Why do they pay for the pensions of the previous generation ? Surely they should pay for pensions for the people who contributed to them .

Because there is no huge pot of money. Just taxation.

Cos the previous generation didn’t pay enough and someone has to make up the shortfall.

I get even crosserer when they fill potholes on SOMEONE ELSE’s street with MY tax!

Cos the previous generation didn’t pay enough, continue to take too much, and someone has to make up the shortfall

Ftfy

Because the previous generation had to pay for the generation before that.

The previous generation paid for the nurses and teachers who delivered and educated you…

It is an unfunded scheme. Today’s contributions pay today’s pensions. Can you really imagine government having a pension fund invested? No way, everything is pay as you go

It depends on what ‘pension contributions’ you’re referring to. The State Pension is paid out of current tax/NI, but personal pensions only pay out what was paid in for you, and defined benefit schemes must (in the private sector) be ‘funded’ within limits.

Paying state benefits from income makes sense given the underlying assumption that there will always be taxpayers to fund it. If the state pension was building up a fund, it would need to be used somehow – like ‘investing’ in infrastructure, which wouldnt be much different to what happens, just accounted for differently.

http://www.investopedia.com/video/play/what-is-a-ponzi-scheme/

https://www.ft.com/content/914d9cba-7232-11e7-aca6-c6bd07df1a3c

It’s a Ponzi scheme

Polite answer: pyramid scheme
Realistic answer; a ponzi version

Be afraid, very afraid…

Public sector pensions = Government Ponzi scheme paid by everyone paying tax. Unless the Government finds the seeds to the magic money tree and plants its soon, the economic impact of having more retirees than we have taxpayers is going to be catastrophic. Made worse as many of those workers have skills where there are significant shortfalls, burdened by student loans and simply not enough people in education and discouraging EU immigration. Bizzarely, one solution would be large scale immigration of skilled workers from Asia – can see the Brexies liking that one!

Isnt the Norwegian pension fund one of biggest pots of money? So big they can use it to influence the direction of goverments and businesses.

Seems more sensible that our choice of spending money of ships and bombs and stuff which neither influences or funds our retirements.

Probably an over simplification of course.

The most important thing is to put away money you have today to pay for living in the future when you can’t/don’t work.

If you want to retire at 60, and you think you’ll live til you’re 90, and you start work when you’re 20, that’s earning for only ~58% of your life when you need to pay for yourself.

Given, you’ll have paid off your mortgage by then with some luck. But you need to be putting away at least 20% of all your earnings if you want a decent life when you can’t or don’t work, from the day you start work.

The longer you leave it, the more % of your earnings youll need to put away, as you’ll be getting a return on your investment, and that return accumulates year on year.

Do not rely on the state pension.

I firmly believe we will be guided into personal investments that the government subsidises, rather than a state pension (e.g. Lifetime ISA)

Savings, investments, pensions and government subsidies needs to be taught in schools.

The government has already started offloading their responsibilities onto employers in preparation for the money running out.

Unless the Government finds the seeds to the magic money tree

They already have – it’s called Government Borrowing

I’m 34, and have always just assumed that I’ll never see a penny of state pension. I’m paying into a private scheme but I expect that real retirement will be only be for the very wealthy by the time I reach 65(ish) so my pension will be to fund working fewer hours in my old age.

It’ll be OK, students starting university this year will probably paying off their student loans into their 50s, and might have saved-up enough of a deposit on a house by then so by extending the retirement age they’ll still have 15 years to pay for their retirement!

I think if you’re under 50 and think you’ll ever be ‘retiring’ in anything like the present meaning of the word, you probably need to give yourself a slap and a dose of reality.

Like unknown, I just assume I’ll never ‘retire’ . I’ve got a couple of private pensions that will probably be worth a packet of Werthers Originals a week as I piss away my last in abject poverty. Hey ho!

Our scheme is called “auto enrolment” it’s a brilliant system, we pay for our own pensions as the OP suggested.

Sadly we also pay high VAT, Duty NI and Tax to fund current retirees and maybe the next 10-15 years of new retirees.

we pay 4 times as much for a roof over our heads as the retirees to ensure their private pensions pay out and they can release money for cruises.

We pay more than they did for utilities, because they sold them.

We pay more for trains, because they sold them.

There’s a couple more of them…

The only people who lose in Ponzi schemes are the last investors – which might be us

The news just now is saying that the deficit for the British university ponzi pension scheme presently stands at 17 billion. I’ve no doubt that pretty much every other ponzi pension scheme is in similar shape

You’re not retiring. Ever!

Current forecasts for state pension affordability aren’t that bad, from 5% to 7% of national income.

https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/9238

To all of you moaning about so called ponzi pensions (and by the way, you repeatedly calling them that doesn’t make it true) you do realise that you come across as Generation Whinge don’t you? It isn’t all one way either. For example we chose not to have kids. However we have had to pay plenty of tax to educate other people’s kids, quite probably some of you. We don’t have the slightest problem with doing that as those kids then earn money and pay taxes that will ultimately pay our pensions. That’s just society in action, each generation paying something towards the upkeep of the other.

And something else. I was made redundant last year at the age of 52 (ironically from a company making tons of money from auto enrolment). I can’t get another job because all the companies want younger people ( you lot in other words) so that’s 14 years I will have to somehow finance myself until I get my state pension. However I’m not complaining about your generation hogging all the well paid jobs.

If you want a decent retirement then start planning now. We made lots of financial sacrifices, and paid into pension schemes of our own, in order that we would be comfortable in our later years. We also funded the generation that went before us. Nobody moaned or complained, they just got on with it.

Should just stop paying out pensions and paying into them too.

Nothing’s guaranteed, don’t expect the state to bail you out.

@ dovebiker

Unless the Government finds the seeds to the magic money tree and plants its soon, the economic impact of having more retirees than we have taxpayers is going to be catastrophic.

the government knwos where there is a forest of them. Thats how it can find £1bn to bribe the DUP and fund taxcuts for the wealthiest. The majority of magic money tree forests are in tax havens that are British Colonies that could be shut down overnight if the government chose to. It wont because the people and companies who use them are the ones that fund the Tory Party and provide the cushy jobs for ex ministers.

Generation Whinge eh?

Can’t say I agree with that but you do realise that people my age, or maybe a bit younger, will probably be the first generation to be worse off than their parents. We aren’t making money from property like the previous generation did for a start, goodness only knows what the state pension age will be if we ever reach it, and er… thanks for Brexit you old farts. I’d say that entitles folk to a wee bit of a whinge, no?

I think it would be better for everybody , apart from people who sell private pensions , if there was just a state pension and if you wanted to pay more into it you could and you would get more out come retirement . That way you would only be paying for one set of people to manage your investment , therefore you would ultimately get more out come the time . I’m sure that I read of a country that does that , might have been Norway or perhaps Denmark .

I think it would be better for everybody , apart from people who sell private pensions , if there was just a state pension and if you wanted to pay more into it you could and you would get more out come retirement . That way you would only be paying for one set of people to manage your investment , therefore you would ultimately get more out come the time . I’m sure that I read of a country that does that , might have been Norway or perhaps Denmark .

Except the state pension isn’t a fund you can pay into and isn’t invested. It just gets paid out of tax receipts like all other expenditure.

So could we not start now, better late than never etc.?

On the separate point of buying a pension, if I get to 65 with say 500k in the bank giving that to some spiv who promises to give me back 10k a year seems very bad value.

Better to pocket it even with a tax hit shirley.

You’d need a large input of money to get it off the ground. Maybe by investing the taxes from a natural resources windfall. Unfortunately Thatcher et al frittered ours away.

On the separate point of buying a pension, if I get to 65 with say 500k in the bank giving that to some spiv who promises to give me back 10k a year seems very bad value.

Do you mean annuities?

That looks like a shit annuity to me.

You also don’t need one. Pensions Freedom opened up Pensions Flexibility. You can take 25% of your entire pot tax free. So £125k you take yourself, invest it how you see fit, pay off your mortgage etc. and it’s all yours, not a penny goes as tax.

The rest, you can do whatever you like, leave it invested, convert to drawdown and take income, or buy some kind of secure income. Lots of different products are being offered now.

Remember though, whatever you take of that remaining 75% you will pay at the standard rate of income.

£500k is a pretty good target, if you’re on ~£60k a year, that would maintain your lifestyle.

£500k is a pretty good target, if you’re on ~£60k a year, that would maintain your lifestyle

How?

£500k is a pretty good target, if you’re on ~£60k a year, that would maintain your lifestyle.

That’s a pretty aggressive draw down rate, rule of thumb I normally see discussed is 4%, so for a 60k annual payout would be looking at a £1.5m pot

if you’re on ~£60k a year, that would maintain your lifestyle.

I think he means current gross income. Pension providers work on the basis that you need 60% of your current gross income retirement (adjusst for inflation, natch) to maintain your current lifestyle.

When you factor in lower overall tax bill, no saving toward pension, no mortgage etc, etc, then it sounds about right.

Whether a pension pot of £500k would generate income of £40k is another matter…

I think he means current gross income. Pension providers work on the basis that you need 60% of your current gross income retirement (adjusst for inflation, natch) to maintain your current lifestyle.

When you factor in lower overall tax bill, no saving toward pension, no mortgage etc, etc, then it sounds about right.

Whether a pension pot of £500k would generate income of £40k is another matter…

Spot on, cheers 🙂 Was too late to reply.

Yes, adjusted for having very little outgoings (including no new bikes, as you just spent part of that £125k on a custom built titanium hardtail).

That’s a pretty aggressive draw down rate, rule of thumb I normally see discussed is 4%, so for a 60k annual payout would be looking at a £1.5m pot

You won’t need £60k post retirement. You’ll have paid off your mortgage, won’t be paying into your pension, your investments will level out, kids will have grown up and left, student fees paid, hopefully new house for them deposit paid already, your income tax will be under the higher rate, you won’t be communiting everyday etc….

I’d reckon if you’re on £60k before tax, you could easily live on £30k post-retirement, with some of that £125k well invested in a mix of income funds.

That’s the point I’ve made on these threads before- 65 would be a good age for a male in my family 75 is unheard of, so getting as much money as possible at 65 with as little debt as possible seems like the best option for me.

Utility bills cover by £150 a week from UK plc and a Yorkshire BS book stuffed full of cash for beer and ale looks ok to me given its needs to last 10yrs max then send me off in style.

The whole annuity thing just looks like the last swiz tbh. I suppose its down to insurance actuary’s bets vs mine.

The state pension and indeed any final salary / career average is a Ponzi scheme.

We run ours like that as it makes it appear cheaper than it really is. Other countries use a system where you (and your employer) save for yourself.

@footflaps thise charts are meaningles s(based on total guesswork of future variables), how about if inflation is 10% and the economy shrinks ? How about Greece ?

Pension pots only generate what the market will pay, today £500k will give you about £17k pa but it depends on a lot of things not least flat payment or rising with inflation.

Yup annuities are imo a total rip off.

I don’t think that £500k is going to generate an annual income of £30K. That’s a withdrawal rate of of 6% which is highly likely to leave you broke before you die.

I reckon you could safely get 20K pa which I think will be a big hit for someone who was on 60K. Don’t get me wrong, it’s decent amount to live on but it’s nowhere near 60K is it?

Corbyn’s pension is estimate to be worth the equivalent of about £1.5m which is what you would need to buy a £50k pa pension which is roughly what he has.