Pensioners have higher incomes than working age people
Pension age is the most comfortable place to be right now.
Pensioners now have higher average weekly incomes than working age people.
Research from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has found that pensioners on average earn £394 a week, compared to the £385 a week that the working age population takes home. It represents a significant shift since 1990, when pensioners were about 30% worse off than workers.
The IFS put this down to the generosity of work pensions, better support from the state and baby boomers paying off mortgages before retirement age.
Incredibly, the IFS reckons that around 40% of pensioner households earn more in retirement than they did on average during their working lives.
It can't continue
However, things will soon change. The IFS said that pensioner wealth will collapse again in a decade, leaving workers who are currently in their 20s, 30s and 40s worse off.
For starters, younger people are finding it incredibly difficult to get onto the housing ladder, which is why the IFS says there has been “an extraordinary fall in rates of home ownership". On top of that, future state pensions will be far less generous, while ‘final salary’ pension schemes have all but disappeared.
Paul Johnson, director of the IFS, said: “Younger generations are also likely bearing some of the cost of these generous occupational pension schemes from which they themselves will never benefit.”
The end of the pension 'triple lock'?
So what’s the answer? The IFS believes the Government will need to take action to ensure state and private pensions are more stable and sustainable, and that includes ending the pension ‘triple lock’.
Currently pensions are protected by the ‘triple lock’ policy where it rises every year based on whichever is highest of inflation, earnings growth or 2.5%. According to Johnson, at some point this policy will prove to be “prohibitively expensive”.
He added that the retirement age has to go up significantly to sustain the system.
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Matthew Wright of "The Wright Stuff" is usually fairly sensible in his comments on most things. However, a few days ago he said how "rich" most pensioners are and that they should be made to contribute more in taxes (due to the Tax Credit debate) or via some other means i.e. giving up their winter fuel allowance, free bus pass etc. Firstly many pensioners are not rich and those that are have got that way not through the 20 years of work he suggested but more like 50 years of work (and some of us are still working). In this way we are still paying taxes, national insurance contributions etc. I have no children so have never claimed child allowance or used other services that a parent would use (I am not criticising parents just making a point) but I help pay for schools, the nhs etc through my taxes. We have paid all our contributions towards our state pension over many years (a CONTRACT we have had with the Governments of the day). Although the state pension may be described as a "benefit" it is a contribution that we had no choice about making and therefore we went into a CONTRACT with the various governments. If they have abused this money paid to them it is the various governments fault and not that of the pensioner/contributor. If they take it away then it is THEFT. Sorry Matthew Wright but for once I disagree with you. If you feel so strongly about this however then perhaps you won't mind having an increase in the amount of tax you pay and I understand that many presenter have very high salaries - some even in their millions (e.g. Jonathan Ross). Rather attack those who are failing to pay taxes in Great Britain (e.g. large companies who earn millions but who pay little in taxes by having clever accountants and off-shore accounts). Stop attacking pensioners who have lived frugal lives because we had little when young and with regards to our properties (1) we have to live somewhere (2) it pays for our care homes when we need them. Very few pensioners manage to avoid these fees so their children/grandchildren do not see this money and even if they do the Government takes 40% in death duties. I can't wait to start "the good life" of the so-called rich pensioner.
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Matthew Wright of "The Wright Stuff" is usually fairly sensible in his comments on most things. However, a few days ago he said how "rich" most pensioners are and that they should be made to contribute more in taxes (due to the Tax Credit debate) or via some other means i.e. giving up their winter fuel allowance, free bus pass etc. Firstly many pensioners are not rich and those that are have got that way not through the 20 years of work he suggested but more like 50 years of work (and some of us are still working). In this way we are still paying taxes, national insurance contributions etc. I have no children so have never claimed child allowance or used other services that a parent would use (I am not criticising parents just making a point) but I help pay for schools, the nhs etc through my taxes. We have paid all our contributions towards our state pension over many years (a CONTRACT we have had with the Governments of the day). Although the state pension may be described as a "benefit" it is a contribution that we had no choice about making and therefore we went into a CONTRACT with the various governments. If they have abused this money paid to them it is the various governments fault and not that of the pensioner/contributor. If they take it away then it is THEFT. Sorry Matthew Wright but for once I disagree with you. If you feel so strongly about this however then perhaps you won't mind having an increase in the amount of tax you pay and I understand that many presenter have very high salaries - some even in their millions (e.g. Jonathan Ross). Rather attack those who are failing to pay taxes in Great Britain (e.g. large companies who earn millions but who pay little in taxes by having clever accountants and off-shore accounts). Stop attacking pensioners who have lived frugal lives because we had little when young and with regards to our properties (1) we have to live somewhere (2) it pays for our care homes when we need them. Very few pensioners manage to avoid these fees so their children/grandchildren do not see this money and even if they do the Government takes 40% in death duties. I can't wait to start "the good life" of the so-called rich pensioner.
REPORT This comment has been reported. -
Matthew Wright of "The Wright Stuff" is usually fairly sensible in his comments on most things. However, a few days ago he said how "rich" most pensioners are and that they should be made to contribute more in taxes (due to the Tax Credit debate) or via some other means i.e. giving up their winter fuel allowance, free bus pass etc. Firstly many pensioners are not rich and those that are have got that way not through the 20 years of work he suggested but more like 50 years of work (and some of us are still working). In this way we are still paying taxes, national insurance contributions etc. I have no children so have never claimed child allowance or used other services that a parent would use (I am not criticising parents just making a point) but I help pay for schools, the nhs etc through my taxes. We have paid all our contributions towards our state pension over many years (a CONTRACT we have had with the Governments of the day). Although the state pension may be described as a "benefit" it is a contribution that we had no choice about making and therefore we went into a CONTRACT with the various governments. If they have abused this money paid to them it is the various governments fault and not that of the pensioner/contributor. If they take it away then it is THEFT. Sorry Matthew Wright but for once I disagree with you. If you feel so strongly about this however then perhaps you won't mind having an increase in the amount of tax you pay and I understand that many presenter have very high salaries - some even in their millions (e.g. Jonathan Ross). Rather attack those who are failing to pay taxes in Great Britain (e.g. large companies who earn millions but who pay little in taxes by having clever accountants and off-shore accounts). Stop attacking pensioners who have lived frugal lives because we had little when young and with regards to our properties (1) we have to live somewhere (2) it pays for our care homes when we need them. Very few pensioners manage to avoid these fees so their children/grandchildren do not see this money and even if they do the Government takes 40% in death duties. I can't wait to start "the good life" of the so-called rich pensioner.
REPORT This comment has been reported.
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31 October 2015