Are we going to have alot of homeless pensioners?

Rodin

Yurt! wrote: »

Yes, it's that tiny sliver of long-term unemployed that is causing a pensions time bomb, in-work poverty, housing unaffordability and the prospect of hundreds of thousands in old-age homelessness in a couple of decades. :rolleyes:

Social welfare is the biggest burden in this state.
House prices aren't unaffordable nationwide.

HAP payments raised a false floor in rental prices and made it more difficult for those in lower incomes who aren't entitled to social welfare.

Yurt2

Rodin wrote: »

Social welfare is the biggest burden in this state.
House prices aren't unaffordable nationwide.

.

Nope, pensions are. And by quite a way. Look at the figures.

theres no chance

no chance at all, mind


that the malthusian, doom mongering, dystopian view of technology and economic and societal progress that has been wrong throughout history is wrong this time also?

do people feel more important when their random opinions veer towards catastrophe or something?

Rodin

Yurt! wrote: »

Nope, pensions are. And by quite a way. Look at the figures.

I'd happily reduce the state pension.
A pension age couple on almost 500 notes a week in their hand? Nonsense

seamusk84

Portsalon wrote: »

PRSI funds are spent on Social Welfare Benefit (not Assistance) payments and surpluses are transferred to the Investment Fund. At end-2017, the amount in the SW Investment Fund was about €1.185bn.

That’s actually nothing when you consider the amount pissed away on the inefficient HSE every week.

tayto lover

I’m a pensioner and own my home.
As a contributor for nearly 50 years I’ll enjoy my retirement. Thanks.

Portsalon

seamusk84 wrote: »

That’s actually nothing when you consider the amount pissed away on the inefficient HSE every week.

What about the amount "pissed away" in the efficient parts of the HSE - i.e. the vast majority?

Yurt2

Rodin wrote: »

I'd happily reduce the state pension.
A pension age couple on almost 500 notes a week in their hand? Nonsense

So you'd be happy to push hundreds of thousands into poverty and probably food insecurity in old age despite a lifetime of prsi contributions.

Good to know where you stand on things.

Mrs OBumble

Yurt! wrote: »

Nope, pensions are. And by quite a way. Look at the figures.

Oldness benefit is part of the overall welfare spend.

Yurt2

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

Oldness benefit is part of the overall welfare spend.

It's not called oldness benefit, it's the state pension. And I'm aware it's part of the wider social spend. The original poster was speaking of social welfare for the unemployed (his 'cradle to grave' comment), unless he was trying to frame people who worked all their lives and paid contributions, and now rely on the state pension to put bread in their mouths as some sort of class of scroungers - which is a distinct possibility.

Pretty toxic all round.

endacl

aido79 wrote: »

Stamps were abolished in 1979 but don't know how this affects a person's pension.

Figure of speech. If you’ve made the required contributions, you’ve bought your state pension.

endacl

Yurt! wrote: »

This. If you attempted to introduce here German style rules that would give renters some semblance of stability, boards servers would catch fire from all the skin and hair flying in this forum.

I’m not so sure. It would benefit landlords too. They’d also be able to deal with defaulters and messers far more quickly and efficiently.

Mrs OBumble

endacl wrote: »

Figure of speech. If you’ve made the required contributions, you’ve bought your state pension.

You haven't.

You've bought the right to be considered to have paid X contributions no matter which of the have-pension-bilateral-with-ireland countries you retire in.

This does not guarantee you a specific pension though. Countries regularly change amounts and entitlement rules for pensions, the same as they do for any other welfare schemes.

Assetbacked

john4321 wrote: »

If you contribute tax, PRSI and USC for 40 years to the state why should you not be entitled to a state pension?

40 years, worked all their life etc. Taking the attitude that "they're old, you can't touch them" ignores the reality that things change. There was a recession caused by excessive lending, not contributed to in any way by young people yet they are saddled with the debt burden for decades. That's not fair but it's necessary.

Similarly, house prices have shot up hundreds of percent in the last few decades. All this wealth needs to be taken back into the economy someway as we live in a progressive tax system which means those that have more generally contribute more. There is no denying that house prices are far too expensive and it is dead money for the most part to pump it into land and property. There is money there and serious inequality between those that own property and those that don't, it's as simple as that. Lose your selfish attitude of "pull up the ladder", it's tiring.

Saudades

Assetbacked wrote: »

If you own your own home now and there is minimal or no mortgage on it, you should not be getting state pension.

I see the reasoning in targeting home-owners as if you own your own home you are generally in the wealthiest bracket and one day will be mortgage/rent free - but if someone has paid PRSI for 40+ years, then they are as fully entitled to the state pension as anyone else and I wouldn't take that away from anyone who has contributed PRSI for so many years.

Alternatively, Property Tax could be significantly increased instead.

At the moment it's only a mere 0.18% of the value of the property.

To put into context - a couple living in their own house worth €500,000 in Dublin in 2019 are currently paying just €30.25 a month each on LPT.

Rodin wrote: »

I'd happily reduce the state pension.
A pension age couple on almost 500 notes a week in their hand? Nonsense

What if that pension age couple on 500 notes a week were paying rent at 250 notes a week.....

And when one of them dies, the rent amount stays the same of course, so that widowed person on 250 notes a week still has rent to pay at 250 notes a week....

If there is a shortage of funds in the pot, then I would much rather see the 4% PRSI tax increased rather than the State Pension decreased.

pwurple

People who own a home maintain the buildings. You can take the view they are custodians of our built heritage and housing stock. They simultaneously provide the state a service by housing themselves and the future custodians.


Incentives drive economic behaviours, tread very bloody carefully with pensions, people are more protective of those, than any other benefit (and rightly so). They are also often extremely experienced with finance by the time they get there., and there is a huge pot of money the exchequer can lose out on by messing with it.

We already have a trickle of private pensions leaving this country due to tax incentives in other parts of Europe. Tell people if they own a home or a private pension here they get no state pension? They notionally sell the home to their kids, pop the private pension into a Portuguese investment fund and draw down the state pension plus their investment dividends. How does that help anyone except fund manager taking their cut.

Assetbacked

endacl wrote: »

If you paid your mortgage, you own your house.
If you paid your stamps, you own your pension.

There’s no crossover.

Pull up the ladders, lads. There's no room on board for everyone.

Give a proportionate pension taking into account contribution and inflation and while it would be commensurat, it would not be viable. This would just mean the pensioner needs to sell their house to make up the difference. Not a big deal considering how much cash they can be handed for doing this.

Assetbacked

[quote="pwurple;110940771"
We already have a trickle of private pensions leaving this country due to tax incentives in other parts of Europe. Tell people if they own a home or a private pension here they get no state pension? They notionally sell the home to their kids, pop the private pension into a Portuguese investment fund and draw down the state pension plus their investment dividends. How does that help anyone except fund manager taking their cut.[/quote]

We have workers paying huge chunks of their salaries in rent to institutional landlords which have shareholders based internationally outside of Ireland who get these salaries into their pockets tax free. This is a bigger issue than what you have highlighted but the only reason it is not seemingly as pressing is because we don't have the voices in the ear of the high ranking civil servants and their bosses in the Dept of Finance. It should bring down the government the fact that the tax incentives to institutionals has not been suppressed, three years past their need.

Ha Long Bay

Assetbacked wrote: »

40 years, worked all their life etc. Taking the attitude that "they're old, you can't touch them" ignores the reality that things change. There was a recession caused by excessive lending, not contributed to in any way by young people yet they are saddled with the debt burden for decades. That's not fair but it's necessary.

Similarly, house prices have shot up hundreds of percent in the last few decades. All this wealth needs to be taken back into the economy someway as we live in a progressive tax system which means those that have more generally contribute more. There is no denying that house prices are far too expensive and it is dead money for the most part to pump it into land and property. There is money there and serious inequality between those that own property and those that don't, it's as simple as that. Lose your selfish attitude of "pull up the ladder", it's tiring.

I didn't take any attitude I just asked a question why you thought someone who paid into the system for many years did not deserve to get a fraction of that back through the contributory pension.

pwurple

Assetbacked wrote: »

We have workers paying huge chunks of their salaries in rent to institutional landlords which have shareholders based internationally outside of Ireland who get these salaries into their pockets tax free. This is a bigger issue than what you have highlighted but the only reason it is not seemingly as pressing is because we don't have the voices in the ear of the high ranking civil servants and their bosses in the Dept of Finance. It should bring down the government the fact that the tax incentives to institutionals has not been suppressed, three years past their need.

I think we agree... my point was Ireland doesn’t exist in a vacuum. When you make something financially problematic here, people will take their ball (of money) and go elsewhere.

It doesn’t even need to be institutional large landlords in your example for goodness sake. I know a guy with just two properties, who moved his tax base from shaggin’ dungarven to the Isle of Man over the change in taxes on accommodation based income now. These are ordinary people, taking reactive steps to idiotic tax environments.

Despite rents being at an all time high, and tax on them being at an all time high, the exchequer income from that sector is dropping. Funny that eh?

Multiply that up now a good bit for stripping away pensions, and see where we end up.


It is a fairly silly idea to means test pensions for the elderly. That group is ultra mobile. No jobs tying them here, off they head to the sunshine. You chase away the money. I wish the people making economic decisions had at the very least an economics undergrad degree. Or even a leaving cert in it.

pc7

A lady I work with is 60, has worked for 43 years and cannot afford to retire and is dreading it. Rents a dingy flat, can't afford to move, has no family, 1 close friend outside of work. Its pretty grim, she doesn't know what she is going to do when the time comes to retiring.

Kivaro

pc7 wrote: »

A lady I work with is 60, has worked for 43 years and cannot afford to retire and is dreading it. Rents a dingy flat, can't afford to move, has no family, 1 close friend outside of work. Its pretty grim, she doesn't know what she is going to do when the time comes to retiring.

I would imagine that there are a lot of similar stories out there.

Our tax resources should be concentrated on people like these, but then again it's the squeaky wheel that gets the oil, so the money goes to the "won't work" brigade, the asylum industry, etc. ......... all those sexy liberal causes. Old Irish people in dingy flats and just surviving after years of contributing to society do not make the headlines in Irish media.

Horusire

pc7 wrote: »

A lady I work with is 60, has worked for 43 years and cannot afford to retire and is dreading it. Rents a dingy flat, can't afford to move, has no family, 1 close friend outside of work. Its pretty grim, she doesn't know what she is going to do when the time comes to retiring.

The thought of this terrifies me. I am under 30 and have saved up a deposit for the last 5 years just so even if I end up in a similar situation I won't have to pay rent.

What she must feel like day to day.. admittedly she might have forward planned a bit but hard to point the finger at someone who's worked for 43 years.

Mad_maxx

pc7 wrote: »

A lady I work with is 60, has worked for 43 years and cannot afford to retire and is dreading it. Rents a dingy flat, can't afford to move, has no family, 1 close friend outside of work. Its pretty grim, she doesn't know what she is going to do when the time comes to retiring.

She sounds like a terrible planner,something is amiss if you have worked constantly since twenty yet face retirement with a bleak outlook, the state pension is extremely generous, she e should be grand

pc7

Well I don't judge her or anyone in that positions. Jesus at least she has done her best. She'd be on a low wage, not everyone rises up through the ranks or the ambition for management etc. A generous state pension is nothing if you are renting in Dublin

ETA - leaving school 43 years ago is very different to now, again I wouldn't judge her on todays standards.

jam_mac_jam

Kivaro wrote: »

I would imagine that there are a lot of similar stories out there.

Our tax resources should be concentrated on people like these, but then again it's the squeaky wheel that gets the oil, so the money goes to the "won't work" brigade, the asylum industry, etc. ......... all those sexy liberal causes. Old Irish people in dingy flats and just surviving after years of contributing to society do not make the headlines in Irish media.

It really doesn't go to the sexy causes. Have a look yourself, most social welfare is pensions and it keeps rising all the time.

Seanachai

My landlord kind of catered for older people, mostly bachelors from the sticks, a few women who worked in the civil service since the 60's\70's, some of them have passed on but there's still a few there.

He's probably one of the cheapest in town at this stage, the buildings are old and a little shabby, there seems to be a few similar buildings in the area, but I notice they're being renovated for families now. I'm not sure where older renters are going to go if social housing isn't built soon tbh.

I can always go back to the small plot of land my parents have and put a cabin on it, which unless I strike it lucky in the meantime is the most likely option.

Addle

Mad_maxx wrote: »

She sounds like a terrible planner,something is amiss if you have worked constantly since twenty yet face retirement with a bleak outlook, the state pension is extremely generous, she e should be grand

A single lady I know of retired lately after spending her whole working life renting in Dublin, on a low level wage, and has just bought a house in her hometown for cash from her lifetime of savings.

niallers1

Those who saved and worked and sacrificed to pay for their own house and paid tax/prsi should get the state pension.

Some people here suggesting that homeowners shouldn't.

So if instead that homeowner instead of paying a mortgage decided to spend that money in the pub and said to hell with it i'm going to let the state take care of my housing and at the end of it i'll get the state pension.

Tell me again why the person who sacrificed and worked and decided to put a roof over their family head should not get the state pension they contributed towards and the layabout should get it.

The state pension belongs to the person making the PRSI contributions.
The house paid for by sacrifice belongs to the homeowner.

Two separate things,

Mad_maxx

pc7 wrote: »

Well I don't judge her or anyone in that positions. Jesus at least she has done her best. She'd be on a low wage, not everyone rises up through the ranks or the ambition for management etc. A generous state pension is nothing if you are renting in Dublin

ETA - leaving school 43 years ago is very different to now, again I wouldn't judge her on todays standards.

Housing is far more expensive today than forty three years ago relative to wages