An extra hubdred for OAPS?

[RaggedRocks]

The government wants us to keep cash at home for emergencies. Many pensioners are struggling to pay their bills and don't have a spare 100 quid.

AIBU to think that they should add an extra hundred onto the WFA in the budget, so oldies can have some spare cash to keep for the coming emergency. Also consider an extra hundred for UC recipients.

If I can come back on a couple of your points.

1. Houses never were pennies, that's just stupid. How much did your father earn when he paid £5k for his house in the 1960s? Without that information, your point is well, pointless.
2. The much-quoted mortgage interest relief often cited as an example of why older generations lived a life of unimaginable wealth was worth - wait for it - £2.50 a week on average. How much is free childcare hours worth nowadays?
3. As an interesting project, I worked out recently that to buy the house I bought in 1988 now, the buyers would need a joint salary of £58k, barely more than NMW x 2. Deposit would be about £13k at 10%. Of course, it's not the nice three bed two bathroom house in a good area that seems to be the bare minimum expected now, but I am tired of hearing how young buyers can't buy a house when most could if they lowered their expectations of where and what to buy. The issue is mainly around London and the SE but we are being brainwashed into thinking it is a countrywide issue. It doesn't have to be.

Ok. House was in West London (the posh bit but wasnt at the time!) It was just fairly standard when two people worked to be able to afford something like this.

Mum was a teacher. Dad was in insurance. Both were lower rate tax payers. The point I am making is that it was much easier if a couple both worked. I recognise that some women didnt want to or relied on the man to support her.

We have now had to give my adult child a hefty deposit to afford their first house. My parents didnt have this option. It was a different time. Stamp Duty wasnt the amount it is now.

I'd rather see a disaster recovery plan that factored in those who can't prep to fend for themselves for three days, either due to cost or other issues. Possibly funding to food banks and community groups so they could buy in the extra stock to dish out if needed.

You will if you have good Direct Benefit pensions from public sector etc
Or if your employer makes generous contributions and you have a good salary.
MN is studded with 30 somethings on massive salaries (compared to anything I ever earned)
Though obviously many, many struggle.

Families are on the most stretched, financially challenged time of their lives
My (v modest ) pension was peanuts until the childcare bills and Uni bills stopped and we could put more into the mortgage and get it paid off and then a few years stacking up for pensions.
Our salaries crept up.

Life changes.

I think a lot of MNetters see the lifestyle their parents have and think they have always lived like that and feel hard-done by because they can't afford the same.
Raising a family has always been the most financially-challenging period of your life, nothing has changed.

I remember my childhood. Foreign holidays. Dinner parties, big Christmases, plenty of food, theatre trips, new furniture...

And a stay at home parent.

I buy almost everything second hand, I have taken my kids on one foreign holiday, paid for with an inheritance, I meal plan and budget every bit of food.

My parents are still buying more food than they eat, foreign holidays, big Christmas, new cars, new furniture, new clothes, 4 bedroom house for the two of them... their life has not changed, except now neither of them are working. I dont think im ever going to be able to retire.

I thought the general idea was that people who can afford to do it, should do it. Then the government could focus on helping the vulnerable in the first 3 days of any crisis, while people who can afford it are looking after themselves. Surely people who can't afford it now are exactly those people who would be helped first in any kind of crisis?

I would say you are either looking back through rose-coloured spectacles or your father was a high earner. Either way, this certainly was not typical when I was growing up in the 1970s, and once you get into the late 80s/90s, it was more usual to have two working parents to afford a lifestyle like this.
What did your working parent do? You're not the poster who has previously claimed it was perfectly possible to have three lots of school fees on one ordinary wage in years gone by, are you??

Im not, no.

My dad was an estate agent, then set up as self employed doing consultancy.
My parents did keep moving further and further out of London to capitalise on their property.

And this was 80s and 90s.

Everyone in that group worked manual
labour or office jobs etc, but they were in the golden era for pensions.

Not easy now, we just have to chip away at it if we can.

Exactly. Worked for an advice organisation and it was entirely predictable that most men would come in with a decent pension of some sort. Women not so much. I wrote to my MP before the WFA U-turn saying I thought it was discriminatory to women as many women 70+ age group do not have good private pensions for many reasons including the fact that they would have been subject to sex discrimination especially around pay and benefits throughout their working lives.

Not sure whether you're bragging or complaining.

My dh had a sahp and it was free school meals, holidays in a caravan in wales, restaurant meals for birthdays only…

Wherever they want 😵‍💫

Well obviously, but if say 2/3rds of households had £100 this then thats an extra £2,000,000,000 extra available to use and barter in the UK with than if nobody did.
Obviously, if you can afford a bit more, keep a bit more. If they had gone in much higher than one hundred pounds, even more people would moan, about it. I keep about £500 at home apart from when I am really skint and have to dip into it.

As a welfare benefits specialist I can tell you that pensioners who qualify for the winter fuel allowance are overall better off than those on the NSP only, as those only on the NSP generally don't qualify for the WFA unless they receive PC via a gateway benefit such as Attendance Allowance. So your logic is way off. Also adding £100 to UC is not a good idea for multiple reasons- it would undoubtedly cause further resentment amongst people not in receipt of it at a time when the WB bill is already under huge scrutiny.

Neither. Just pointing out that my parents have always had a good lifestyle, even in their child rearing days.

Actually not only do I think no, absolutely not i also think the WFA should be stopped too. Means test it and give it to those who are genuinely not able to afford their heating sure. But that isnt the case for aomeone with an income of £35k a year (or a couple on £70k!!) And I would include families with a baby under 1 in that too. Elderly people dont need heat more than babies and families are more likely to be in poverty

It’s already means tested. And old people do need more heat, they feel the cold more and are less mobile.

Feel the cold more and less mobile than babies? I dont think so.
Yes I realise its means tested. I just think £35k up is way too high. That means a couple could have N income of £70k and still receive it. £70k with no childcare costs and probably no housing costs is frankly wealthy. Thats way more spare money than the average family would have.

This. There is this strange idea on here that today’s young parents invented hardship when bringing up children etc.

Most older people walked the same walk when their children were young.

And without handouts, top ups, nursery funding and things like food banks. 🙄

I agree that the older generation were probably harder up when they were raising their kids. That makes sense. What DOESNT make sense is to treat them now as though they dont have more than younger people and be talking about giving them all a hundred quid!!

I am guessing you are one of the many on MN who is unable to look outside their own circumstances or lifestage. There's a lot of it on here.
It is fact that old people (and remember people are living a lot longer now) feel the cold and many have medical conditions that need their homes to be kept reasonably warm, despite what you 'think'.
That said, i agree that the £35k threshold is far too high and should be scaled back.
Definately don't agree with the baby under one - once it's given, there will be lobbying to make it under 2. Then pre-school.
Once something is given, thecwirld apparently ceases to turn if it's taken away - see UC covid uplift, free food during school hols etc.

There’s a reason care homes are tropically hot and it’s not because their owners love paying astronomical heating bills.

I agree that the threshold for WFA is too high but the answer isn’t to dole it or its equivalent out to another group. I hope that the review of pensions goes beyond the triple lock and the WFA threshold is addressed. It would be a good time to consign the £10 “Christmas bonus” to history as well.

Absolutely re the £10. A good example of something that makes no difference to the recipient but collectively costs millions. It should be scrapped this year, but i hope you are braced for the howls of protest when something - anything - is taken away.