The Elderly. Try and put yourself into their shoes.

[ivanhoe]

You have paid into the system all your working life, and for a lot less money than today, and all the Government can pay you back is a £97 a week State pension.

Try and put yourself in their shoes.

How would you "feel" about this ?

Now forget the age you are, put yourself in the position of an elderly person knowing you have worked hard all your lives payng into the system.

How do you "feel" ?

Resentful, resigned, angry? Some combination of these.

But I trust I'd also remember everything else my NICs and tax had paid for: healthcare, education, perhaps Child Benefit and Income Support.

And I would worry about my children and grandchildren who were also paying into "the system" in just the way I did but with even fewer guarantees of what they'd eventually get at the end.

Exactly.

Next question, what are "we" going to do about not only changing the fortunes of our elderly people, but also changing the fortunes of tommorrow's elderly people ?

Goodness only knows. Reassess spending priorities, I suppose. Illegal wars that also did not have a popular mandate would seem to be a good place to start - although, in many ways, that is the easy (and certainly incomplete) answer.

A few facts for you that have responded so far, and in no particular order.

Means testing pensioners is costing £15 per person per pensioner.

Restoring the State pension link with national average wages would cost £5 per person per pensioner.

Conclusion ?. Means testing pensioners on a miserly £97 a week is costing more tax payers money than the restoration of the earnings link would cost.

Conclusion ?. The media and the politicians are keeping us in the dark.

The reason ?. Because right wing politics since Thatcher, ensures the demise of what the State provides, including a "State pension".

Fact. The Tory lead coalition are sitting on a National Insurance "surplus" of £40 billion, but the coalition are using this money for other things.

So, including foreign wars, upholding third worl countries, funding into the EU of £50 million a day, Britain is a very wealthy country.

Our big problem in this country has always been that we are not consolidated as a nation, we are infact very easily devided, and we are class entrenched.

Thank you for this Ivanhoe it has really made me think.
I was very angry about the Iraq war and I find it so hard to let go . So many wasted lives so much wasted money.
I am split between the greens and labour can I ask who you voted for ? I want to join one or the other officially can anyone persuade me either way ?

I think you're generalising. Many people of pension age have worked and contributed their whole lives and have not expected the pension to end up being their sole source of income in later life. Many have wisely put aside savings, made investments and other provisions. The ones that have been unable or unwilling to make extra provision are in the minority and, yes, many of them are poor as a result. Pension credits are there as a top up.

In a society where the number of people over 60 is expected to keep rising as a proportion of the total population the task has been for every government for at least the last 30 years to encourage as many of us as possible to make better plans for our retirement. Stake-holder pensions, tax-relief on contributions and so forth. It makes more sense to top up the income of poor pensioners than to pay retired company directors extra money as standard.

Chil1234, You can think what you like, you are parroting the medfia and the politicians.

There is more than enough money in the general sense, to pay our elderly people are decent State pension.

Thee are 12 million penbsioners in Britain, right wing Government's since the 80's have been usinbg just 5 per cent of our GNP to fund State pensions, that figure could be easilky doubled or trebled for our elderly people.

You see, we do not have a wealth problem in Britain, what we have is a waelth distribution problem.

And this problem is also going to effect our young people when they are old, ie our young people are still paying NI conhtrbitions, but what for ?

Because the coalition are reducing the role of what the State should provide, in favour of privatisation, and private pensions are too expensive and ultimately insecure.

Wheras the State is secure, but we are allk being brainwashed to demonise the State.

Thank you, yes, I can think what I like but I'm parroting no-one. There may be enough money in the coffers to give every single person of pension age £400 a week but you haven't really explained why that is a good idea beyond redistribution of wealth.

My parents paid NI contributions, worked all their lives and are now in their seventies and retired. They were manual/clerical workers, not company directors, and grew up with a strong savings & thrift ethic. They did not qualify for company pensions. However, they did not rely on the state pension, planned accordingly and are enjoying a comfortable retirement. A work-colleague of my mother's decided to 'spend the lot & let the government look after me' (I quote) and now lives on the state pension with credit top-ups, also reasonably comfortably.

Private pensions may be insecure but they are only one way of many to finance old age.

The first thing I'd be pised off about is being referred to as "the elderly". Older people.

Even if I did explain it, I dont think you could understand it, so I wont bother.

Footgloves

Go on Ivanhoe... have a go :) If you can explain why my good friend Mike, a retired director of an engineering firm with a five bed detached house in Surrey, motor-launch, Mercedes and fat company pension could do with having his state pension trebled, I'm all ears.

There won't even be a state pension for my generation. Considering those people drawing their pensions now have been lucky enough to skim the cream from the 20th Century, and are also almost one of the only groups still receiving universal benefits, I think YABU.

(and a bit preachy)

I find it utterly amazing that a nation which can afford to spend money round the word like a bottomless pit, and in the name of so-called "GREAT BRITAIN", can have people living in this country who when it comes to the civilised and fair livelyhoods of millions of impoverished elderly / older people, suddenly these people come out and bring every trick in the book to try and convince others to the contrary.

Self interest is what this is called, narrow minded self interest.

Since the 80's the basic State pension has increased with the lower inflation rate rather than British prosperity through an earnings link.

Since the 80's the basic State pension has been reducing in value, with means tested handouts as the only rescourse for millions of pensioners who through the years could not save for their old age, they relied on their NI contributions to secure them a decent retirement.

I cannot understand why anybody would argue with what im saying ?

////There won't even be a state pension for my generation/////

No, there wont.

///////Go on Ivanhoe... have a go If you can explain why my good friend Mike, a retired director of an engineering firm with a five bed detached house in Surrey, motor-launch, Mercedes and fat company pension could do with having his state pension trebled, I'm all ears.///////

Because your friend has also paid for the State pension via his working life of N.I. contributions.

It is his "right" to receive a decent State pension.

Cant you even understand that ???????????

Can we argue the point about 'millions' of improverished elderly people? I'm not having a go for the sake of it, but are there any statistics to back up how many people of retirement age are actually impoverished? Is it really 'millions'? I realise that there is a perennial problem with some older people not claiming benefits to which they are entitled & some who even see the pension itself as 'charity' and refuse to accept it, but is that a question of the amount of money available or is it more a question of culture & education?

And did anyone retiring today who would have been in their late thirties/early forties when pensions started to be reformed and the link with average earnings/inflation was changed.... did they genuinely 'rely on their NI contributions' to give them a decent retirement?

@Ivanhoe... Yes I do understand the point you're making that all old people, regardless of their circumstances should get a much higher state pension. You're arguing for a substantially increased universal benefit that doesn't take need into account because everyone has paid in. I understand it, I just don't happen to agree that it's fair

Why dont you think it's fair ?, incidently may I know your age ?

////////Can we argue the point about 'millions' of improverished elderly people? I'm not having a go for the sake of it, but are there any statistics to back up how many people of retirement age are actually impoverished? Is it really 'millions'? I realise that there is a perennial problem with some older people not claiming benefits to which they are entitled & some who even see the pension itself as 'charity' and refuse to accept it, but is that a question of the amount of money available or is it more a question of culture & education?

And did anyone retiring today who would have been in their late thirties/early forties when pensions started to be reformed and the link with average earnings/inflation was changed.... did they genuinely 'rely on their NI contributions' to give them a decent retirement?////////////

With all of your retorich, you are not splitting hairs as they say.

We British either have a decent State pension on reaching retirement, or we dont.

I believe as a person not yet of pensionable age myself, that we should have a decent State pension on reaching retirement age.

What is so wrong with this ?

So if you agree that there will be no state pension for my generation, then how can it possibly be "fair" for us to be paying in and in and in and in and ultimately never getting anything back?

I pay into a private pension, I can ill-afford to do so, but I do it anyway.

I'm mid-forties. (And it's not 'rhetoric', it's an attempt at debate btw) I think it's fair that all people over a certain age who have contributed via NI are entitled to a basic income of some kind on retirement. Prior to the state pension, once people stopped working, they were reliant on savings or charity... so a fixed state pension was a massive improvement. But I think we departed from the idea of a state pension being a comfortable wage (definition of 'decent' depends on your lifestyle) in the 'cradle to grave' model a long time ago. For the last 30+ years we've been encouraged to save.

Your ideas are not wrong but they are idealistic. I think you'd also find that with the demographic/life-expectancy changes a 3x increase in the pension would cost a lot more than 5% of GDP and the retirement age would have to go up to about 75.

///////So if you agree that there will be no state pension for my generation, then how can it possibly be "fair" for us to be paying in and in and in and in and ultimately never getting anything back?

I pay into a private pension, I can ill-afford to do so, but I do it anyway.////////

An excellent question. And your private pension contributions could so eaily dissapear the markets the way they are, they go up, and they go down.

Basically all "younger" people are indeed paying into a system that when pay out time comes, what comes forth wont be worth a light.

Which is why I have been saying for years, that the younge generations should stand and be counted with the older generations for a decent State pension on retirement.

Since the 80's, both the State and the State pension have been demonised by right wing politicians.

The only way this demonisation will change, is by the British standing and being counted against it.

But we British being largely what we are, ie politically docile, this just isnt going to happen.

And so, with the demise of the State and the State pension, the younger people of Britain, are heading for the same impoverishment in their old age as millions of their grandparents today.

So, we either stand together, or we perish apart.

/////Your ideas are not wrong but they are idealistic. I think you'd also find that with the demographic/life-expectancy changes a 3x increase in the pension would cost a lot more than 5% of GDP and the retirement age would have to go up to about 75.////

So, wat is wrong with idealism ????, based on the fact that millions of younbger people today are facing the same impoverishment in their old age, just like their parents and grandparents today

//////I think you'd also find that with the demographic/life-expectancy changes a 3x increase in the pension would cost a lot more than 5% of GDP and the retirement age would have to go up to about 75.//////

Im repeating my initial postng for you to read,-

The beaurocracy behind Means testing pensioners is costing £15 per person per pensioner.

Restoring the State pension link with national average wages would cost £5 per person per pensioner.

Conclusion ?. Means testing pensioners on a miserly £97 a week is costing more tax payers money than the restoration of the earnings link would cost.

Conclusion ?. The media and the politicians are keeping us in the dark.

The reason ?. Because right wing politics since Thatcher, ensures the demise of what the State provides, including a "State pension".

Fact. The Tory lead coalition are sitting on a National Insurance "surplus" of "£40 billion" but the coalition are using this money for other things, other than what the NI fund is meant for.

So, including foreign wars, upholding third world countries, funding into the EU of £50 million a day, Britain is a very wealthy country.