Triple-lock on pensions will stay. Pensions will increase when earnings have decreased

[HACO]

I very much doubt that wages are going to go back to normal within a single year.

Many industries have been ruined.

Cinemas, airline industry, hotels, indoor entertainment like comedy clubs, theatres, etc. Nightclubs are ruined.

A lot of independent cafes that relied on offices and footfall.

It would be mental for them to bounce back within a year. It will take many years to go back to the way things were and only if there is a vaccine that works long term.

The high street was already dying this has pretty put another nail in that coffin.

I'd bet good money it's never going to be 18%

Unemployment doesn't affect average earnings. It's about earnings of people in work.

 

[HACO]

No mention of 18% by law. None. Nada.

The only way it could possibly be 18% is if there was a massive jump in the CPI or if average wages went up by 18%
Thats a massive IF, and entirely dependant on how you calculate average earnings, which the government can do using a considerable amount of discretion.

You are not going to get an 18% pay rise next year, so the average earnings will not rise by 18% in real terms, and they can quite happily exclude any anomaly from covid without much bother.
This was covered about ten pages back, but still everybody is stating 18% as if this is a figure that has been officially announced - which it hasn't.

A lot of you appear to have jumped to a conclusion with absolutely no evidence, purely for the sake of being offended at something.
Sounds very... err.. well, millennial...

18% is government's own figure:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53082530

You may disagree with the OBR on that, but you can't blame anyone for using that figure as their reference.

 

[HACO]

I’ll come back to this since the conversation has turned sensible again .

Greebo has a valid point about pensions and voting - it wins seats for sure if your pro OAP’s

65+ was a 74% turn out
18-24 was a 47% turn out

Last G E - it’s a massive difference .


https://www.ipsos.com/ipsos-mori/en-uk/how-britain-voted-2019-election

I think there is a bigger problem for late born Millennials and most of generation Z than how much their state pension will be - Who will fund their housing costs ?

If so many of them as they say can’t save for a house ( let alone a pension ) as they pay sky high rents to private landlords then who pays their rent in old age ?

That's why younger people are worried, they're being milked dry right now, and the social systems that they're paying into right now have no chance of surviving in the long term, when they're going to be beneficiaries. No party addresses the concerns of young people, that's why they're disconnected with politics and don't vote.

I personally have planned for my life assuming there will be no NHS, no social care and no state pension by the time I get to the retirement age. So it's either working until I die, or I need to save several million pounds for a chance of retiring without burdening my children, like Americans do.

 

[HACO]

Have also this mindset.
You can see it coming. Unless there's something significantly new (like literal robot slaves, or we can do away with capitalism) we are on the decline.

You can't milk much more out of the next generations. While leaving the mega rich untouched. Pension and NHS will soon be unaffordable.

We are in negative feedback loop territory now. Take more from young now, they we have less when we are older. Rinse and repeat.

More and more people are going to be renting when they are pension age. In this case the welfare bill will be unaffordable.
So no pension.

But I guess by that point people will have voted for a non tory party. But still, where will the money come from?

Only way I can see things going is a big big house price correction. As its the cost of living thats devastating. If a tiny percentage of people own it will be wanted too. At that point all bets are off.

This will lead to a collapse of society in western countries. There will be uprisings, and it will either end in extreme violence, millions dead, or in communist revolutions and some serious wealth confiscation.

When historians in future centuries, assuming humanity survives, look back at the cause of collapse of society, it's all these small things that we did to give more to the old and destroy our future.

 

[HACO]

I don't even think there's a long-term plan. I get the distinct impression that each government only looks at the immediate future, about as far as the next election, and doesn't really worry too much about long-term trends or possible warning flags or - crucially - consider any policy that would help in the long term but be unpopular with the electorate/their base in the here and now.

I just think we're going to muddle along with sticking plasters, not addressing the major issues, until the **** hits the fan, properly. It won't be because we couldn't see it coming, it will be because nobody had the political will to address the issue or do anything about it.

Yeah, 100% correct. There is no plan. Each government wants to kick the can down the road for future governments to clean up, and they only care about the short-term. That's the greatest bug in western democracies, there are no long-term plans for anything. No government or party will accept short-term sacrifice for long-term prosperity. They will sacrifice long-term health and prosperity of the country (and the world), for a small bump in immediate popularity.

 

[HACO]

Yeah it's a flaw in democracy. You don't look into the future. I do find for people who have kids that this is a very odd mindset. But hey ho.

I expect the tail end of my life will bear witness to some sort of big transition. For a while we can keep at this method and keep hoping technology will save things. It might.

Second half of this century will be quite interesting. Will humanity come together and rise to the challenges? Or will we just keep going as we've been. Technology is great, but it can be used for good or bad. I'm just not optimistic at all. They'd rather develop/fund technologies that keep people occupied, or even kill people, than figure out ways to improve quality of life for all people and not just the rich and powerful.