Is living on the state pension really that bad?

[cateringday]

I mean, if you own your home then you’re getting around £250 a week just for bills and spends.
i have a tiny pension and DH has none. I am always worrying about this but then realised that we will have no rent or mortgage to pay.
im just wondering if it would be as awful as people make out? I hear stuff saying you need £300000 in pension pot to have a comfortable retirement, why would you need that much?

That is based on wanting to spend a good portion of your retirement years having fun, travelling and doing things you maybe didn't have the time or funds to do whilst working FT. However, if none if that is in your sights for whatever reason then you should be able to live well on less than that although if you are on SP alone I think it would be a frugal existence particularly if you are living in your own home mortgage free but exposed to repair costs and ever increasing utility bills.

Agree
@Tacohill it's a problem I have come across as a lawyer. People will put requirements to be "registered disabled" in their policies and be shocked when I point out it's a meaningless term and could also trip them up as the Equality Act applies if you have a disability, theres no "registration" requirement

I am a pensioner as are most of my friends and family and we all have to pay council tax. We live in various parts of the country. I certainly do not have over £16k in savings and I only get state pension

Single pensioners get single person discount but every single person in a house or flat gets that

My main thing is barring extenuating circumstances and health issues isn't the onus on an individual to put away a pension? Whilst you work you put some away, the company matches a certain percentage?

Stop the bullying!

Why can't the NEETs do the jobs?

Where is it 250, that would be fine but when I looked on gov website it said £176 per week and that is a big difference. I could love on 250 a week 176 I couldn't.

Lots of employers don't put anything into the pension scheme even if they offer one, it's just the employee putting in. Lots of people on minimum wage or thereabouts can't afford to put in anyway. They need the money for their daily living expenses. Even if they do put in the recommended 10% of their salary, they'd have a pension pot by the time they retire but it wouldn't be huge.

Especially for anyone working part time or taking career breaks to bring up children - which isn't a luxury in many cases, it's the only way they can do it, since the people providing childcare are also entitled to be paid minimum wage. UK is a tolerant country so I can't see them bringing in forced abortions or forced adoptions for people struggling financially. Nobody would vote for a party who tried to do that except total dickheads. It would be political suicide. They want more children born anyway to provide the next generation of tax payers.

The government could start means testing the state pension but they're not going to be able to cut it out altogether because there will always be people who haven't paid enough into a private pension to exist in old age without financial assistance.

There are rules about who can claim income related benefits, but there's no rules about having to work full time if a person has some other means of supporting themselves and isn't claiming income related benefits.

Unless they've changed those rules, it's not compulsory to pay into the employer's pension scheme either. The employer has to offer one now, but the employee can choose to opt out and I imagine a great many of those struggling do.

Surely some proof of the condition would have to be backed up by medical evidence.

Not contributing though. And then a 'burden in the state' when they 'retire' not that they ARE actually retiring if they didn't work anyway!

You go to the GP and say you are depressed and have anxiety and how can that be disproved?

My neighbour supposedly has such bad anxiety that he cannot leave his house so therefore cannot work. He in fact leaves his house almost every day, often multiple times. He goes shopping, walks his dogs, sees his girlfriend and, best of all, works cash in hand sometimes 5 days a week!

It's not £250 for anyone, someone has just rounded up to an approximate figure and everyone has rolled with it. The amount depends on what year you retire because the rules are changing and different people are in different situations because of that.

It also depends on how much NI you've paid. If someone hasn't paid the full amount of NI qualifying years, they might only get a 3/4 or 1/2 of the full pension amount. The only way to know what you, personally, are in line to get is to look at your state pension forecast.

There's a legal minimum employer contribution of 3%. Even if you are on NMW you can learn to budget and put some away. Don't plan to stay in NNW forever, learn some marketable skills to get a better job.

There's plenty of practical qualifications to do for those who don't even have GCSEs.

I think the state pension needs to be phased out where people get a lump equivalent to what they "paid in" via NI. Ultimately resulting in a world of personal responsibility.

What jobs? Did you quote the wrong person?

The fact you've paid off your mortgage makes a huge difference. You've got that asset now, which, psychologically makes your life easier and more doable. Good for you. What else do you need but that comfort factor and your dog!

This. There are large number of ( mainly) women who have barely worked. In my job role I am seeing many who are currently coming up to retirement age who have barely worked and looking to see what benefits there are to top up their very small state pension as you only have to have looked after kids and claimed child benefit for 10 years to get a very basic state pension.
they then go on to claim pension credit sometimes for 30+ years, all rent and council tax paid. If they start to claim a disability benefit they get an additional disability premium on pension credit on top of the actual disability benefit. The costs are huge. So many who have barely paid anything in yet taking huge amounts out. It's completely unsustainable.
The numbers of people now on long term disability benefits ( I understand some on PIP do work), or not able to work due to caring responsibilities, so many SEN children whose parents can't work, so many older people needing care whose adult kids give up work to care for them. So few people actually working and contributing. It's a ticking timebomb that no-one wants to address.

Someone upthread hasn't worked in 8 years due to their MH issues and just lives of UC..

There are so many like this. So many cases of both of a couple on long term sick and disability benefits also.

The problem is that benefits often exceed the minimum wage or the basic state pension. And benefits are not taxable.

I don't begrudge anyone who really needs some help, but we have reached the pint now where there are more people on benefits as a lifestyle choice than there are people working.

It's not sustainable and will all crash one day.

Even the PM knows that but his back benchers won't allow changes as their constituents are on benefits! And they are watching their own backs/ jobs.

But those claiming benefits rather than being supported by their partner are more of a drain. Go after them first.

Plus the partner may be a very high rate tax payer

Vast swathes of the population will be destitute and this will have a knock on effect affecting everyone. That is why cuts need to be made now. It will be tough but in the long term the better option.

I meant that some information from a medical professional must have to be provided to claim PIP. I doubt that it's granted simply on the applicant's say so.

And then claiming carers for each other

What are your current bills? How do you expect to live and to what standard? This will be most key between 70-80, after that you may well not need an awful lot, unless you require 24 hour care. If you own your home, could you sell now and downsize, use some of the profit to leverage a stocks and shares ISA (over 10 years these are thought to come good). Let’s face it, they keep moving the date on women’s pensions, plenty don’t live to receive it. Do you have children OP?

It’s fine to point it out once but that poster was rude and kept on.

We all knew what that poster meant when they said their wife was registered as disabled.
Its a bit like saying registered as autistic - we know they’re not actually registered but are medically diagnosed and there is official documentation to prove it.
Thats all that poster meant.

There was no need to keep swearing and calling them out over it.
They had probably had a few drinks and was being a bit of a bitch and so myself and other posters told her to calm down.