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?

ChatGPT says at stocks and shares ISA of 60k could grow to 97k at 5% return, 118k at 7% return, 146.5k at 9.%. Not bad for 10 years of relatively passive investment. Best to assume between 5-7%, though there’s a good chance you’d get more.

@Pddn you do realise that many many jobs at NMW or just above, care work, retail, admin etc and its not just as simple as get a better job. There are only so many team leader jobs, management jobs, senior jobs. A care home for example may have 20 support workers and x2 seniors and then one manager. Retail may have 30 shop floor workers, 5 team leaders, x1 manager. Offices may have 10 admin staff, one senior admin staff and 1 manager. Not everyone will get promotion regardless of if they want it or not.

Many of these positions are only paid pence an hour more anyway.

The argument for budgeting better for your pension on NMW is ridiculous, their unlikely to be living an extravagant lifestyle and budgeting for their day to day bills. A quick MSE calculation on nmw from april means £88 into their pension a month. They are not going to be thinking i will put an extra 6% (to take up to the recommended 10%) which would increase this to £220 a month, when day to day life is tight. That £132 is gas/electix or CT or two weeks shopping.

They are not going to sacrifice essential living now for something happening many years in advance because whether its short sighted or not they need to eat, be warm and house themselves now.

@Cashmereclothing because they have anxiety.

I just don’t know how PIP can be abused. The form is extensive and the questions invasive. Then there’s the assessment process.

I have 2 incurable cancers, one being secondary BC. I’m a member of a FB group for women and men who have this disease. So many of their PIP claims are being rejected and they are having to go to tribunal as a result. These are people who struggle to breathe, have limited mobility or who struggle to leave house due to the sheer anxiety of knowing they are dying slowly.

How this benefits system can be abused, god alone knows.

Anxiety needs to be removed from PIP

@Cashmereclothing As housewives are now. That doesn’t mean they have a NI record and a pension, i was actually referring to someone who is 80 snd a woman. They didn’t need to work all their lives for a pension and many didnt pay anything much towards anyone else’s.

I was asking AI to generate some policies to effectively means test PIP and saying like with child benefit having a high income PIP charge.

Yes insane that this is allowed.

I know someone claiming mainly for anxiety. Got her husband to do all the speaking for her as an appointee. Doesn't stop her going out riding her bike, going to the theatre and going on scary fairground rides that twirl her upside down. It's a joke. 50 and hasn't worked for years and unlikely to ever again when she continue on benefits. Multiply this thousands over.
PIP needs to be reserved for the most severely disabled in society not given out willy nilly. It's become such a joke now that the genuine claimants will suffer in the longer term.

I’ve mentioned this before and always get abuse that ‘my mother worked full time etc ‘ - I’m 64 and more women definitely worked- but if you look at the women in their 70s, 80s and 90s - an awful lot did very few hours for long periods of life - my MIL ( RIP ) was a nice person to me personally, but never did more than 8 hours week and long periods not at all after her first child was born right up to ‘retiring’ but was exactly the person who would have been moaning about WFA or turning a blind eye to family members abusing the system etc and moaning about immigrants/ voting Reform etc

I completely agree. I've got a fair bit of anxiety myself, and have had for years. I'm a natural worrier by nature, and that's been heightened greatly these last few years due to pretty crippling financial problems and setbacks, plus concerns over my wife's physical and mental health. Should I receive financial awards for it? Of course not. It's my problem to deal with.

Same with my mum. never worked after having kids until I was about 12 and then she did a few hours a week for about 5 years until health problems stopped her.

Far too much of this going on ( and im a centre left voter) - thing is it’s many of this type of person who moan about the country going to the dogs, NHS being crap , immigrants etc - I think Faragexwill have a very big shock if he gets power - many of those advocating ‘get tough on xyz’ are first in the queue to abuse the system if they can - what they mean is ‘other people claiming’ - not me and my family!!

Same here. I've worked for 40 years in jobs which have taken their toll on my mental health, nursing terminally ill people etc. Still working now albeit in a different role and seeing people claiming and not working for years on end. the system needs to change.

youll be lucky if you have £15 a day after bills. Can’t wait!!

There's a MN poster in her late 20s who says she can't work because "every job she's ever had makes her ill". So she expects the taxpayer to fund and her DC for the next 40+ years. She can't even help him with primary level HW and says it's too hard for her to comprehend herself.

But despite all this, she has enough for Netflix, can doom scroll on her phone endlessly and spends hours playing on her Nintendo switch.

Those claiming PIP for anxiety related conditions must consider themselves to be seriously ill. Maybe we should go back to institutionalising such people.

Watch PIP claimants rapidly decrease.....

It’s the lump sums you need, new boiler, or even new fridge, clothes, passport, lumps that you need every now and again. One might be able to live day to day on the state pension but where does even a few hundred quid come from - unless you have a decent lump of savings …

For many claimants, there is an actual reason for anxiety. Serious illness such as cancer and its treatments, can trigger anxiety for example.

The suggested method weeds out the claimants trying it on.

Yes let's get back to the Victorian days, life was so much better then.

But not every with cancer etc has anxiety.

Wonder why some people get it and some font

Person with cancer definitely needs the support as they are unwell

My 78 year old mother owns her own home. She receives the Basic State Pension maximum which is £176.45/week. She worked from the age of 15.

Not if they’ve got similar problem solving skills to you 😅