Just to qualify, I do realise that a lot of elderly people are in dire financial straights with prices increasing, and if inflation carries on going up then lots more of them will be in a bad way.
But......
My Mum was a professional and paid into a final salary pension through her work. She took time off to have children, but she paid additional voluntary contributions to partly make up for it. She also has her state pension, and she works part time - getting rather good freelance rates.
She has been moaning to me recently about her financial situation. She owns her own home, and I worked out that after we've paid rent, council tax and pensions, we have less money each month than my Mum does after she pays her council tax (and we're supporting 3 of us, soon to be 4, with that money). That's not counting her freelance money, just her pensions. She could have had even more money each month, but she chose to take some of her pension as a lump sum and decorate her house. We are playing "catch up" with our pensions (for various reasons) and we're trying really hard to save now. We only have private pensions though, and so it's a bit of a risk as they could be worth peanuts when we retire.
I think the sticking point for her is that she has separated from my Dad and he has just had an inheritance (that obviously she isn't benefitting from). So I think that she compares her situation unfavourably with his.
So is she being unreasonable for moaning to us about "final salary pensions not being that good really"? Is she insensitive for complaining to us when we're struggling a bit as a young family, or am I insensitive because it's natural that she'll compare her situation with my Dad's?