Why was the state pension age lower for women?

[pinksocks3]

I can't find a simple answer to this question. Why was the pension age 60 for women and 65 for men until recently?

Was it because women were seen as weaker and unable to work after 60?

My FIL was born in the early 30s and he changed nappies, cooked, took the kids out for the day, made them toys/activities and he worked full time as well.

Hmmph. This reminds me of the time my DH said "I've tidied up for you." I pointed out to him that since everything he had put away was his own, tidying up after himself would have been more correct

^^

I'll go out on a limb and say the 30's FIL was the exception not the rule

They do now but I don't think they always did - repeated childbirth etc

The role of women has changed so much since the 60 /70s and before .Mum told me that her Cousin, had to wear her wedding ring round her neck on a chain, as women were not really able to work on getting married in the 1930s! Even when Mum worked in the 60s she was told hours of 9am/4pm were "part time".In truth she worked 8 to 5 including travelling .Nurseries were often State Run and over subscribed . My Nan looked after me a lot .Women were often unable to work as expected to be at home due to DC "coming home for Lunch".They earnt their "retirement" early. However they would often be busy with DGC and elderly parents as well!

Or if he'd been asking in the UK not the US.

And he was asking about the weekends. We didn't hear much evidence of sharing tasks in the evening.

Wife’s salary wasn’t taken into account for mortgage borrowing until 1970! Hence why house prices rocketed Even then, and into the 80s, it was "3 x man's income plus 0.5 x woman's"

I have no idea of the reason - but I hoovered mine up at 60 with a smile!!

Not in our case. We bought our first house in 1986 and the formula for how much we could borrow (I'm pretty sure) was 3 times the larger income plus the lower income, or 2.5 times the joint income, up to 90% of the purchase price (possibly it was 95%) and the rest was deposit which you had to have saved up with your mortgage provider over (IIRC) two years plus. It was when Mrs Thatcher 'reformed' mortgage lending and that link was broken that house prices rocketed. That's a different topic, though.

It was possible to opt for separate taxation, but in that case you would lose out on the married allowance, so you'd pay more tax if you chose for your incomes to be treated separately rather than handing all your details to your husband for him to put on his form.

A woman with a husband was expected to be supported by her husband. Not only that, I think you could take him to court for not supporting you, though whether anyone did, and what happened, I don't know.

I think the whole idea of the 'nuclear family' being solely responsible for their own children only really started to take place in the 1970s and accelerated in the 1980s with the demise of traditional working class communities and the rise of the culture of individualism. I think in some parts of society it was earlier - direction of labour during the war meant some women met men they'd never otherwise have met, and ended up living far from their family.

My parents were exactly 5 years apart.

They didn't retire at the same time though, they both took different early retirement (both teachers).

"Most" women? I would be interested to see stats on that. It's certainly not my experience. In fact, in my friendship group a lot of the men are younger than the women. And very few are married.

Don't know what age or income bracket you're talking about, but my impression is that often once older couples starting to think about inheritance etc they quietly or otherwise head for the registry office. Paying no inheritance tax on a bequest to a spouse or civil partner is a huge incentive if they own a house and have children they want to inherit in due course.

On a side note I remember when filling forms in at school, it was only ever fathers’s name and occupation which was asked for.

The age gap was introduced in 1940 and I believe the Government also felt able to pay women their pension earlier because very few women were eligible for it in the early days of state pension.
Most married women in professional or office jobs had to leave on marriage, or at least on pregnancy. It was rare for women to return to these type of jobs back then. Working class manual jobs were more likely to be cash in hand and not eligible for pension contributions.
For those married women who did work, most paid the married women's lower contribution which meant no pension.

Because women were usually younger than their husbands, if they got their pensions at 60 and the men got theirs at 65, they could potentially retire together.

Thankfully not all men are alike.

Watched the clip and not sure it actually did suggest that they were doing their fair share even self reported

I thought it was because women struggled to get jobs, had less work history, and 'aged' out of the marketplace sooner, couldn't get jobs; a 59yo female was less or maybe no more sought after as an employee than a 64yo male

Interestingly the raising of women's pension age has led to an increase in cost of elder care as women are less available to provide it for free.
I did read that this was not factored into policy at all,

Funny how women's free labour is invisible, until it's not done.

I always assumed it was because female life expectancy is lower than males’

Many women still do that anyway and now have to work into their late 60s.

Very true.

1986 I had cheque, inheritance, to pay in to my then Midland Bank. They would not accept it unless my husband counter signed it. Needless to say I moved my bank else where. People forget how recent women were regarded as second class, unable to do things without a mans approval.

When men retired, they didn't do the chores. When women became 60, they still carried on doing all the housework. Women never actually retired.

I think men do not now die earlier than women, or not to the same extent as they no longer smoke. It’s levelling put.

Men still die much younger than women (on average), it's why care homes are overwhelmingly female occupants. The big public health interest now is in "healthy Life expectancy" : females may live longer but they tend to start being unwell only a few months later than males, they then have more years of living with poor health, while the blokes get on with dying sooner. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/342587699_Population-based_estimates_of_healthy_working_life_expectancy_in_England_at_age_50_years_analysis_of_data_from_the_English_Longitudinal_Study_of_Ageing