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As for working harder/work ethic – different people have different interpretations of ‘working hard’.
How about (always) striving to do their best.
This in no way guarantees being paid well. I know plenty of people, myself included, who have done/do this in jobs that pay very little.
Nonsense isn't it.The subpostmasters were striving to do there best.I wonder how that worked out.
It keeps me going at work that I will step down to a less stressful role at some point. No way I could do this into late 50’s early 60’s, my head would explode.
I push as much into pensions as possible for this reason. However, it does make me nervous the government can tell me when I can access it. I am starting to consider more into ISA. Yes, I’m fortunate to be able to have this choice but as mentioned previously, planning for the last 20 years has allowed me to do this.
But we don’t vote anyway in substantial numbers so it’s even less of a vote loser.
At 31 your age cohort is circa 50% voting, but do note that age 34 and below are the only cohorts increasing their voting turnout - so I think the message is getting across.
Based on the current state of folk, and even in my older generation (late 50's) the lack of private pension provision by far too many folk (too many lattes? 🙂 ) I think people need to ignore the State Pension Age and accept a very high percentage will be on other benefits already. The cost will still be there, just in a different line on the budget.
How many folk reading this will be reliant on whatever benefits they can get, whether it's the State Pension (because it is a benefit) or another rather than their private pensions, savings and/or assets?
One in six over-55s have no pension savings yet (unbiased.co.uk)
I've got an idea. We swap state pensioners for young Rwandans. The pensioners costs less in Rwanda because exchange rate and the young rwandans are economically productive in the UK.
I’ve got an idea. We swap state pensioners for young Rwandans. The pensioners costs less in Rwanda because exchange rate and the young rwandans are economically productive in the UK.
Could you imagine? New rule to be brought in; if you’re economically inactive for 5 years and over 25 years old? On the aeroplane to Rwanda with you. 😀
It keeps me going at work that I will step down to a less stressful role at some point. No way I could do this into late 50’s early 60’s, my head would explode.<br /><br />
Welcome to my world, and I would have said the same except… Having recently been demoted from Sales Director to salesperson (same salary), I’m mixed with thoughts of being let down by my company, yet less responsibility and more commissions potential which can go straight into the savings pot (plus a decent pension match). But of course it’s not proving to be less stressful, so the inclination now is to maintain this as long as possible (now age 52) to fund retirement. I suspect I’ve reached the pinnacle of my career so need to maximise it as much as possible until I “break” and need to step down in salary to lower the day to day stress to maintain my health. <br /><br />
This will be the thoughts of many “how can I keep this going for as long as possible” knowing they will not be supported by the state in this formative years. In my simple head this will lead to burnout, mental and physical health issues beyond which we have today vs a continual decline in the NHS. <br /><br />
To me this is a continual “**** you” from this government. Reducing post employment care across all factions and increasing taxation and cost of living continues to squeeze the life out of the hardworking taxpayer. This country has really become a soulless gray, unenjoyable piece of land about as far from the aspiration the verses of Jerusalem would hint as you can get.
I think it’s simply middle aged ennui, and it’s been happening since employment began. Count yourself lucky, some people get a job upon leaving education and are still doing the same thing decades later whether they like it or not.
My point was that as much as most would love to ramp down in their 50’s the reality is that in the majority we are under pressure to continue working until we can’t to fund a mediocre outcome at best, and not the dream we all hoped for.
Im aware that this has always been the case, but we strive for improvement dont we? And as much as I’m doing better than my parents and I hope my kids will fare better then us, the changing goalposts mean we all continue to change an elusive dream.
Maybe we should all just give up any hope of a bright future in a sudden blaze of realism and trudge along the dreary grey and unpleasant lands in quiet acceptance.
The issue is one of inherretance. If wealth inherretance were capped - not taxed, CAPPED and all additional inherretance went to the state instead of to individuals, the wealth gap would not continually increase, there'd be more money for public finances, infrastructure and research and the coutry as a whole might start to grow rather than just displacing wealth to the few.
Yep, inheritance just ensures inequality is maintained through the generations.
As per a few above, I'm in a sedentary job and there is no way I'm making 71.
I'm 43 currently and if I can make it through another 5 years of it I'll consider that a win. Work is ridiculously stressful, has all sorts of negative impacts across other areas of my life, interferes with my rheumatoid arthritis, and I'm right now in a hospital bed I've been in for the last 12 nights where I've just burnt myself out and ended up fairly ill. I view it like climbing Everest, and for the last few years I've gone above 8000 ft and into the death zone, I can cling on for a while while slowly deteriorating but not indefinitely. Hopefully I can squirrel away enough money while I'm here to allow me to do something else after 45.
The other option as someone said above would be disability. My brother has the same or a very very similar RA condition to the one I have, and while my aim has always been to make the treatments work and to struggle through and get back to work he has taken a slightly different route and gets paid a fair 'wage' as disability allowance now which if I threw in a tactical downsize could probably sustain me.
The only thing that could possibly keep me going longer would be the opportunity to help my kids with a leg up so they have any sort of chance to make a life for themselves.
The issue is one of inherretance. If wealth inherretance were capped – not taxed, CAPPED and all additional inherretance went to the state instead of to individuals, the wealth gap would not continually increase, there’d be more money for public finances, infrastructure and research and the country as a whole might start to grow rather than just displacing wealth to the few.
Great idea but in practice quite hard to achieve, there are just so many ways that money & privilege can flow down the generations it would be near impossible to stem it, although I agree with the sentiment.
Dare to mention the problems of inherited wealth and people with barely a pot to piss in will froth at the mouth about how their children deserve to get their china teacup.
Dare to mention the problems of inherited wealth and people with barely a pot to piss in will froth at the mouth about how their children deserve to get their china teacup.
With good reason though, all the Tabloids stir it up as a moral outrage just to ensure the millionaire paper owners don't have to pay too much when they pop their clogs...
I’m 31, pretty much everyone my age and 5 years up expects to get no state pension anyway. I don’t even think it would be a political suicide by this point most of us have mentally checked out of expecting that.
But we don’t vote anyway in substantial numbers so it’s even less of a vote loser.
Your generation might start voting more if there was a political difference on attitudes to this!! The smart political move would be (for at least those who have not started earning) to give them the option to not get state pension at whatever age, in return for some advantage - like better private pension arrangements now (most early career people will only be getting 20% tax relief compared to 40% for high earners!). BUT the whole point of a state pension is to ensure everyone has the bare minimum to survive, giving people an option to gamble that may not be wise.
I’m 50. I’ve thought for a while now that I’m unlikely to be retiring at 68, because the numbers just don’t add up.
I've you good news for you - if you are 50 you are due to retire a 67 not 68!
I think that any form of retirement if you’re still able to do productive work is likely to have to be entirely self funded.
I've got better news for you - if I've interpreted your other posts correctly and you are a Dr - you will have a far better pension arrangement than most and be able to retire whenever you want - of course whether that buys the lifestyle you want is a different question but no Dr can honestly say they have to keep working to 67 because they would be destitute otherwise.
Case in point… me. I’ve put between 20 and 35% of my wage into a pension for 30+ years – rather than spaffed it away on booze / fags / prostitutes. On the basis of a defined retirement age. It’s called PLANNING. Pity the morons running the country can’t plan too. Because ever since I was born, it was predictable when I’d reach 65.
You'll still be able to retire at 65 (or earlier). You won't be quite as well off for the first X years because you won't get state pension, but I wish people would stop describing it as retirement age - there would probably be much more interest in retirement planning / pension provision if people realised its about being able to pick when you retire. If they try to stop me accessing my pension at the age I was entitled to when I paid into it - that might see me get emotional. I am unhappy that they've slipped the age my NI contributions come to fruition - but 2 years at 9k pa is not a massive sum for me to invest to cover over what a 30 year period?
Plenty of people here will have done nicely on the property market and inheritance by the time retirement comes - don't suppose many of them will be keen for more sensible taxation of those either! Boomers seem to have done particularly well on those (and a lot of other things), it may well be that the only way people can afford to comfortably retire is for their parents to die off.
Brevity would be helpful ^^^
TL:DR
Anyway you can retire any age you wish if you have been financially astute. 52 for me.
Replace "astute" with "lucky".
It might have been a lucky bet, a lucky lottery win or more likely buying a house at the right time/place, an inheritance, going to the 'right' school that got you your first job etc etc.
Or maybe just not having kids - and that can be 'luck' too.
But the short of it is that parents affect how successful their children will be. Even if it’s not directly financial, even a stable home is a luxury that a very significant number of people will not have. Some educational opportunities are just not available to others.
This.
The kids knowing that there's always a 'safety net' or even just a warm meal & bed helps someone take 'risks' - our 3 had this (and still do even now with having families of their own), just like I and my OH had with our families.
TDLR?
You'd better earn / win / save / grow enough money to support yourself from your chosen retirement age becuase government help is getting further a further away, despite your NI contributions. And while you are doing that, Gov.uk will continually take more tax from said savings to try to not make that date get any further than it already is*
<br /><br />*whilst as in the current case, potentially splurging it to and not limited to friends of the party, badly managed government procurement, or fancy wallpaper.
This problem isn't exclusive to the UK.
Retirement age increased a while back in Germany and there was talk a while back about doing it again.
But, imo, retirement age isn't the main issue here. It's the current distribution of wealth.
A lack of hope amongst younger people, millennials like myself included (41) is also killing people's futures.
Despite having a bit of money behind me thanks to some good advice and some lucky investments (Fundsmith being one of them) the GF and I couldn't afford to buy a place in our around Munich. A pokey 2 room (not bed! Room!) flat costs around 500k and up.
Amongst my acquaintances only one of them has managed to get on the property ladder without the help of the bank of mum and dad, and he's earning over 280k a year (which in itself is sick).
There is so much property tied up with too few people. Elderly knocking about in properties that are way too big for their needs whilst their kids who are currently renting and paying more in rent than they would a mortgage are putting off having a family as they couldn't afford to house them.
Anyway you can retire any age you wish if you have been financially astute. 52 for me.
If everyone was 'financially astute' there would be no nurses, no care workers to look after your mum, no school dinner ladies and TAs to look after your kids, no delivery drivers to bring you your latest CRC purchase, and no cafe staff to supply you a post-ride cake and coffee.
All these roles (and more) are essential to society, and they should have as much opportunity to have a reasonable retirement as everyone else.
Location also matters. Graduates in the same company earn the same salary in the north west as in the south west, but housing is almost 3x the price.
Logically that all makes sense, but why then are employees not drifting north as quickly as possible? and their employers chasing them North too (where business premises etc are also cheaper).
A person with uni debt will be £800/m worse off in the SW than in the NW.
Can you explain your uni debt being £800/m worse of depending on region?
Because the (potential) employees can't find the jobs up there, and the (potential) employers can't find the workforce up there, and the businesses in the SE are also serving each others' needs. Both the businesses and the workers need to be situated where the opportunities exist. It's a chicken and egg situation, remote working should help to some extent but probably not enough to solve all the problems.
If everyone was ‘financially astute’ there would be no nurses, no care workers to look after your mum, no school dinner ladies and TAs to look after your kids, no delivery drivers to bring you your latest CRC purchase, and no cafe staff to supply you a post-ride cake and coffee.
Exactly, same tory BS along the lines of if everyone tried harder they can all be rich.
Retirement is a maths thing though as others have said. If you have more people living more years past retirement and claiming benefits then something is going to break. To fix that you need to lower the length of time they are in retirement or take more money from the workforce to pay their benefits.
Guessing if it were put to a referendum the workforce would kick the can down the road and say increase retirement age.
If they try to stop me accessing my pension at the age I was entitled to when I paid into it – that might see me get emotional. I am unhappy that they’ve slipped the age my NI contributions come to fruition – but 2 years at 9k pa is not a massive sum for me to invest to cover over what a 30 year period?
@poly but that is exactly what will happen.
Most (non state) pensions you can access up to 10 years before state pension age - at, in my case, about a ~50% reduction in annual payments if I take it the full 10 years early.
So you might be paying into your pension assuming you can access it as early as age 55-58 (depending on your age now), but that will increase if the state pension age increases in the meantime.
I was kind of hoping I might be able to access my local authority pension early at 55 next year if I needed to, despite the cut in monthly payment.
Is it the situation that it is now actually 57?
It's 57 from 2028, you'll be okay next year.
Ta Andy, gives me some leeway then. Obviously leaving it later is more beneficial, but needs might need it.
finbar - there's absolutely no need to rigidly fix the early retirement age (the age at which you can draw down private pension) 10 yrs before full retirement (the age at which you qualify for state pension). Depending on the problem they are trying to solve, and who they wish to placate they can set the rules accordingly. What I'm saying is IF they decide to change my "early retirement age" they may find me in the streets... If they give me sensible notice that my "full retirement" age is slipping again then I'll be more tolerant of that.
Logically that all makes sense, but why then are employees not drifting north as quickly as possible? and their employers chasing them North too (where business premises etc are also cheaper).
Because the same companies do different things in diffeent regions.
Can you explain your uni debt being £800/m worse of depending on region?
It was a somethingion of the housing delta (£600) and the student debt repayment (£200). In essence, housing and student debt in the SW (bristol) will likely cost you £1200 if living alone in a 2 bed place and £600 in the NW. Without the debt, you'd be closer to £450 in the NW.
Just a somethingion of cirumstances affecting peoples ability to save/plan for the future. My SiL has just bought a 2 bed house in the NW for £106k. A comparable sized house in a worse area on the outskirts of Bristol is £300-£350k.
Graduate engineer starting salaries have increased £8k or 30% in 13 years. House prices have almost doubled in the last 10. Pensions have gone from fainal salary schemes (4% buy in with 2% of that to AVCs) in 2012, to employer matched upto 10% in 2023. Fuel, energy and food have doubled in 10 years, but salaries have only increased by 35% average.
Do people REALLY not understand why some young people find it so hard? Is it REALLY because they bought a new iphone? Or a nice car? When you were young, with your first pay cheques, did you save it all?
And while you are doing that, Gov.uk will continually take more tax from said savings to try to not make that date get any further than it already is*
the vast majority of savings should be pretty easy to wrapper away from tax (£80k per year for ISA + pension combined) - I don't think you'll get a lot of sympathy if you're trying to save more than that (although you can, tax free, with things like EIS, plus there's premium bonds etc)
finbar – there’s absolutely no need to rigidly fix the early retirement age (the age at which you can draw down private pension) 10 yrs before full retirement (the age at which you qualify for state pension).
the law stops you accessing your pension pot prior to that. the age bumped up by a couple of years (from 55 to 57 iirc) pretty recently, LISA is already age 60
if you want to retire early, its best to have some of your funds in a place where you can access them regardless of age (ie standard ISA)
@Daffy - a significant portion of my first few years pay went to my folks as board & lodgings 😀
Phone / flash car / Netflix / carry outs etc are all up there as "important" purchases for younger folk and I can see why some folk have a go at them for wasting money on "trivia" instead of saving. However, their lot is, in general, pretty poor as regards housing availability, cost of living, energy/petrol prices and looking like they'll be working into their 70s. Add to that, there's a generation now growing up with the impact of Covid too. Faced with all of that, things looks pretty hopeless and financial security so far out of reach that I can't blame them for adopting a more carpe diem attitude.
Do people REALLY not understand why some young people find it so hard? Is it REALLY because they bought a new iphone? Or a nice car? When you were young, with your first pay cheques, did you save it all?
I remember my first few years, seemed to have no money after paying rent and car HP. I would look at more expensive cars / houses and wonder how on earth anyone could afford them. Then, eventually, after many pay rises and years later, suddenly that was me.
However, I had a career where each year you progressed and got paid more, which is far from the norm.
I will however admit, that many around me don't seem to have the same Scottish attitide to money that I have. I WILL NOT buy a coffee a day (£4* 5 days a week) from the shop! £1000 a year on okayish coffee? Are you f*rking kidding me?
That would pay for ALL of my internet, TV, Phone, car uinsurance and tax - OR...coffee...I mean, WTF?
A Pret subscription is only £30/month, so £360 a year.
Not that I drink coffee myself, never really liked it. Now Earl Grey Tea on the other hand, spend a small fortune on that in Tea Bags alone...
Phone / flash car / Netflix / carry outs etc are all up there as “important” purchases for younger folk and I can see why some folk have a go at them for wasting money on “trivia” instead of saving.
Even then I think it's overstated though! The proportion of under 30's with a driving license has gone down substantially since the 1990s. (not surprising when the average insurance for young people is nearly £2k!). So yeah, some people do have fancier cars than they used to. But nowhere near as much as the Mail would like!
I don't think there's actually a lot of evidence to suggest that regular young people are living particularly extravagantly compared to their predecessors.
Indeed, it was just spent on different things.
Radio Rentals vs Credit Cards,
fish and chips vs dominos or coffee
blockbuster vs Netflix
Kays/Littlewoods vs Apple/EE
Med holidays vs, well, Med holidays.
Car Personal loan vs PCP.
The difference is that in the past those things were maybe more affordable when considering housing/energy/food, thus still allowing for savings, etc. That’s now being squeezed so the 30/30/30 rule can’t apply.
Do people REALLY not understand why some young people find it so hard? Is it REALLY because they bought a new iphone? Or a nice car? When you were young, with your first pay cheques, did you save it all?
I did not save one penny. I bought cars, beer and fags and went on holiday a fair bit. I then bought my first house for £50k back in 1992 (3x salary) with a minimal deposit. And for pensions my first job for 7 years between 18 and 25 had a company pension where I am now going to get £6K per year until I die. Small amount compared to my 'actual' pension but funny to think that was from a job as an 18 year old.
So yes, we had it easy back then and very much lucked out but not much I can do about that.
I didn't save all my money when I was a working teen. But I already started the first of my pension plans . Traded shares on the stock market, was lucky enough to stag a few good ones and was lucky enough to make thousands.
Saving for a house must seem absolutely crazy for the 18 - 30 generation as prices are so high they will never be able to buy anything.
Maybe the government should actually lower IHTax to zero. Then band it at say 20 , 40 and 60%.
Yes you can leave your family a house but the government will take 20% . Leave them an estate worth north of say 2mill , and the government are having 60% of it.
Both my grandads worked in factories every day of thier working lives, retired at 65 and were dead by 75.
An 18 year old male now, assuming uk society doesn't crumble too badly, will make it to 90.
Both my nans hit the ton, so your looking at at least that for a female.
Both my parents died of natural causes when they were ~65.
I'm 60, and I'm still working. What a f++king mug am I.....
As for AI replacing people, so far it’s magical thinking IMO.
Wouldn't AI be perfect to do jobs that are not physically demanding, like pointing folk to the right aisle at B&Q. In other words precisely the jobs old folk are supposed to do?
Can you elect to stop paying NI?
In my family, the men don't make it into their 70's. Might as well divert the payment to the STW default - C&H's