State Pension Changes

An extra £7,500 p.a. will be a nice little top up to my early retirement pension when I eventualy make it to state pension age. Paying a flat rate seems fair to those who've paid for a 2nd pension and saved for their retirement.

 

I think I retire after the changes come into effect, so I will benefit, I guess. Makes up a bit for women my age having their pension age shifted from 60 to 65.5!

I don't see how the retirement age can go as high as 75. It seems to me that employers don't really want anyone over 55 as it is. And workplace stress has become so intense for people in most walks of life that no-one can bear it over that age, anyway.

For those in good occupational pension schemes some people are cynical enough to say that this raising the pension age is a back-door policy for getting people to take much lower, actuarially-reduced pensions of their own volition as they won't be able to hack it until they are 68, 70, 75, dead, whatever.

Anyway, what happened to the doom and gloom predictions for people under 30, whose arteries will be so furred up with an epidemic of obesity (we are told) that life expectation for them will drop back to pre-war levels. If the pension age has been raised to 70, someone will be quids-in.

 

I didn't realise, when pensions began ...

 

Should I have any money invested a couple of year before I reach retirement I've decided to withdraw it all and stash it under the bed.
I'm pretty sure by that time the conservatives will be gone, labour will be back in and the handout gravy trail will be back on track.

But knowing my luck the civil war will have started by then.

 

Europe.

 

I've had suspicions for a while now that Britain is gearing up for war. I reckon for every one thing the public are told about, there's probably 10 things we are not told.

The great military mobilisation in greater London during the olympics for example, was it really necessary? Or was it a chance to test our ability to defend our capital, given that we haven't had the opportunity to test our ability since WW2, when it had to be done for real.

I saw a couple of news articles about war ships being commissioned not so long back, and one firm (British Aerospace? If not then one like it) which was about to lay off lots of workers last year was given a government promise and funding to stay geared up for a big order.

Much more recently, Germany has been waving a stick at us because of anti-EU murmurings. We've had to fight Germany twice before, and both times (if I understand history correctly), it was considered almost unthinkable beforehand on both occasions, yet we know from recent news that Germany is most unhappy with us, and that they have worked on some pretty impressive military kit lately. Still, it wont be a problem seeing as we are their biggest export market. With Greece unlikely to honour their debts, Germany is already financially unsound, and if our government banned the sale of German cars in the UK, Germany would be bankrupt (German cars by the way make up a very significant proportion of the cars on our roads. Not just BMW, Merc and Audi which are the obvious ones, but Jaguar, Volkswagon, Vauxhall and I believe Landrover too).

 

I puzzled for ages of the conflicting signals between growing 'instability' and cutting tropp numbers. Then my dad made a good point. Once you've been in the armed forces and then leave, you are still on reserve for a number of years or until you reach a certain age. So by laying off service men and women, publicly it looks like scaling down, but in practice you can get the numbers back very quickly from new recruits, and if necessary, there is a massive reserve force, already trained, to call upon.

 

Do not worry there will NOT be a war
Mr Cameron will come back from Strasbourg next week waving a piece of paper signed by chancellor Merkle assuring peace in our time

Now the big worry is Argentina and the Falklands, not a chance in hell of defending them this time, No aircraft carrier, = No aircraft, and we only have eight ships sea worthy anyway and they are oop north
Now Argentina only have to take out the four fifteen yearold aircraft at Port Stanley, then sail in an Armada

Will the pensioners of 82 still be able? and if my memory serves me correctly WHERE do you stick the coal in these gas turbine ships

Jack McH

 

I'm sure you're right ARMANDII, but in any case, lets hope my theory is wrong and we're not going to have another fight with Europe any time soon because if there is one thing history teaches us, its that there are no winners at war. Maybe there are winners on paper, but in real terms there aren't. Hopefully enough politicians have started to realise that too.

Anyway, back on topic, state pensions

 

Blimey, it's like *Dim* has made a comeback, all these conspiracies