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?

The women were just knackered running round after men all the time.

I got married in 1980 and wrote to the tax office that we'd decided to opt for separate taxation. Tax office wrote back TO DH thanking him for his wife's letter and got a reply from me saying that I earned my money, I paid tax on it, if I wrote to them I expected them to reply to me.

Feminism ruined everything but (some) women were turkeys voting for Christmas🤷🏻‍♀️

i imagine without checking up,most kids who are abused attend school/nursery during the daytime, parents who invest their time and money (extra heating bills,food costs, no school discounts on daytrips,all ducational costs paper,stationery, study subs are on the parents etc) - are unlikely to start abusing their children.

You are either very naive or trying to start an argument. Mentally muting you now.

The change in pension age is something I've wondered about.

Older women got their pension at a younger age but it was the older, lower amount.

The WASPI women who got their pensions at a later age are getting a larger amount, so if they live longer, not sure how much longer it needs to be, they'll have actually been advantaged by having to wait longer for their pension as in they'll receive more money overall.

Yes, all types of abuse towards children increased during lockdown when parents were unable to take their children to nurseries/childminders. Some children are better off out of the home sadly.

@Bingsbongs unfortunately some parents can't be bothered to wake themselves or their children up on time to go to school or even if they are awake, there's no clean uniform or school equipment, so they keep the children at home but do absolutely nothing with them apart from get abusive when the bored and hungry kids annoy them. It's a massive red flag when kids stop attending school - better that they come in on time, clean, healthy and with the right equipment.

It was so husbands and wives could retire together. (Because the woman was usually a bit younger.) Retirement was short back then!

Originally (early 20th century) retirement was 70 for everyone and then 65 for everyone, and then in about 1940 (?) it was reduced further for women.

It was so husbands and wives could retire together. (Because the woman was usually a bit younger.) Retirement was short back then!

Several people have cited this (including me), but I wonder how true it was?

Considering how everything else tax, income and finance-wise seemed to be wholly based around working men, and their wives were effectively treated as a tagged-on appendage, I wonder why they didn't just say that both spouses could retire once the husband reached 65?

If this is the thinking, it sounds very prescriptive and restrictive, assuming that every wife would be exactly 5 years younger than her husband. What about couples of the same age? What about couples where the wife was 10, 15 or 20 years younger - or indeed older?

Plenty of women did (and still do) marry considerably older men - possibly for financial security or just preferred a more mature or established man - and not just mega-rich rock stars for whom a state pension would be irrelevant anyway!

Women live around 4 years longer than men, womens state pension age should be 4 years later then mens.

In the true spirit of equality.
🙂

I used to work in the pensions industry and the generally accepted answer was that when the State pension ages were originally set, men were, on average, 5 years older than their wives. The intention was than a couple would therefore most probably retire together (or at any rate in the same tax year).

Oh what bollocks. If only we had a man to rely on to look after us. Have you read Mumsnet at all?

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/relationships/4926229-partner-is-horrible-to-me

Just one example of the princes among men women used to have to be financially reliant on.

@FatherJackHackettsUnderpantsHamper

It was so husbands and wives could retire together. (Because the woman was usually a bit younger.) Retirement was short back then!

Several people have cited this (including me), but I wonder how true it was?

Look at my earlier post on pension ages, it explains it exactly and provides the verification links.

Only in MN do men still have the advantage by dying sooner.

I've noticed the government has been very quick to equalise anything that benefits women but very slow to equalise anything that disadvantages them. Women suck it up because they want equality.

Surely you mean that the other way around?

I don't know about the other poster but I'm a woman.

Women like the one in that thread still are reliant on abusive men and that's partly because of the consequences of militant middle class feminists (there's other types of feminism that has done genuinely important campaigning). These militants had and have high earning jobs unlike the majority of people male or female. The consequences are we now have a society where people can't live on one income. This means it's harder for women like the one you quoted to leave abusive relationships.

The majority of women (and men) aren't in high paid jobs and need the state to pay tax credits on top of their salaries because earnings are too low to live on. That's if they can find a job and if they can't they have to claim benefits, and the changes to the welfare system are making that harder and harder. Plus benefits are too low to manage on particularly for single people including single mothers. Things are not better than before and in many ways they're worse.

It's hard for single men as well as women but researchers found it was single women who were worst off. I've lurked on Mumsnet for a while and remember it being posted on here. Something about nowhere in the country or almost nowhere where housing is affordable for single women. Although it's not only housing that's the problem.

.

How are the men in that clip doing ‘more than their fair share’? Their fair share maybe, but not more than.

HISTORY OF PENSION AGE

1908 - age 70
The first state pension in the UK was the Old Age Pension. The law was passed in August 1908 and the first pensions paid on 1 January 1909 to around 500,000 people aged 70 or more. It was 5/= (five shillings or 25p) a week and was paid in full to individuals aged 70 or more with an annual income of £21 a year or less reducing to nothing at an annual income of £31 a year. A higher pension of 7/6 (62.5p) was paid to a married man. At the time only one in four people reached the age of 70 and life expectancy at that age was about 9 years.

1925 - age 65
In 1925 a new kind of pension was introduced based on contributions paid at work by employer and employee. It was paid from age 65 without a means-test. A married couple's rate of pension was paid if both spouses were aged 65 or more. That meant many men had to wait for some time after they reached 65 to get the higher rate for their wives.

1940 - men age 65, women age 60
In 1940 pension age for women was cut to 60 to try to ensure for most couples that the married rate would be paid as soon as the husband reached 65.

1948 - retirement condition added
From 1948, men had to retire as well as reach 65 to claim the new Retirement Pension paid under the National Insurance scheme. If their wife was still under 60 when they reached 65 and retired they could now claim a dependant's addition for her.

1995 - women's state pension age to be equalised
Following pressure from Europe, the Conservative Government was forced to announce plans to equalise state pension age for men and women. The timetable was the most relaxed possible and would raise pension age for women to 65 slowly from April 2010 to April 2020.

2007 - further rises in pension age to 66, 67, and then 68 introduced
The Labour Government passed a new law to raise state pension age to 66 between April 2024 and April 2026, then to 67 between April 2034 and April 2036 and to 68 between April 2044 and April 2046.

6 April 2010 - women's state pension age begins to rise
The first women are affected by the equalisation changes. Women born 6 April 1950 to 5 May 1950 have to wait until 6 May 2010 to reach state pension age, a delay of up to one month.

Entitlement to Pension Credit for men and women is now linked to women's state pension age rather than the age of 60. A similar change restricts entitlement in England only to free bus travel. Entitlement to Winter Fuel Payment is also linked to women's state pension age and the qualifying date for the payment in winter 2010/11 moves to 5 July 2010. It will rise by six months each year.

May 2010 - further change promised
In opposition the Conservative Party had announced it would raise pension age for men and women more quickly than existing plans. After it came to power with the Liberal Democrats in May 2010 this pledge was repeated in the programme for government set out in the Coalition Agreement.
"We will...hold a review to set the date at which the state pension age starts to rise to 66, although it will not be sooner than 2016 for men and 2020 for women."

October 2010 - revised changes
The commitment in the Coalition Agreement fell foul of EU equality laws which allowed the government to equalise state pension ages as late as April 2020 but would not allow further discrimination between men and women during that process. So in the Spending Review of October 2010 the plans were revised. Women's state pension age would now be raised more quickly to reach 65 in 2018 and then both men and women's pension age would rise to 66 by 2020. Critics pointed out that plan breached the Coalition Agreement promise of 'no sooner than...2020 for women'.

2011 - Pensions Bill sets out the planned changes
In February 2011 the detailed timetable for change was announced in the Pensions Bill 2011. Women's state pension age would rise to 65 by November 2018 and then men and women's pension age would rise together to reach 66 by 5 April 2020. Five million men and women would face a later state pension date. But while men would have to wait at most another year, 500,000 women would have to wait longer than a year. The wait for 300,000 would be 18 months or more and 33,000 would have to wait for two years.
Widespread protests and rebellions in Parliament - which the Government defeated - led to promises by the Secretary of State Iain Duncan-Smith to introduce some 'transitional' changes to help the most severely affected women. But the Pensions Bill went through almost all its stages in Parliament with no details of what the Government would actually do.
On Thursday 13 October 2011, the last possible date, the Government announced its plans. It would cap the delay for women at 18 months. It kept the rise to 65 by November 2018. But would then stretch out the transition from age 65 to 66 for both men and women by an extra six months. It will now be completed in October 2020. The concession will cost £1.1 billion (at 2010/11 prices), half of which will be spent on stretching the timetable for men, none of whom had complained.
On Tuesday 18 October 2011 the House of Commons accepted these changes and despite a further attempt in the Lords to amend them the Pensions Act 2011 became law on 3 November 2011.

2011
In April 2011 the Government began a consultation on how it should bring forward the change in state pension age to 67 and then 68. That consultation closed on 24 June 2011. On 29 November 2011 in the Autumn Statement the Chancellor George Osborne announced that the rise in the State Pension Age to 67 would be brought forward to April 2026 to April 2028 instead of April 2034 to April 2036.
Further changes
Under the Pensions Act 2007 the state pension age will rise to 68 between April 2044 and April 2046. That date will be brought forward.

It's probably going to cost more money than save to increase the state pension age. 60 or 65 for men and women is about right. People may be living longer (although I don't know if that's even true anymore) but often in poor health.

State pensions aren't means tested because it costs more to means test than not. Probably that's true for the incapacity benefits too. Even if means testing incapacity is cost effective, the assessments aren't. Private companies get paid many millions to do them and it would be cheaper for the state to accept doctor's notes.

Increased state pension age means more people will need incapacity benefits. People too young to get the state pension but too unwell to work.

Men tended to be older than their wives by a few years, so they could retire together. They were also less likely to be still working than men at that age. Women also often paid the “small stamp” (elected to as cheaper) if they were married and had children which meant they had a smaller pension.

When the welfare state came at first in only women received a pension when widowed. This is because often the man was the breadwinner (remember introduced in post war years). It was calculated at one point based on late husband’s earnings. This was challenged legally as sexism as widowers didn’t get anything. The difference in pension age was challenged legally too as sexism. Took years to resolve I think. I assume the challengers expected the pension age for men to come down to 60 but by the time it was resolved the govt realised everybody was living longer so they took the opportunity to up the pension age and abolish widows’ pension - introduced bereavement allowance payable to both sexes but only for a year (instead of till death or remarriage, like widows benefit.). All saved a fortune. Widowed parents of both sexes are paid for school aged children.

the govt realised everybody was living longer

I think it's going the other way now?

All saved a fortune.

Maybe saves something but even if people are still living longer and I think that's changing and not true anymore, a lot will be in poor health and need incapacity benefits. Too young for state pension but too unwell to work.

Are incapacity benefits less per week or month than the state pension? I don't know but administrating incapacity benefits costs a lot particularly since the privatised assessments were introduced. It was cheaper when doctors evidence was accepted because the assessments cost many millions.

The state pension wasn't means tested because they worked out it would cost more to means test than not.

Women also often paid the “small stamp” (elected to as cheaper) if they were married and had children which meant they had a smaller pension.

My recollection was that this was abolished in May 1977 for new entrants to the scheme. I married in the September of that year. Women already paying the reduced stamp could stay on it. It does mean that I now get the full state pension.