Labour and Pensioners

[Mycatsmudge]

So Labour has declared they will not increase taxes and NI on working people, but they need to raise money for their manifesto promises such as free breakfast clubs, more teachers, dentists etc. To help pay for it all would it be a good idea if they remove the triple lock on state pensions and make pensioners pay NI?

Well the houses l bought in the 80’s and 90’s in very popular expensive areas haven’t made that kind of profit.

1980’s 35k to 450k
1990’s 40k to 250k

I never extrapolated my in-laws or parents example to everyone though I just said equity isn’t meaningless?

Extremely unusual
London hse prices since the 80s has grown on average £9000/yr or 666%
A property in Bedford sq bought for 60k in 1985 would be worth £950,000 now
In Kensington and Chelsea same time same price £650,000.

Ill look up Wandsworth now as this is fun (ps I lived there, no polltax 😊)

I’ve gone for Waterloo part of Lambeth as I don’t know the postcode and assumed the property is a terrace although for 60k in the 80s it could easily be a flat ( bought in London in the 80s on the far Northern line and could only afford a flat for that price )
Here’s the calc
Somehow your in-laws have made an extra £850,000 over the average for the area

Apologies
That’s for @Houseofdragonsisback

@Kandalama what data are you using as surely that only gives you averages for growth? Flats and houses will have seen different growths and inner London has seen different growth to outer London plus even in boroughs certain parts have grown more due to housing stock etc.

Some people haven’t made any equity though.

So it’s meaningless for them.

@Kandalama Im unsure what your point is? Are you accusing me of lying? Why would I? And have never once said that my examples were representative of everyone who bought in the 80s 😆

Some people haven’t made any equity though.

So it’s meaningless for them.

If you are talking about people with equity why would that include people without it?

Not in Waterloo or a terrace

It’s a valuation website we use for uplift called Acadata.
Plus Govn info gives London as averaging 666% since the 80s.( that’s very basic though)

Even if it was slightly out for your family
ie areas near the Millennium dome for example had a massive uplift at one time but not so much now. These things average out.
I also used a random postcode but if you look at the website you can see your in-laws property price increase without major work is very very unusual.
( Just tried a few more postcodes in the area and they are all coming out much the same 🤷‍♀️ )

Not at all.
Im an architect and work in this area.
Ive done a lot in The Bedford Estates property etc.
We, as part of our work, carry out calculations to work out future property prices ( well the QS does ) and I’ve never seen such a huge uplift. Except as I say around the dome which happened in just a few years.

So the point I’m making is the equity your family have made since the 80s in property is very unusual and can’t really be used as an example of pensioner wealth.

Absolutely this. Everyone on MN seems to think all pensioners all live in mortgage-free homes and have gold plated pensions. That’s far removed from reality.

iinterestingly no one can answer my question about how Labour is going to fund their spending pledges if not through Green investments as Andrew Neil has said after consulting the Labour manifesto?
Equally interestingly, you can't answer any of the many questions posed about your supposition, including elaborating on the actual proposal.
You can't expect a detailed analysis of a vague piece of hearsay from highly partisan commentator.

@Kandalama Ive just used that calculator on some roads I know personally in South London using actual sold prices and the calculator doesn’t reflect the actual prices paid & sold for?

I don't think I've seen any poster wanting the poorer pensioners to pay more tax. All the comments I've seen have related to pensioners with higher incomes (i.e. healthy private pensions) or who are capital wealthy.

When the statistics show that average pensioner incomes (before housing costs) are actually higher than younger demographics yet they pay less tax (average), then it's entirely right that we examine ways to tax the richer pensioners more!

So the point I’m making is the equity your family have made since the 80s in property is very unusual and can’t really be used as an example of pensioner wealth.

I never made this point though, I just said equity isn’t meaningless. I don’t think it is, I could buy a house outright if I needed with my equity in cheaper part of London, I’m grateful to have that option. We will have to agree to disagree though.

Why pick on the pensioners? Why base it one age? Rishi is paying about 25% on his income and he's far from a pensioner (although he will get a very fat pension paid for by us).

But also you don’t need to have paid 80k or 100k for a house and it now be over 1.5m to have equity.

interestingly no one can answer my question about how Labour is going to fund their spending pledges if not through Green investments as Andrew Neil has said after consulting the Labour manifesto?

Not that interestingly people have already pointed out that the Labour manifesto has a whole section specifically on their fiscal plan. Of all the manifestos I've read so far - it is the only one to do so in such a manner. The Tory manifesto (for eg) does not have any specific section dedicated to the financial numbers and leaves you to extrapolate them piecemeal from the 80 pages.

It a great deal easier to see Labour's financial workings than the Tory's, based on manifestos. Searching for the word 'funded' in the Tory plan gives 9 hits. 5/9 of those are in contexts unrelated to how they will fund a policy (e.g. when trying to say Labour's plans are unfunded). 4/9 hits give some details on planned funded for specific policies. 2 of those are repeats about HS2 and 1 is for a policy only partly funded (their words). So, 2.5 policies appear to have funding details. Even less success is had by searching for the word 'paid'.

There might be a valid debate about whose numbers are more reliable but it is incorrect to say Labour's funding plans are a black hole compared to others.

(I've picked the Tories but Reform is almost as bad - and the numbers they used are clearly way out even to a lay person).

https://labour.org.uk/change/labours-fiscal-plan/

https://public.conservatives.com/static/documents/GE2024/Conservative-Manifesto-GE2024.pdf

Reform wants to take the entire front line NHS workforce out of taxation entirely.

Wow, I thought Reform was pretty crazy, but that's the most utterly batshit idea I've ever heard from anyone!

I know. Small wonder they’re keeping so quiet about it. Classic fantasy economic policy because they know there’s no danger of ever having to implement it.

Labour have made it clear they intend to keep the triple lock, and paying NI is pointless when you’re retired - as it was created to pay for in work benefits.

They're not pensioners though are they?

How many hours do they work?