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Feb 2022
1:06pm, 4 Feb 2022
16,552 posts
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rf_fozzy
Why should it collapse?
I put my argument out the other day:
Workers work to pay tax which goes into the UK govt pot (forget NI/Income tax - nothing is "ringfenced" - it's one big pot).
The govt then splits the pot to pay for stuff, including pensions.
As the demographics of the UK get older (UK birth rate is still falling rapidly), there will be fewer people of working age in work and more pensioners. Thus pensions are going to get more and more and more and more and more and ever more expensive.
Plus all the major parties are committed to at triple lock on pensions which of course makes the pensions even more expensive year on year.
So your tax base decreases and your outgoings keep going up.
So either taxes go up, there are cuts elsewhere or pensions collapse.
This issue has been accelerated because we were artificially supported the system by importing workers through migration. Brexit has stopped that.
Yes the govt can 'borrow' money to support that, but not idefinitely and not without total consequence. So, yes, the household finances model is indeed flawed, but that doesn't mean that the govt can always just borrow money without any consequence.
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Feb 2022
1:07pm, 4 Feb 2022
15,727 posts
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Cerrertonia
Fozzy isnt right wing and he is the one suggesting the pensions will collape.
It's usually the likes of the IEA who are pumping out propaganda about the state pension and how the government can't afford it and so on.
There is a very real issue in Europe and Japan around demographics and the number of working age people relative to the number of retirees and so on, but that's very different from saying that pensions are a ponzi scheme and will collapse.
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Feb 2022
1:08pm, 4 Feb 2022
16,553 posts
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rf_fozzy
"historic contributions made by people paying into the UK pensions pot, pre-independence"
That's not how state pensions work.
There is no ringfenced pot.
Tax today pays for pensions today.
This idea of a "piggy bank" that somehow everyone has been paying into is nonsense.
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Feb 2022
1:09pm, 4 Feb 2022
16,554 posts
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rf_fozzy
"pensions are a ponzi scheme"
Look up the definition of ponzi scheme. It may not be advertanly one, but the state pension clearly is a form of pyramid scheme.
It relies on a bigger working base to pay for a smaller retire pool. -> pyramid scheme.
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Feb 2022
1:13pm, 4 Feb 2022
9,409 posts
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simbil
Surely it doesn't matter that there is no pot, what matters is that the UK government currently honours pensions regardless of citizenship or residency.
So that gives the SNP a reasonable precedent to argue that the UK would carry on doing so.
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Feb 2022
1:14pm, 4 Feb 2022
2,869 posts
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JRitchie
I can have previously worked in Scotland and England and my accruing pension entitlement has been easy. When I worked in Aus for a couple of years it messed this up. I have to make additional UK contributions and goodness knows what's happened to the Super contributions I made in Aus.
The bigger issue for me is that post an independent Scotland this will be barrier/cost/challenge to our current existing freedom to easily take up work elsewhere - Yes it's like the EU freedom of movement was but its more fundamental as the EU doesn't operate a single state based NI system.
Its one other small example why Independence would be such a shit show. Think Brexit problems x10. The Guardian would have to produce a daily supplement of news articles that even this thread would truly have difficulty keeping up with sharing.
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Feb 2022
1:14pm, 4 Feb 2022
2,683 posts
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HappyTimes
Similar to majority of individuals that work for an employer then fozzy?
In that most are at bottom or lower levels of their particular company pyramid.
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Feb 2022
1:18pm, 4 Feb 2022
842 posts
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fuzzyduck79
This energy rebate/loan is madness. If you don't own a house when they hand out the £200 reduction you still end up on the hook for an additional £200 over the next five years:
Martin Lewis @MartinSLewis 13m
Just to clarify in practice the £200 bill-credit 'loan' on all home elec bills in Oct.
- every bill will reduce by £200
- every bill after Apr 23 increases by £40/yr for 5yrs regardless of if you got the £200 or not.
Its a 1yr bill reduction followed by a 5yr compulsory levy.
To all those asking "what about if you're fixed?", "what about prepay" or "can you opt out?"
My use of the word EVERY is not accidental. This is not optional. It applies automatically with no opt out to EVERY residential elec household in eng, scot, wales.
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Feb 2022
1:20pm, 4 Feb 2022
16,556 posts
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rf_fozzy
HT -no.
"So that gives the SNP a reasonable precedent to argue that the UK would carry on doing so."
Not necessarily. It would have to be negotiated.
My position if I were a negotiator for the UK would be to start from the point of saying if Scotland wants to go independent and sort all its stuff out, then that includes pensions.
There's no obligation on the UK govt I think.
Because if I've got it right, once you've reached the threshold for pension contributions, you recieve the same amount of state pension for as long as you are alive.
Paid for by current taxes.
My argument would be is if the Scottish govt is raising taxes, they can raise the taxes to pay for pensions.
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Feb 2022
1:23pm, 4 Feb 2022
16,557 posts
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rf_fozzy
FD - it's a big con.
Because the people who need the most help will probably not be paying council tax either, so they won't get the £150.
And it's an odd way of targeting support - based on the notional value of your house in 1990. Not on how much money you have now, nor your current income.
Bizarre.
And at the same time as a big regressive tax increase too of course.
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Fantasy General Election
Jul 2024