The problem with the benefit system
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That would make university amazingly expensive and even more elitist! In current money that’s what, £55k!
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I'm glad that between us a bunch of middle class home owning professionals have it all figured out to solve the problem of dullard tradesmen. Now to what we do for ourselves. Tricky.
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Where people get this idea tradesmen are paid badly is beyond me.
Guy in my class at school went into plumbing - he’s absolutely loaded. I was barely out of uni and he was buying his first of many houses. Way more successful than me
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So, for a quick summary, old people should not drive, but should work, we have a problem of too many old people to pay for, and we have a shrinking population masked by immigration, otherwise known as a rising population, and this is causing a housing crisis that in turn is exacerbated by old people not voluntarily leaving their homes and, in addition, when they do so, leaving money to their family.
Have I missed anything?
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Going back to the non article in the NYT, if the boomers are old and there were proportionately 1.5 times as many of them as the next generation, how are demographics expected to change as the boomers die off?
Life expectancy isn't rising much, birth rate is low, immigrants tend to be younger people of working age. What are the longer term projections for the change in the number of working age people Vs retirees? Data would be a good starting point for a discussion on policy.
One solution not raised is that the UK has to be more serious about personal pensions so that the state pension qualifying age actually could be raised. Our employment "packages" tend to be salary and feck all else other than BUPA. That's something that could change.
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Possibly because he knows the difference between data and anecdote?
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Are you talking about yourself in the third person
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There's a life expectancy difference of about 3 or 4 in favour of professionals such as accountants and doctors compared to skilled manual workers (and even more to unskilled manual workers) so it's actually just redressing the balance.Surely the whole point is you get educated to a higher standard that allows you to earn more money without working outside in all weathers. Maybe it would make people consider whether that 3 or 4 years at university is really the best way for them to go.
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Possibly the biggest success story of the Conservative Government of the last 13 years is their pensions policy.
Auto-enrolment has been a massive, massive success, just a shame that Gordon Brown's failed stakeholder idea didn't have the compulsion back in 2001. Sure the contribution rates ideally will rise further, but AE has got far more people saving towards retirement than ever before, and employers have to contribute too. Not much help for the self employed mind.
Also pension freedoms have been a huge success despite the hatred of them by the FCA, enabling far more flexibility in retirement.
So we are moving in the right direction.
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The state pension age has already been raised and is being raised further - current plans go as far as 68. Which I don't disagree with. How far do you think it should go?
"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
I don't think anyone said old people should not drive, they said they should get tested.
That's like saying young people should not drive because they have to get a licence first.
- Genesis Croix de Fer
- Dolan Tuono1 -
I thought you said you were in the top 5%? If he's earning more than you he is seriously outperforming the market. How about doing a simple check of data (albeit a few years old now) https://www.hitchcockandking.co.uk/h-k-news/average-salary-for-tradespeople-in-the-uk/ Sure, some can earn a lot but they are usually the ones who start their own companies, build them and employ staff, good general builders with a large workload or specialists.
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Beat me to it.
It's no different to most other lines of work where you need to own your own company and have people working for you to make a lot of money. (City FS being one exception which may be colouring Rick's take on this).
"I spent most of my money on birds, booze and fast cars: the rest of it I just squandered." [George Best]0 -
I thought Rick claimed to be in the top 1%.
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If the guy was buying his first house when Rick was just out of uni, and Rick was not earning as much as he is now until recently, it will take Rick a while to catch up no? This is pretty basic stuff... You have to have been earning a high salary for a while to build some material wealth.
- Genesis Croix de Fer
- Dolan Tuono1 -
There's quite a few farmers in their seventies.
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Graduates don’t earn much is hardly news. Looking at someone who has been working for a few years in a trade and comparing it to a straight out of university job that is in many ways an unskilled role is a bit of a silly way to try to make a point that manual workers aren’t poorly paid. As a general rule I would say they hit the peak of their earning potential far sooner as there’s less progression available.
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I literally work with them every day. Bit rich being lectured on being too middle class and out of touch by you, 😛
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition1 -
Owning your own business is pretty common amongst trades.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
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Retrain as a patent attorney then. There's nothing stopping you. Or is it not feasible at your age. Oh, wait.
And anyway, I'm not the one telling tradesmen to stop working and retrain while they still can, because Rick doesn't want to pay for your pension until you are 72.
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OK, so that's one guy sorted, just need to deal with the other million.
I work on large construction projects in London so my experience is skewed away from the kind of small trader electrician earning fortunes and buying loads of houses. A lot of the guys on these sites are earning say £200 a day, self employed - it's decent money but bear in mind that they are working 10 hour days out in all weather for that.
A few of them could potentially progress to supervisory/management roles but there is limited scope for that obviously or we'd have teams of supervisors and no workers.
Some of them could retrain but they need to find the time and money to do so and every day they take off for training is a days lost earnings - the end result is likely going to be a decent pay cut at least in the short term.
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It’s a trade off between how generous it is and when it starts.
We should treat it like other benefits; something the worst off need as a safety net and not much else.
I’d be inclined to make it means tested in the same way too.
The message must be clear. It should really be up to you to save enough for your retirement. The state can stop you being destitute but if you want comfort, get saving.
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Do you think £10k a year is a lot?
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I have no intention of retiring any time soon, and certainly don't expect to stop at 67 or whatever the age is when I get there. I've been pretty clear on my views on pensions before.
1985 Mercian King of Mercia - work in progress (Hah! Who am I kidding?)
Pinnacle Monzonite
Part of the anti-growth coalition0 -
Should add it’s already been calculated the current retirees will have received more on average from the state than they paid in over an average life time , so I’d love to know where they think it’s appropriate to be paid so much to be retired.
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Aye but, if you're retired then you can spend your morning messing about on t'internet and t'likes... oh hang on...
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If that's your sole income, having paid NI during your working life, is that a lot? Because I think that's about £200 a week.
It's a pension, it's for literally not having sat on your arse. Hope that helps your comprehension.
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