.

Jivens,
I very much doubt that they could stop the state pension that quickly, look how long they have to give to increase the retirement age.

Anxioys
Do you think everyone has been as lucky as you to save for a pension, there are many reasons why people haven’t enough extra money to put away in a pension that would make it worthwhile

I've been working for over 25 years! Private pensions care not a new thing. Nor was I lucky, because it has been a positive choice to do it. That has meant less money for other things.

The state pension is the bare minimum and always has been. A reasonable level of comfort when you retire and if single is 20k a year.

I won't ever get that from the state! It's not luck, but a plan.

Thats nobodies problem but your own.

The concept of PERSONAL RESPONSIBILITY seems alien to you folks.

Nobody owes you a "comfortable retirement"

Nobody. That is your responsibility to secure by making optimal life financial choices.

It truly is shocking how entitled some of you folks are.