This is just going to get worse as time moves on and medical advances increase average lifespans. I don’t want to work an extra 5 years if my lifespan increases 5 years but I do see the logic in working an extra 2/2.5 years in that case.
I mean this as a serious proposal.
Since the turn of the millennium, we’ve seen the average life expectancy in Ireland climb from 74 to 78 without a change in pension/retirement age, despite the massive increase in social costs associated with this increase.
Meanwhile, asset values like land and house prices have grown at a much faster pace than wages, creating a generational wealth gap whereby the older people of Ireland are leveraging the future earnings of their children, and their children, to make themselves wealthier.
I would propose a significant change to inheritance tax, whereby a tax as high as 30% of inheritance is used to fund social housing construction and provide social care for the elderly who won’t retire later. Homes or farms would only incur the tax at the point of sale, so if they stay within the family, so be it.
As someone with elderly parents myself, I would stand to lose a lot of money likely to come my way, but I don’t see a fairer solution here. My parents “wealth” is a function of their homes value outstripping their children’s earnings and at some point, the imbalance needs to be addressed.
The pension age should rise with life expectancy.
Someone has to pay for the increased cost that an increase in life expectancy has on the pension system.
It doesn’t make sense to have young people who can barely afford somewhere to live to pay for older people who’ve paid off their minuscule mortgage years ago.
The pension age was originally set at 65 in an era where the life expectancy was around the same
There’s no way the current Government will implement a policy that negatively affects their staple voters with the current polling.
That is completely unsustainable.
I see a lot of people mention life expectancy, but that’s only part of the problem too. As birth rates drop, our population is going to become more and more skewed towards the elderly. That significantly cuts down the tax base as less people are of working age, and as well as pension costs increasing, so will healthcare costs.
Choosing to not move it sooner rather than later just hurts younger people further as they have to pay to support current pensioners while not receiving these benefits when they get older. Obviously changes to the state pension will need to be coupled with reforms to incentivise private saving, but it needs to happen somehow. We also need to address housing to ensure people aren’t expected to pay extortionate rent in retirement.
This is an issue everywhere. Countries like the Netherlands have already explicitly tied the pension age to life expectancy and it’s expected to be in the early 70s for current young adults. There’s no reason to think Ireland won’t be similar.
Honestly, if they want us working longer, then they should introduce the 4 day week.
Edit: add the comma.
This is completely unsustainable. The current system is already underfunded, but as the ratio of retirees to workers increases with life expectancy increases and birth rate decreases, the entire state pension scheme is likely to collapse in our lifetime.
Anyone here ever work with a 64 year old?
With all due respect, they’re fucking shit and for the most part don’t care anymore. I don’t begrudge them one bit, they’ve paid their dues.
The idea that people will successfully and willingly work up to the age of 70 is tragic and absurd.
Life expectancy increases: “We should raise the age of retirement! Make people work longer, for less!”
Life expectancy _decreases_: “…”
TD pension should be the same as the state pension and not paid out until 66 too. If they want an extra pension, they can contribute to a private pension themselves.
Is there any reason everyone shouldn’t be mandatorily signed up to contribute to their own pension fund the moment they turn 18. Every payslip you get a chunk of it should go towards your own personal investment. Surely that would go a long way solve this issue long term?
Employers are reluctant to hire people over 50 while the state pension age increases. There is going to be a lot of older people on the dole. It’s already happening. Most employers force people to retire at 65 but the state pension doesn’t kick in until 66 so you have to go on jobseekers for a year. If they are going to raise the pension age they also will have to “force” employers to keep older workers or it will be a waste of time.
>”Mr Naughten denied that there would be a need for additional taxation on employees. “The committee looked at a number of funding streams that could be available, for example, the State pays out €2.4 billion per annum in **tax relief on private pensions**, five per cent of people who avail of that relief avail of 50 per cent of the benefit of that, so even standardising that at 33 per cent would be far more equitable, would be far more gender proof, but would actually reduce the liability the State would have and that would be a saving that could go towards the pension age.”
>
>Several of the recommendations in the commitee’s report involve extra costs for the pension system and it offers no suggestion about funding beyond asking the separate Commission on Taxation and Welfare to **examine taxes on wealth.**”
This is insane. You’re already one of the highest-taxed countries in the world and you’re getting rid of one of the very, very few effective ways to save for retirement.
On top of condemning everyone to live 20+ years on poverty-level public pension payments, you’re risking even *more* private investments going into real estate in a context of sky-rocketing real estate prices.
Public pensions, as a whole, are a Ponzi scheme. They need to add more people to the scheme (the younger working generation) than those receiving payments (the retirees) at all times to work. With birth rates declining and life expectancy increasing, the Ponzi scheme is bound to collapse. This is the same in Ireland as it is in [Spain](https://dialnet.unirioja.es/descarga/articulo/7021713.pdf) or [France](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51502427).
It’s amazing how little people understand of finances, even among EU citizens.
All the lads that think we should raise the pension age:
Do you not realize how difficult it is to get a job when you’re over 55?
Nevermind over 65.
And that’s ignoring the fact that people over 60, in non-office jobs, are generally shite workers. And it’s not their fault. The human body at 60 can’t work as hard as someone in their 20s/30s/40s.
I’m getting older and I want my handout as soon as I can get it. I don’t care about the “macro economic situation”. Borrow the bloody money and give it to us.
There will be a blind panic in 2030 when countries like Italy, Japan and Germany are faced with borrowing billions for pension payments. The children haven’t been born, the future taxpayers will not be there, hard choices need to be made and proper supports ready for the elderly unemployed.
As expected.
Now for the difficult part, who will pony up to pay for this?
Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t get the point of this committee if they weren’t required to say how they would pay for their recommendations.
“Should people get good things, and is it the job of someone else to pay for it?” – Sure!
The problem with pensions is the cost. Most people want the option to retire at 65/66, but how do we pay for it with a shrinking population? What are we willing to sacrifice to pay for this? How much tax are we willing to ask younger people to pay (because they will be the ones paying for it).
Fuck it. Just cut to the chase and raise the pension age to 160. Problems solved!
21 comments
Carousel is the only solution.
This is just going to get worse as time moves on and medical advances increase average lifespans. I don’t want to work an extra 5 years if my lifespan increases 5 years but I do see the logic in working an extra 2/2.5 years in that case.
I mean this as a serious proposal.
Since the turn of the millennium, we’ve seen the average life expectancy in Ireland climb from 74 to 78 without a change in pension/retirement age, despite the massive increase in social costs associated with this increase.
Meanwhile, asset values like land and house prices have grown at a much faster pace than wages, creating a generational wealth gap whereby the older people of Ireland are leveraging the future earnings of their children, and their children, to make themselves wealthier.
I would propose a significant change to inheritance tax, whereby a tax as high as 30% of inheritance is used to fund social housing construction and provide social care for the elderly who won’t retire later. Homes or farms would only incur the tax at the point of sale, so if they stay within the family, so be it.
As someone with elderly parents myself, I would stand to lose a lot of money likely to come my way, but I don’t see a fairer solution here. My parents “wealth” is a function of their homes value outstripping their children’s earnings and at some point, the imbalance needs to be addressed.
The pension age should rise with life expectancy.
Someone has to pay for the increased cost that an increase in life expectancy has on the pension system.
It doesn’t make sense to have young people who can barely afford somewhere to live to pay for older people who’ve paid off their minuscule mortgage years ago.
The pension age was originally set at 65 in an era where the life expectancy was around the same
There’s no way the current Government will implement a policy that negatively affects their staple voters with the current polling.
That is completely unsustainable.
I see a lot of people mention life expectancy, but that’s only part of the problem too. As birth rates drop, our population is going to become more and more skewed towards the elderly. That significantly cuts down the tax base as less people are of working age, and as well as pension costs increasing, so will healthcare costs.
Choosing to not move it sooner rather than later just hurts younger people further as they have to pay to support current pensioners while not receiving these benefits when they get older. Obviously changes to the state pension will need to be coupled with reforms to incentivise private saving, but it needs to happen somehow. We also need to address housing to ensure people aren’t expected to pay extortionate rent in retirement.
This is an issue everywhere. Countries like the Netherlands have already explicitly tied the pension age to life expectancy and it’s expected to be in the early 70s for current young adults. There’s no reason to think Ireland won’t be similar.
Honestly, if they want us working longer, then they should introduce the 4 day week.
Edit: add the comma.
This is completely unsustainable. The current system is already underfunded, but as the ratio of retirees to workers increases with life expectancy increases and birth rate decreases, the entire state pension scheme is likely to collapse in our lifetime.
Anyone here ever work with a 64 year old?
With all due respect, they’re fucking shit and for the most part don’t care anymore. I don’t begrudge them one bit, they’ve paid their dues.
The idea that people will successfully and willingly work up to the age of 70 is tragic and absurd.
Life expectancy increases: “We should raise the age of retirement! Make people work longer, for less!”
Life expectancy _decreases_: “…”
TD pension should be the same as the state pension and not paid out until 66 too. If they want an extra pension, they can contribute to a private pension themselves.
Is there any reason everyone shouldn’t be mandatorily signed up to contribute to their own pension fund the moment they turn 18. Every payslip you get a chunk of it should go towards your own personal investment. Surely that would go a long way solve this issue long term?
Employers are reluctant to hire people over 50 while the state pension age increases. There is going to be a lot of older people on the dole. It’s already happening. Most employers force people to retire at 65 but the state pension doesn’t kick in until 66 so you have to go on jobseekers for a year. If they are going to raise the pension age they also will have to “force” employers to keep older workers or it will be a waste of time.
>”Mr Naughten denied that there would be a need for additional taxation on employees. “The committee looked at a number of funding streams that could be available, for example, the State pays out €2.4 billion per annum in **tax relief on private pensions**, five per cent of people who avail of that relief avail of 50 per cent of the benefit of that, so even standardising that at 33 per cent would be far more equitable, would be far more gender proof, but would actually reduce the liability the State would have and that would be a saving that could go towards the pension age.”
>
>Several of the recommendations in the commitee’s report involve extra costs for the pension system and it offers no suggestion about funding beyond asking the separate Commission on Taxation and Welfare to **examine taxes on wealth.**”
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/no-guarantee-raising-pension-age-would-breach-deficit-says-naughten-1.4791740
This is insane. You’re already one of the highest-taxed countries in the world and you’re getting rid of one of the very, very few effective ways to save for retirement.
On top of condemning everyone to live 20+ years on poverty-level public pension payments, you’re risking even *more* private investments going into real estate in a context of sky-rocketing real estate prices.
Public pensions, as a whole, are a Ponzi scheme. They need to add more people to the scheme (the younger working generation) than those receiving payments (the retirees) at all times to work. With birth rates declining and life expectancy increasing, the Ponzi scheme is bound to collapse. This is the same in Ireland as it is in [Spain](https://dialnet.unirioja.es/descarga/articulo/7021713.pdf) or [France](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-51502427).
It’s amazing how little people understand of finances, even among EU citizens.
All the lads that think we should raise the pension age:
Do you not realize how difficult it is to get a job when you’re over 55?
Nevermind over 65.
And that’s ignoring the fact that people over 60, in non-office jobs, are generally shite workers. And it’s not their fault. The human body at 60 can’t work as hard as someone in their 20s/30s/40s.
I’m getting older and I want my handout as soon as I can get it. I don’t care about the “macro economic situation”. Borrow the bloody money and give it to us.
There will be a blind panic in 2030 when countries like Italy, Japan and Germany are faced with borrowing billions for pension payments. The children haven’t been born, the future taxpayers will not be there, hard choices need to be made and proper supports ready for the elderly unemployed.
As expected.
Now for the difficult part, who will pony up to pay for this?
Maybe it’s just me, but I don’t get the point of this committee if they weren’t required to say how they would pay for their recommendations.
“Should people get good things, and is it the job of someone else to pay for it?” – Sure!
The problem with pensions is the cost. Most people want the option to retire at 65/66, but how do we pay for it with a shrinking population? What are we willing to sacrifice to pay for this? How much tax are we willing to ask younger people to pay (because they will be the ones paying for it).
Fuck it. Just cut to the chase and raise the pension age to 160. Problems solved!