I agree, coming up to 65 next year. You get c**p when you take an annuity out, the govt (along with the bank robbers) have mad interest from our savings almost worthless, and the govt doesn't care - as usual sponge off those that have saved, we don't care.

Clive

absolutely agree, joined pensions when 20yrs old now 64 and they are c--p.
Legal and general pays out on my 60th birthday but refuses to pay, I,m now 64, say they didnt make the money so they are entitled to keep it till I,m 65, 5yrs late I wonder what wonderfull excuse they will have next year. Do not touch them with a barge pole. 5 other work pensions paying out but all $%^&. After 45 pension years don,t get 7000 pounds a year.
Jimmie from Scotland

The big problem is people are living far too long. In the middle ages most people died in their 40s, so pensions were not an issue. Better health care, nutrition and so on created the situation we have today. Also in those times Altsheimers, Parkinsons Disease etc. were also unknown. Of couse nature really requires people to live only to their child bearing ages, it requires nothing more ....

Oh and I am quite happy - at 65 my income goes UP - by the State Pension. Cannot wait to live at a ... higher level ... !!!!

Just goes to prove we need to save more and save sensibly! certainly cant rely on the Government for a pension.

Pensions:

Tax relief at source and (almost) tax-free compounding = a good deal to me.

My employer pays 20% into my pension in return for a 3% contribution. If I pay another 3, they will match it.

Yes thanks for telling us what we already knew, Professor Louis! This isn't the History channel!

Never bothered with pension schemes in the past because they always looked suspicious when you checked into them. So worked up to buying a large house now can downsize and pocket cash without being taxed. My age? 69 and still enjoying a good life.

wish we had done same. paid tax and pension contributions all our working lives, now my husband is disabled and we need help with care, equipment alterations etc. Guess what? because he now has a small occupational pension (less than 300£ month) we dont qualify for help, we have to pay! If we hadnt worked if he didnt have this pension we would get that wonderful passport to benefit, income support which would enable us to have the equipment and help we need at no cost to anyone except the people who are paying tax now, so beware out there you may be doing yourselves a serious disadvantage by working at all, and definitely if you are aquiring a pension.

I agree with not paying into a pension scheme. All the foreigners and dole scroungers will still live well off the state despite paying next to nothing in.

If, in the future, the money runs out to be able to pay them any pension, then life will be so unbearable for all.

Best idea I heard of is to buy one 1oz gold coin every time you have enough saved in your pension pot. Then hide them away, tell no-one especially the Gov or DHSS. Then when you are of pensionable age, sell one per month (or more depending on what you need and have ac$%^&ulated, and gold being gold will always be inflation proof, so if a 1oz coin is worth a good weeks wage now, so it will by time you retire.
Also, it will not be traceable by inland revenue and will top up any pittance the Gov hand out.

True you will not get interest on it, but you won't be lining someone elses pocket, or have it plunge in value, or have it stolen from you if you end up in a home being spoon fed soup.

Exactly folks.

Over the decades, most people faced with the choice of commuting some of the pension for a tax-free lump sum have taken it.

The Word "pension" had disappeared up someones trouserleg. It was only ever just a word.

Conclusion number one: if the rules had permitted 100% commutation there wouldn't be any "pensions".

Conclusion number two: it was only ever a tax-assisted investment.....and the value of investments can fall as well as rise.

It's all just a hedge against the enemy; inflation.

Concentrate on that. Be objective,not subjective.

Deflation is your friend; it most certainly is for those of us who bought our long-term gilt holdings (sorry, were forced to take these awful things called "pensions") a while back.

What a scandal.

I've many times sued myself for giving myself such poor advice.

So what have u done with the profits from your house william?

Did u buy an anuity? Stick it in the bank?

Yes, this Labour government has treated pensioners and working people very badly, but working people are ALWAYS worse off after any Labour government. In this case we've had not only Prudence Brown's incompetence but his irresponsibility too, and so much of it while his toxic, corrosive boss Tony Blair was in charge.

By the way, there's no such word as independant. It's independent.

your taxed when you earn it then taxed again on your pension what is the point - if you dont have enough to live on it will be topped up with pension credits/housing benifit/council tax benifits I agree spend it

Twiggie old bean,

Correction;you get tax relief on the way in and are taxed on the way out (except to the extent you are able to commute the pension for a lump sum).

See earlier post; it still doesn't make "pensions" that special - it's simply about "investing" money....and people who haven't slightest idea what that means (i e the vast majority of the population of the globe) should steer well clear.

It still does not alter it - Pensions are totally stuffed. But then - you need lots of loot in those 30s/40s "kids/marriage/mortgage/ garage full of junk" years, not when you are older. Too old to have fun with it then ....

An alternative and luckier history and different conclusion:

I started my pensions savings aged 23 on joining a company with a final salary scheme. I separately took out endowment savings to support a planned early retirement at 55. I worked my way to a compulsory redundancy aged 52 (hooray) and invested the pay-off in repaying mortgage and taking out an NFU immediate vesting pension avoiding paying some £18k in income tax in the process, and taking an immediate pension from my employer which is luckily solvent with finances vastly in excess of its pension fund commitments.

I have now been retired 3 years and enjoy all the voluntary and leisure activities that should not be rightfully mine until 65 or is that 66.... I await the first endowment payouts next year and a State Pension top up in 10 years time as a pay rise (which might not be much!)

Smug - yes perhaps, but like others the endowments are not what we expected, but then I didn't expect to gain so much on property values in my lifetime either. Its swings and roundabouts.

I advise my children to put some of their relatively high earnings aside towards pensions, but this is only part of their assets and should be seen as a mix with the associated risks understood. Having fun is part of a sensible mix you have to live a little!

Living off state benefits and having few spare resources is not fun, even if it does mean that you may be taking out more than you put in - this does not make you a winner.

I believe it is dangerous to encourage the younger generation to believe that state benefits of the kind present today will still be there to support them in 40 years time - I fear that the UK and other countries may have to severely reduce their social payments. They need to plan on the basis of paddling their own canoes!