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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » The persistence of lack of memory. How the state retirement age was changed and communicated
Old sins have long shadows. The equalisation of state pension age was first mooted in the early 1990s and was enacted in 1995. Yet it remains controversial now. The action group WASPI campaigned in the last general election and that campaign arguably made the difference in some marginals. Theresa May might conceivably have got an overall majority if it had not been for their efforts and the whole course of Britain’s departure from the EU, among other things, might have been radically different.
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My state retirement age has risen from 65 to (I think) 67, and the issues regarding awareness and preparation are the same for men. The increase for women has of course been greater, but then surely no-one expected equality to be a one-way street?
Not one MP will put the case like this though. And so we come to why, ceteris paribus Govt tends to run a deficit. Always easier to listen to various groups grievances and give prizes to that group, borrowing those prizes from future taxpayers.
The painting is great too,
But politics isn't simple. The WASPI campaign benefits from two of the most pernicious but deeply rooted myths in British politics. #1 That anyone other 60 is somehow the generation that defeated Hitler and personally stormed the Normandy beaches. #2 That there is a " pot " which simply having payed income taxes at some point in your life means you've paid into which means you aren't a recipient of the welfare state. If you add to these two myths that these are women and thus an oppressed majority and the general anti politics mood ( who cares what they were told when ? It's what folk believe that matters ) then they become a political problem.
Personally Inthink the Tories are insane if they spend a penny on WASPI that could be spent redeeming Universal Credit, helping the formation of Conservative voters by allowing people to buy houses or repairing our collapsing public realm. But these are Strange Days.
Beautifully written article though. Contempt rises from every sentence.
I'll get my coat.
Now Corbyn is promising everything and the Tories as the hegemonic governing party of the last 250 years can never match that ( which is why that Red Bus is ripping them apart ) so they must have something. And WASPI isn't something credible. There are bigger and better electoral fish to fry.
More importantly: without the context of rising costs of pensions and healthcare, it's fundamentally dishonest.
The Tories need a counter gamble. We can see that that by kicking most key decisions into Transition that one possibility is to keep Brexit going for years after Brexit Day. To argue we've git Dominion status but must fight on for proper independence. But what ever that counter gamble will be it has to be big. Not WASPI.
An early try for 'pedant of the day'!
https://www.inquisitr.com/3605574/the-twisted-psychology-of-trump-supporters/
Good article, Mr. Meeks. My mother was unexpectedly vehement in her condemnation of said women a week or so ago when it was in the news for some reason. Apparently, they had to have been 'living in a cave'.
It's also quite special to want equality and moan about getting it.
F1: very interesting grid set-up. I imagine the markets will take a while to get all the way there but I'll start on the bones of a pre-race ramble.
My own bet (Raikkonen) was nowhere near correct. That said, my assumption that Red Bull was out of it was utterly wrong, so an incorrect view of the situation naturally led to an incorrect conclusion.
But that's increasingly not the case, both in law and in practice. There's further to go, but equality is about removing inequalities wherever they occur, and the pension situation is clearly an inequality. It's just one that advantages women.
The BBC women demand equal pay with the men, but most people I know, of both sexes think that should be achieved by lowering the ludicrous pay of the men.
As I've said before, I think I might be associating with the wrong class of people.
On topic, I knew all about the pension changes planned for women; I was totally bored with the continual barrage of publicity, even though it was nothing to do with me.
Women had longer life expectancy and earlier pensions for years. Shouldn't they apologise for the female privilege they enjoyed?
Unfortunately, in the absence of any political leaders what we'll get is pandering to the loudest voices. Again.
https://www.gov.uk/state-pension-age
One might add I did tip Verstappen for the win at 5.6. Still eminently layable.
Genuinely surprised Red Bull were in it. Perhaps the altitude diminishes the impact of the so-called party mode. Hmm.
The number who were quite aware of the changes, thought them deeply unfair at the time, and then put the whole thing out of their mind, and are now WASPI, is very likely greater than none.
Mercedes actually improved their pace more than any other team this year.
Entitlement to other benefits often changes, and is likely to change again in the future. Compared to the problems of UC or disability payments assessments it is pretty low down the pecking order for me.
I think the real issue here is how it was phased in almost overnight. Born 1953 - sorted. 1954 - stuffed.
An aunt of mine used to make great play of the fact she was born in coronation year. Little did she know.
Verstappen is probably shorter odds than Ricciardo because there’s a possibility of rain, a theory that the team might favour him with strategy calls, and because a lot of people just think he’s a bit faster.
I’m reluctant to bet, as I suspect there’s a good chance of first lap carnage.
They guys in the top ten starting on ultras are going to suffer, which might be worth thinking about.
*Grim indeed..
It. Is. Not. True. It's smug nonsense. And the reason people here believe it to be true is the same kind of category error that judges make when they intone that even credible ignorance of the law is no excuse. We are actively engaged. We know what's happening, we are interested in discussing the pros and cons. We are not remotely typical. Most people barely follow what's happening apart from a glance at the Metro or the evening news, and if it's something complicated about pensions, still less. That applies especially to many hard-pressed people in poorer groups, immigrants with a shaky command of English and anyone with any kind of mental disability.
People like that fall through the cracks all the time. And yes, the protestors are mostly middle-class, because protestors nearly always are - people in marginal groups are not organised. But they're affected nonetheless - they just shake their heads bemusedly and struggle on.
What was needed here is the same kind of effort that is made for electoral registration (which is still deficient, but I accept there are limits to what can be done). Personal letters, with a follow-up if there's no reply.
Is that really the case? There are a wide variety of 'small towns', and many have been fairly squalid in the past, but are now much better; likewise, some have declined. What do you base your statement on?
Indeed, I do wonder how we would be doing with Miliband and Balls as the top team, had they indeed won a working majority in 2015. A counterfactual of a very different country, but one that was very plausible just a few years ago.
I think that if the parliament runs to term none of the current UK party leaders will be still in charge.
I fully get why they are unhappy and I don’t think that successive governments handled this well (there’s a whole different article in that too). But there’s no evidence to speak of that any of these women would have taken any steps if they had this information. Those that were very low paid would probably have been poorly advised to take any, as it happens.
What they’re really complaining about is the change, not the notice. But that case is unmakable.
https://twitter.com/adambienkov/status/1056441066109448192?s=21
My comment that it's middle-class women leading the protest is because of the nonsense that they didn't understand the changes. Frankly, I don't believe that's the case for the majority. They just don't want to be disadvantaged, even if it means equality.
Yes, there are always people who need help to circumvent any benefit change, but these vocal women aren't among them. They are demanding they are not disadvantaged. They are not saying that we must ensure that some vulnerable people don't suffer.
Edit: Every benefit change involves a sudden change and if twenty years or so isn't enough notice, what is?
https://twitter.com/foxinsoxuk/status/978302412363624448?s=19
Women can’t demand equality when it suits and then also behave like weak and feeble girlies when it suits.
Considering that there are perennial rumours of the Chancellor cutting tax relief on pensions contributions and pot size and worsening terms such as tax on lump sums, can we be at all surprised when folk don't save?
Surely any pot of money saved by the prudent is always going to be targeted by Chancellors like Brown, Osborne and Hammond? surely we are better with the bird in the hand?
Previous generations bequeathed my town with lots. Large parks. Public buildings. Monuments. What is my generation bequeathing to the future? Metal Shutters...
Now its students against student fees..women pensioners for women's pensions....Countryside Allance for fox hunting...poll tax etc.
One of the few notable exceptions is Corbyn and it's probably why he's capturing the imagination of the young
Farage, of course, has also previously said that Jews generally are the US's biggest problem.
Meanwhile, the line from the Corbyn left today seems to be that it is OK to be virulently anti-Semitic just as long as you do not actually kill Jews.
On both sides of the coin racists, white supremacists and anti-Semites haven't been this empowered since the 1930s. Now that bombs are being sent and people are being killed, is it too much to hope for that we begin to take the similarities with that time more seriously?
That is what being an adult means.
Universal Credit is another example, though a muh shorter-term one. I would guess that maybe half the people who may be affected are aware there's some sort of problem, perhaps a serious one. They hope it won't happen to them, and if it does they'll try to cope. Everyone else doesn't even know it's happening. Then one day they find they're £150/month poorer, and hey, they should have been keeping up and they'd have seen it coming and desperately economised for years.
Real life isn't like that for many people. We too often think it is.
Utterly tendentious balderdash of course, but will get shared on social media and convince a lot of people
I'm surprised this wasn't mentioned in the thread header. Do I remember incorrectly?
Question is though, what have the Tories got that will counter this?
It is disingenuous to pretend that this is a problem affecting those with mental disabilities who did not understand. In some cases recently aired on radio, the problems seem to be that women have had to stop work for other reasons, which has nothing to do with this change. Immigrants who have only just arrived and have a shaky grasp of Englisgh are not likely to be affected. Immigrants who have been here for decades working with a shaky grasp of English? Come off it.
People may noy follow the ins and outs of pension law but they do pay attention to their finances and spend money on holidays and other nice stuff and if they don’t save it’s because either they spend the money or because they don’t have it, in which case the issue is low pay, which is a whole different issue.
What these women are doing is wanting to be bailed put from their own refusal to take action, having for years agitated for equality. Well, sorry, no. There are better calls on public money, more deserving groups.
Long experience has taught me that there’s only so much you can get people voluntarily to read about pensions.
We could of course choose to tackle the threat from online and have the likes of Amazon pay actual taxes. We could also help retailers stay afloat on the high street - a perennial complaint locally as retailers close and the shutters go down is about rents and business rates. Neither of which are in the council's power. Its very odd that we have a system where government sets business rates so high as to close businesses and thus remove business rates revenue, and where landlords a long long way away seem content to set rent that nobody can afford thus leaving their asset unused.
Last week's anti-Brexit march was about idealism rather than enriching themselves. And, much as I am against it as a cause, the fox hunting march was surely about an idea rather than personal gain?
Not all inequality of outcome is down to discrimination. Some of it is down to peoples’ choices. And the relatively well off who make such choices shouldn’t then complain about the results.
For example they imply that fire service budget cuts directly caused the increase in response times. I’ve no idea if that is true or not but it’s plausible and complicated to argue the counterposition.
Unfortunately “living in our means and investong in achieving the best possible outcomes” isn’t very sexy.
Looking at it objectively, though, there is no reason that towns could not be made pleasant places to live, rather than shop. There is a housing shortage, and much high street retail is (likely inevitably) dying. Bringing in residents would also provide more trade for the businesses which do survive in towns.
Doing it well would not be without significant cost, but it would represent a genuine investment for the future. And likely prove quite popular.
😆
This is about setting the frame
For instance as per earlier post I was a little low on years, through not knowing I needed to notify them of a change I could have made so as not to loose those years. It was something I was entitled to do but could not do retrospectively (you can now).
It got sorted when the number of years required was reduced, but came back to bite me again when the equalisation of women's pension age came in. Now you might ask how is that possible - I am a man?
Well once you hit 60 if you are not working you used to get years credit without making any NI contribution. I assumed this was there just because of the difficulty of getting work if you were unemployed and over 60. There was no link made to women's pension age at all. Why would you think that.
Well it disappeared when the women's pension age was increased, but I didn't see any notification of this. By chance I did notice it and as I worked for my own company I could do something about it. If I didn't notice it or wasn't in a fortunate position to do something about it at short notice I would have been stuffed.
But if you got a letter, that's something! - I didn't know that.