To think we can't afford the triple lock

[paddleboardingmum]

Things seem very weighted against young people right now in terms of tax, student loans, and then there's the cost of mortgages and childcare. I know there are some older people struggling and I do feel sorry for them. But plenty are not and I think we just can't afford the triple lock at the moment. AIBU

Stop asking for personal details.

The money wasn't "found", it was borrowed and added to the trillions of national debt on which we're paying billions of interest every year (most of which is also being borrowed thus making the situation ever worse!).

I benefit from the triple lock but I agree it should change. It was necessary when it was introduced because pensions were very low in comparison to wages and there was a lot of pensioner poverty but it has served it's purpose.
I think probably the lock should be broken now and pensions should increase in line with inflation. I would like the savings to go towards supporting younger people.
But I don't think any Government would be brave enough to do it.. The outcry over the winter fuel allowance changes illustrates that.
I also think pensioners with income over a certain amount should pay NI.

Well I'm glad you're ok and want the triple lock to go. Plenty of pensioners are not as fortunate as you.

I will take all the discounts (including the cinema) going not that there are that many nowadays. Sometimes you can get a couple of £1 discount on entry into somewhere but that is nothing compared with lots of places charging really really low prices for entry such as £1 to people on universal credit.

That is unnecessary and really nasty.

I’m 65. When I had my kids in the 1980’s very few mums worked. Most of us stayed at home with our kids until they were at least school age and even then had jobs that fitted in with school hours. There was no wrap around care and very few nursery’s in those days. As a consequence any jobs we did were low paid - for example I ran a pre school playgroup for over 10 years. It paid a pittance but fitted in with my kids. I had a Saturday job for a few years too. My exh worked long hours and often had to work weekends. My parents lived 250 miles away and my MIL was elderly and it would have been too much for her. As a result I have no pension in my own name. I had a job I loved before having children ( I worked in a hospital path lab) but it would have been impossible to go back to it. I am now unable to work due to serious illness and disability and my only income is PIP. I still have to wait another 2 years for my pension. I think there will be a lot of other women that are my age that have no pension of their own through similar circumstances. You need to understand things haven’t always been as they are now.

I had a steak sandwich the other day in a pub, not a garden centre. £12. Still thinking about it 😂. It was delicious!

if you want to keep ( bare minimum - you try living on 13k a year ) pensions for the next generations I suggest you keep them for this generation too

it’s not penions that are the problem it’s the super rich

Well it doesn't help much when you have oil central heating. £200 over the course of a year yippee do

Ok, it's not our fault that working age members of society can't be bothered to work, or work full time, or are too bothered to have more children than they can feed.

These working age members of society are at the stage of life when they can do something about their life situation, unlike pensioners.

Why don't we start with them? Welfare bill is only a few bn less than state pensions bill and is projected to grow very fast. It's not only they are consuming our taxes, but they also don't generate any output which could be taxed. So prime target for review before pensions.

Government borrowing is not the same as getting a loan in a domestic setting.

Probably we cant but personally Ive paid my taxes, have never really been ill to use NHS, never claimed benefits apart from child benefit, always worked, paid into pensions. So if its still here when I retire I shall take it thankyou.

In what way does the triple lock cost £15.5 billion? Please can we see your workings?

There are about 13.2 million pensioners who will receive around £154 billion in pension payments during the current year. Next year the state pension will rise by 3.9% so the total bill increases by £6 billion so where does the alleged cost of £15.5 billion come from?

I would save your breath, the rabid anti-pensioners brigade think that today's 60+ women had exactly the same opportunities as they have and judge them for not doing something that was impossible at the time. They don't want to know.

Anyone born in 1960 is not a pensioner yet!

You need to work out what you're comparing it to, too. Is that £15.5 billion supposed to be the extra cost of having the triple-lock vs just CPI, say? Or just of having pensions go up at all?

So why should someone on universal credit not have to pay tax no matter how much a month they get?

But why should innocent billionaires suffer because of the bad behaviour of a few ?

This, plus the ironic declarations usually made on threads like this that today's youngsters can't possibly afford to pay into a workplace pension while simultaneously criticising today's pensioners for not doing so (even though they didn't even really exist when they pensioners were working in a lot of cases)

Anyone born in 1960 is not a pensioner yet!

Anyone born before 15th June 1960 is already receiving their pension.

https://www.gov.uk/state-pension-age

Ok, it's not our fault that working age members of society can't be bothered to work, or work full time, or are too bothered to have more children than they can feed.
These working age members of society are at the stage of life when they can do something about their life situation, unlike pensioners.

There is a crisis with young people being unable to get jobs, which is devastating for them.

We can’t keep increasing the amount of money we borrow as a country. Huge costs to service our debt.

I hope anyone thinking of voting Reform has looked at their policy regarding pensions.
They favour the Australian approach. Sort of. They do not expressly say it. With no explanation of how they would move from the NI contributions to the Australian version. What Reform take from that version is that if you have assets over an unspecified amount you get nothing. So that will be house, car, savings, income.

I assume lots of pensioners are clueless as to what the ‘triple lock’ is.

Of course there is, but it's hard for older people to get jobs too because of ageism.

Isn't the usual response here that parents should have thought before having them ?