State pension

[blondeboobshell]

There’s concerns the state pension won’t be an option in years to come or will be means tested. Iyo what age group need to start not counting on getting the state pension, people in there 50’s? 40’s? 30’s? Or younger?

They won’t eradicate it. It is already happening gradually. First you got it at 60 for women, now for most people it’s 68.
The age for getting it could increase further. It could be means tested. The limit for means testing could increase.

They will do anything rather than tax billionaires.

UK needs to do what Australia did in the 1990s - make it compulsory for both employees and employers to put a large chunk of salary right from your very first job into a private pension. Then people have the money ready for retirement. There is a state pension there, but I’m 99% sure it’s means tested and very many people don’t need it because their private pension is so good after 40+ years of saving and investment into it. The system here where wealthy people get a state pension is bonkers.

This is total scaremongering baloney

@SummerInSunit is means tested & it’s ridiculous that we means test virtually everything else but not the state pension. Plus today’s pensioners have far better private pensions.

Been hearing this for 50 years. No one is getting rid of the state pension. Stop reading Facebook

The system where you pay pension credit to people who pissed their money up the wall and never saved a day in their life is also bonkers. Its bonkers that thrifty people who saved in a modest occupational pension are worse off than freeloaders.

Moving the age out is taking it away because healthy life expectancy hasn’t increased.

Also why not scrap NI & roll it into income tax so you pay it regardless

There will be pension. I don't understand why brits think of it like a benefit like JSA. It's a different matter.
What will happen is that pension age will go so high the pension will be basically impossible to get to or enjoy.

@IAmInTheHouseSidney because it is a benefit…..

If they are going to stop it they need to set a date, and the only fair way to do it IMO is to say any babies born after a certain date won’t get it. So all babies born now will receive something, after that nothing.
It’s bad enough that they keep sliding the date back for those of us who are heading towards retirement and have paid in fully.

What we can’t afford is the triple lock. That needs to go.

I don't think it will stop existing for those who are solely reliant on it.

It will become a tapered benefit. The full state pension will still exist but won't actually be enough to live a dignified life on - those with nothing else will have to rely on foodbanks and other charitable support to actually survive but a somewhat miserable and stressful life will still be just about possible. For everyone with any private pension you'll get £1 less in state pension for every £2 you get from any other source, so to top up your pension from "can barely survive" level to "ok I can live on this income" level you'll need to privately fund twice the difference. For anyone aiming to fund an actually comfortable or dare-I-say afflent lifestyle in retirement the taper will erode the state element of their retirement income to nothing.

Anyone planning to be able to retire in reasonablely bearable circumstances needs to be putting at least 20% of their income into a pension rather than the current default of 5%. This is obviously unaffordable for those on low income - wages will have to rise to make it feasible for people to save enough.

They won't suddenly start means testing the pension because people will just spend a lot of their private pension at 55/57 or not bother to put much in to be below the means testing if it was for example set at £35k like WFA. Also it would affect a lot of public sector workers.

They have already taken 8 years off my alleged 30 years of funding and will be taxing it...so how much more do you want them to take?

Pension contributions by employees aren't set at 25% in France.

They typically equate to that, given the basic and compulsory occupational schemes.

Given they couldn't get rid of the winter fuel allowance in the end, good luck getting rid of the state pension!

The auto enrollment amounts are too low and too easy to opt out of. We need it on every pound earned from age 16 and gradually increased to a higher personal contribution. Say add 1% every 2 years until everyone contributes 10%. The gentle encouragement model clearly isn't working.

Means testing just encourages people not to save, so raising the age you can claim it to 70 seems more likely.

They’ll have to put a concerted effort to tackle rampant ageism in recruitment if they want this to work. I can’t tell you how many people I know who are made redundant in their fifties and are struggling to find work. I suspect pension will just be replaced by out of work benefits for many before they reach retirement age, reducing self esteem and in return quickening ill health which costs the government even more!

It's very suspicious how many pension related threads keep appearing.
If you were actually gathering opinions rather than trying to influence them, you could read one of the almost daily threads that are already in existence.

This type of thinking is the start of the demise of the pension. It is the most stupid opinion and gives the government a get out clause to worsen the lives of living standards when we reach pension age. As it stands, every single person that reaches pension age in the country benefits from the triple lock. Every. Single. Person. For that reason, every single person should be fighting to keep it. We must, must, must ensure that we keep the triple lock and that government accepts that the public will accept nothing less. But sadly we live in a world full of brexit fans, covid deniers, anti-vaxxers and conspiracy theorists. Far too many people who just don't understand the impact of losing the triple lock. Too many people who are too stupid to look to their future and are focusing on now with seemingly no understanding that if you support losing the triple lock, you are literally costing yourself money.

From the research I’ve done it seems unlikely state pension will just stop or become means tested, it’s part of the social contract. But I expect to see the state pension age to increase, that’s how they’ll save money. So it’s going to be even more important people plan outside of the state pension if they want to have some choice over when they retire. I’ve personally not factored state pension into my own figures, I want to retire earlier than state pension age.

The law changed that every employer needed to offer a pension in 2018 (well before that but rolled out to all by then) so probably totally gone altogether but the time those retire, and means tested well before that.

It's almost like someone on Mumsnet, who stands to gain from loads of people posting about pensions on Mumsnet, is starting these threads...

How do you means test state pension? On the individual or on the household?

A lot of households will have had one low earner (taking on childcare, elderly parent caring roles) and one higher (though not necessarily very high) earner.

Means testing state pension would be an administrative mess. Managing it would place a huge burden on the state and also on the family of elderly relatives who no longer have the ability to manage their own affairs.