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EARLIER THIS WEEK, it emerged that we might be all working well beyond the age of 68 by the year 2028.
The OECD report recommended that pensionable age should be linked to life expectancy (and it’s thought that we will all be living longer in 15 years’ time).
Those with particularly stressful or physical jobs might be concerned about this potential of working arduous jobs for longer. This set of photographs, gathered from the PA Images archive, show a time of post-World War II industrial activity when increased consumer demand led to labour-intensive mass production. Monotony and the chances of ending up with a bad back seem to be the order of the day:
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Complex mix of factors? Eh not really, the fact that women take on caring responsibility of children and/or elderly parents, so women either work part time and/or take career breaks and this is not recognised by society or the government as ‘working” so therefore no contributions.
I have taken career breaks and work part time due to the above, I know my pension will be effected but I will always choose my family and their needs, plus I am contributing towards society by providing unpaid care.
I could be dead by the time I can retire!
@Gucky: nail on the head here – my wife chooses to stay home and mind our children (not that we could afford childcare anyway) but I still think we would choose this anyway – all the government does is give you a measly 1500 per year tax credit for this and doesn’t recognize the work that goes into raising and taking care of the family – how about a better tax credit/ tax break for those spouses that want to contribute on their spouses behalf? All they seem to talk about is how they can get women back to “work” – equality should be there for those that choose to work and those that decide to stay at home.
@Gucky: And also the group in the study would have been affected by the Marriage bar – only lifted in the 70′s. Meaning a lot of them would of had to leave work once married, further hampering their potential to work and earn a pension. Horrible to think how they have been treated, forced out of work and also no provisions made to support them.
@Grainne Tallon: good point, I didn’t even think about that. A better analysis would be to analyse the current pension provisions of the current workforce if that’s the demographic that the laws are to effect.
@Sean Baylon: are you seriously saying that those that decide to work should get the same pension as those that decide to stay at home – with your logic the Jobseeker’s Allowance should be same average wage as those that go out to work
@lorcmulv: that isn’t what I said at all – I said that people who’s partners work should be allowed to contribute on their behalf as they are “working” in the home.
@Sean Baylon: 2 people work the same hours and one is specialised and earns 90k but the other 45k. Should they get the same pension? 2 people work different hours one earns 90k and the other 45k. Should they get the same pension? It doesn’t matter about gender or why the person works less hours. Simply some people pay more into their pension.
I’m not at all shocked by this. Women with children tend to not stay in the workforce as long as men over the course of their lives, as such, they get a lesser pension, usually just the state pension. Hardly a groundbreaking story.
So men who worked between 1965 and 2010 earned more pension than women in the same period?! They also earned more income. Women in the same period traditionally stayed home more. How is this news and why is the data 10 years out of date?
But there’s three different categories in retirement isnt there? Men women and politicians.
It is incorrect to conclude that there is no gender variance in the average state pension actually awarded.
The averaging of contributions over lifetime employments does reduce the actual, particularly for women, whose employment contributions are reduced by periods of domestic commitment.
Another factor is involuntary contract employment, whereby the state allowed widespread abuses by employers, to recategorise previously insure able jobs as self employment.
The recent announcement by a lady minister to redress these discriminations is limited in scope by age & records constraints, & does not offer equity universally. Unfortunately, The headline pronouncements do not reveal the continuing limitations to the rectification of these pension reductions.
I work with a number of job sharers who chose to work less hours because they wanted to spend time with their children. They are able to do this because their partners work full time. As a result they will have less pension contributions than their partner. Gender doesn’t come into it they simply earned less in paid employment which was their choice.
Every job sharer I know does no overtime and expect other team members to because they don’t have kids or they have a partner. This is not equality
Don’t have baby’s basically
Women also tend to be much more risk averse when it comes to finances. They are far less likely to invest money, preferring to keep it in deposit accounts – thus becoming poorer over time.
By the way, I’m not saying this is the main cause but it’s a large contributor.
Total household income is a much better indicator of economic well-being!
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