Who’s going to pay our pensions in 20-30years if the UK keeps its birth rate low and also restricts immigration?

[AlertEagle]

posted from another forum
Serious question. The UK’s birth rate is well below replacement level, meaning fewer young people entering the workforce. At the same time, the political mood seems pretty anti-immigration, even though immigration is one of the only things that’s kept the tax base stable.

State pensions are paid by current workers’ National Insurance contributions, not some magic fund. So… what happens when there’s a huge retired population and not enough working-age people to support them?

Will the government raise taxes, increase the retirement age, cut pensions, or eventually U-turn on immigration just to prop things up?

Feels like a ticking time bomb no one’s really addressing. Curious what others think, is anyone actually planning for this?

Or are we as a nation willing to give up state pensions if it means less immigration?

Excellent, I didn’t know it had been changed. I did think it was a seriously f*cking stupid and embarrassing thing to do, maybe there’s hope for this government yet !!

Glad to help.

I worked 3 years past state pension age and would have happily continued to pay NI and would have expected my employer to pay their share as well. I'm usually shot down when I suggest this but surely it makes sense for working pensioners to carry on paying in to the pot to help pay for others?

What's my suggestion for paying pensions? Well I don't really know, but who's going to pay for the immigrants' pensions when the time comes? Bearing in mind that your expectation is that they will be doing the lowest-paid jobs that British people don't want to do, their tax and NI will be low, so that their contributions will be barely funding their own housing, NHS healthcare and the education of their children on an ongoing basis, let alone contributing to anything else.

Perhaps one solution would be to increase taxes for the most well-off. But that would go down like a lead balloon, wouldn't it? They'll all be wanting to know why they should be paying more out of their incomes in order to fund the riff-raff.

Yes I agree, the main other option for paying for pensions is to increase taxes. Obviously also delaying the retirement age as many PPs have mentioned will help.

People who arrive here as adults are going to be on average net contributors to government coffers because another country will have paid for their education and healthcare as children. Once they arrive here, they are ready to work and pay taxes.

Not all immigrants are doing low-skilled jobs. NHS hospitals are absolutely full of foreign doctors. Many tradespeople - like plumbers and electricians - are Polish.

Obviously when they get old, immigrants, like anyone else, will be drawing more on the state than at other times of their lives. Same with anyone who gives birth or has school-age children.

“Not all immigrants are doing low-skilled jobs. NHS hospitals are absolutely full of foreign doctors. Many tradespeople - like plumbers and electricians - are Polish”

But an awful lot of immigrants are either not working AT ALL or in minimum wage jobs like Deliveroo. They are, and always will be, a drain on the system. Once settled, they are followed by family members (parents, grandparents etc) who are also a drain on the system.

The system is like a club. We all pay in and we take out when needed. We can afford to under write some non contributors. But once the balance between those paying in and thos taking out shifts too far in favour of taking out the whole thing collapses.

Well said. The mental gymnastics people go through to argue that the paying in part
is only for other people is amazing.

Which immigrants are you referring to? The ones who have settled here with settled status or the illegal immigrants who do food delivery with someone elses license.

we don’t collect the data to know this here, but this is the graph for Denmark. Only western immigrants (recruited for highly skilled jobs, basically) are net contributors. And that is legal immigrants, recruited for jobs, let alone those working illegally and not paying tax

The tax hasn’t changed the pp means it’s optional because there’s free state education

Think you need to read about Thomas Malthus. He made the same argument and it never came to pass. Humans are the ultimate resource. We are clever, innovative, generous, and cooperative. We are no where near peak resource. Maybe peak fossil fuel. But technology is making us more capable of feeding people.

we just need to be better at distributing our wealth

@FreedomandPeace Ah, what a strange way of looking at it. I’m guessing the pp thinks income tax is optional by never earning any.

?? The comment was about the Education tax being optional.

There obviously is a limit, the argument is where it lies. From a quality of life point of view, I think a lot of the U.K. has too large a population and people suffer.

Yeah, I meant the pp looks at a tax as optional if they don’t pay it. It’s an odd way to look at it.

You see I don’t think it is. The issue we have is chronic underfunding of all key services which has been happening for years and is now coming home to roost. If we start decreasing our population the whole pack of cards will tumble.

if we had properly funded services people wouldn’t think the country was full.

The roads are still pretty busy and where we live it feels like you are in the minority so not sure about that

I’m in agreement with @ThatBoldBear
our population is too large.

It’s short sighted to just consider the here and now. That’s what’s got us into this mess
We and the planet as a whole must look at the impact growing populations have on the planets resources and our wellbeing
It can’t be sustained

If that means increased taxes or reduced welfare provision so that our services are maintained then so be it.

It needn’t be a bad thing though if building standards are high. Councils built a lot of single level terraced, one bedroomed houses in the early 70s. Usually clustered around a central green. There was always a good community spirit.

The student halls I went in in the 90s weren't one bed flats! A tiny room, communal bathrooms/ toilets and a dining hall serving the worst food known to man! Highlight one evening was baked potato with rice filling. Not even flavoured rice. Plain rice in a baked potato. The food budget was like £1 pppd.

I van forsee some grim institution like that for the 'have nots' in 30-40 years time.

Student halls are definitely not like that now! My son’s halls were lovely - all with private en suite and comfy communal cooking facilities with plenty of cupboards/sinks/fridge freezers/large TV.

Gym on site too.

The uk population is around 10 million higher than at the millennium and is forecast to hit 70 million by 2026; not sure where the shortage of people is?!

You understand proportions, right?

It's not the absolute number of people but the proportion of working age: non working age that is the concern.

So the notion of increasing employers' NI and reducing the start point for paying it to £5k just reduces job opportunities for young people? That's going to fuel economic growth?

Any tax rise cold be argued to stifle growth, the govt had to pay for the £10 billion it costs each year to fund Hunts NI cut, pay for independent reviewed pay rises, settle compensation claims in Blood and PO, increase funding for the NHS and other public services, D&C Police are getting a 8% increase in funding.

None of which Hunt made provision for, then there is increased defence spend.

If you don't want Businesses taxes to go up, which taxes would you put up to pay for the above or which public services would you cut or would you not have funded any of the above??

Many businesses had a tax cut on investment in 2023, did they suddenly go out and recruit young people? no.

NMW also went up too, would you have not done that?