To think the standard of living for retired people had to change

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I'm a millennial. I will retire in my seventies. Many in my age group will be still paying their mortgage off well into their sixties. Many will never be able to buy. This is not a moan about that.

My mums generation were able to buy cheaper houses in the eighties. Some have also inherited well (houses which their parents owned and didn't have to sell to pay for care, which had risen in price to above a million). They had better pension plans. Some were able to go to university for free and their degrees actually meant something in the workplace: They often paid off their mortgages in their forties. I see a lot of my parents relatives have retired early and have very enviable lives.

Two uncles have retired in their early sixties. They are both in good help. They spend their days on many holidays, eating out multiple times per week, going to garden centres, renovating their beautiful houses, helping children financially and with childcare. They will have presumably worked out their finances and could afford to continue to live like this for the rest of their lives! Possibly thirty more years!

I think they are possibly going to be unique in their quality of life. We will never have that and I don't see my children's generation having things any earlier.

In essence the generation before me were mostly fortunate, unless personal situations changed their financial situation or they lost their homes during the nineties interest rises. Retirements and pensions were never designed to support people for three decades and that things had to change hence raising the retirement age and making people pay more towards their care.

Unbelievable! Is that you, Suella?

They AREN’T ‘productive’.

Look, this isn’t something I’ve made up. Growth and Productivity are well known economic concepts.

You might not like them but that’s another story!

*From their 20s to their 40s they will be paying the pensions of the current 60-80yr olds.

From their 20s to their 40s they will be paying the health care of the current 60-80yr olds.

From their 20s to their 40s they will be paying the social care of the current 60-80yr olds*

That would be the 60-80 year olds whose taxes paid for schools, doctors, nurses, dentists, teachers, libraries and the like when your children needed them, would it? and if they're in their 80s probably when you were a child, as well.

I’ll be encouraging them to vote to limit free NHS care to under 70s only

A society that can limit healthcare to one sector can quite easily do it to another. Incidentally, NHS care is only free at the point of use. It's funded by general taxation, paid for, among other people, by those 60-80 year olds you loathe so much.

You seem really nice. Super kind hearted. And I agree we should all have everything free forever.

But, maths.

Yes but don't you remember? We were there too! We were the kids who were always told "no you can't have it" and who were hungry all day because our parents couldn't afford snacks.
I was amazed when I found out Pink Panther wafers were a real thing and not just something sold in Kwik Save No Frills Broken Biscuits.
Us millennials all lived through that too and we aren't getting to retire at 62 or even getting a house out of it.

There are lots of impoverished pensioners too.

My kingdom for an ignore poster button, MN. Pretty please?

How dismissive.

What does it matter what the house is worth? That's only if you sell it, and people tend to need somewhere to live!!! We sold our first house which we bought for £30k in 1990, for £17 more 7 years later. My how we rolled in it.

I would just like to point out a couple of things.

1. yes, some of the boomer generation hit the perfect storm jackpot, free education, full employment, affordable homes. But not all of them did, before the eighties and nineties further education was only really available to about 18% of young people compared to the huge number who go to university now. Full employment is great, but for women we didn’t have equal pay, maternity pay and employment rights, had to put up with sexist and unequal work places where advancement was often for men only. Houses were cheaper but mortgage rates were killers, and women had to have male sponsors to get mortgage or other credit . And no, that perfect storm will never come again, it was an unprecedented and totally unexpected combination of post war policies to do with the regeneration of national health and wealth.

2. in the OPs post she talks about childcare and financial help being offered. In financial terms a day or two of free child care is actually a huge support to working parents. Just pointing this out. In my day it was almost impossible to find good professional childcare for preschoolers and wrap around care was unheard of

3. many of the houses owned today by boomers will be passed down to their children or grandchildren, yes, some will be sold to fund care or cats homes, but many people will inherit an extremely valuable property, or even properties.

Huh?
Are you think I agree with this batshit idea?

You do realise that wealthy pensioners continue to pay tax on their income, don't you? So my SIL, who taught for 38 years and retired a couple of years ago on close to £30k pension and has now added the state pension, meaning she's on around £40k pa, pays around £5k tax pa.

Better-off pensioners are still contributing financially to society and many are also supporting the very old and the very young. My SIL spends three days a week providing childcare for her grandchildren, enabling her daughters to work so that they can afford their lovely homes, their posh car loans and their foreign holidays — which are luxuries my SIL never had when she was raising them.

That's when there was a big overhaul of the whole system. It was essentially simplified. Explanation here https://www.oversixties.co.uk/the-new-pension.html.
It was an absolute cut off and there was no way an older pensioner could qualify under the new rules, even if they had already made the increased number of qualifying years needed under the new scheme.

Judging by the way the £10,600 figure is bandied around I don't think many people realise this.

No they definitely don’t!!

No sorry @FuzzyPuffling I meant to quote the poster who said that, but I quoted you by mistake. I thought the whole post would show up. I wish i could edit on here!

I was being ironic about the outraged entitlement of the younger generations. 🙂

If you ignore me, how will you know what other people are thinking?

They are looking out of the window of their office blocks, knowing they will not retire until 70 while paying for this generation to retire 10 years earlier.

So your parents are wealthy OP but you don't expect to inherit from them. Have you been horrible to them? I dunno, maybe you've resented their good fortune and moaned about them on line?

What's your stance on child sex offenders, those serving life sentences etc? I take it that you are in favour of a loose death sentence?

You do realise that wealthy pensioners continue to pay tax on their income, don't you?

Anyone whose pension is over the tax free limit pays tax, not just the wealthy ones.

Does scrapping mean they were all closed immediately? Seems unlikely…as well as impossible…. And yes, more schools were opened as the population grew, but the apparatus of grammar schools had been wilfully destroyed by the levelling down Labour Party and councils they were comprehensives 😂Who’d have thought opening more schools was a bad thing ;)

You say that, but I started a role in a Jobcentre back in 2018- in my first week we were told in a trauning session that economists calculated that baby born that day would be expected to work u til age 90.

They then led in to why it's important for employers to give all ages a chance (appreciate a lot of private sector ones don't).

Those that retired later had to wait up to six years extra to get it. Women that used to retire at 60 often had to wait until they were 66 (WASPIS). The later ones got a higher flat rate pension.

No problem..forgiven!
( Not Suella!)

Better than you I'll wager. I take it you're not in a caring profession then?!

Your attitude stinks. It's not about Maths. It's about social conscience and you are totally devoid of one.

It's disgraceful that such a huge world economy would ever even think about such a vile practice. This country can afford it, but the fat cats cream off so much!! What a horrible mind you must have.

I hope to never meet you or your children. What a way to bring a child up.

You are aware that the current retirement age is 66 and will soon be going up to 67, don't you? So why pretend that everyone retires at 60? I know a woman in her 80s who is still working in the kitchens of one of the local pubs.