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Discounts for OAPs


DaveH said:
Well, all you need to do is find a political party that wants to put the time and effort in to making OAP discounts a priority and vote for them. Until one pops up, you are stuck seething with bitterness.

Do bear in mind that there is no direct benefit to any government in doing so. Also remember the point of free bus travel is to get older people out and socialising and an active pensioner base means lower NHS and care costs. All these discounted tuna sandwiches contribute to that.
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I love how you’re so arrogant and so sure you’re right that anyone disagreeing with you is “seething with bitterness”
 
Mousehold Mackem said:
So if you work hard you shouldn't be rewarded for that hard work? Right.
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Isn't the reward the coin you get/your wages?

Most agree that those who earn more should pay more tax.

And yet we don't apply the same thinking to age. Just you're a certain age so here's a discount.

As with most things, means testing woukd seem the fairest way to go about things. There's some very wealthy pensioners. There's also some who are skint.
DaveH said:
Well, all you need to do is find a political party that wants to put the time and effort in to making OAP discounts a priority and vote for them. Until one pops up, you are stuck seething with bitterness.

Do bear in mind that there is no direct benefit to any government in doing so. Also remember the point of free bus travel is to get older people out and socialising and an active pensioner base means lower NHS and care costs. All these discounted tuna sandwiches contribute to that.
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On the flip side, as you saying pensioners with a load of coin won't get out, socislise and spend if they have to pay full price?
 
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dangermows said:
Isn't the reward the coin you get/your wages?

Most agree that those who earn more should pay more tax.

And yet we don't apply the same thinking to age. Just you're a certain age so here's a discount.

As with most things, means testing woukd seem the fairest way to go about things. There's some very wealthy pensioners. There's also some who are skint.
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Agreed. There are some very wealthy pensioners just as there are some very wealthy non-pensioners. They both pay tax on their income.

As I've already pointed out... kids get discounts, families get discounts, families get family allowance. But apparently their discounts should remain in place and pensioners should lose theirs.

Various governments have abandoned and/or failed to introduce means testing. No one on here has been able to show if there are any real benefits to it's reintroduction.

I'm just looking for a little logic here. All we get is dog in a manger bitterness.
 
Mousehold Mackem said:
Agreed. There are some very wealthy pensioners just as there are some very wealthy non-pensioners. They both pay tax on their income.

As I've already pointed out... kids get discounts, families get discounts, families get family allowance. But apparently their discounts should remain in place and pensioners should lose theirs.

Various governments have abandoned and/or failed to introduce means testing. No one on here has been able to show if there are any real benefits to it's reintroduction.

I'm just looking for a little logic here. All we get is dog in a manger bitterness.
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Fair post.
 
As we don't shop at Iceland pay the same as everybody else, same with heating oil and electricity same with road tax and car insurance, holiday insurance pay more as we are older , tv licence pat the same as every else, get a bus pass i use occasionally free prescriptions ( got them at 60 ) and eye test, just had cataracts done so only cheap reading glasses from boots so no more eye tests.
 
Makem57 said:
As we don't shop at Iceland pay the same as everybody else, same with heating oil and electricity same with road tax and car insurance, holiday insurance pay more as we are older , tv licence pat the same as every else, get a bus pass i use occasionally free prescriptions ( got them at 60 ) and eye test, just had cataracts done so only cheap reading glasses from boots so no more eye tests.
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So other than the free things you mentioned there, that other people don’t usually get, and a WFA you failed to mention, you get nothing extra? Okay.
 
Well obviously rich pensioners will pay larger tax than not so well off pensioners. I would class myself as a not so well off pensioner. About 15 years ago my tax number was in the 300's, it's now down to into the 30's. The only difference in my income is the yearly pension rise.
 
I don’t know why but this thread seems to have a morbid fascination for me.

I was just doing my monthly ‘accounts’ this morning. I do it on state pension day - coincidentally - and just review my bank accounts and spending and check up on my pension funds, savings interest and all that. I think it comes from being challenged by figures. I overcompensate. In that regard, three words describe me: almost numerate.

Anyway.

I was pondering. And the telly was on with people - pensioners included - regarding the energy price cap. And I realised that my state pension (which is maximum) accounts for about half of my income. The rest is derived from pensions that I set up at various times from various jobs and savings. My income is nowhere near what I was earning when I stopped work. But it balances out that I don’t have the associated expenses, and I don’t have debt.

If I was relying on my state pension we’d be fucked. My wife doesn’t have any work or private pensions to speak of and her state pension doesn’t kick-in until 2027. By which time, depending on how the diagnosis progresses, she will probably no longer be around.

That situation applies to a large number of people that I know - family etc. The raising of the pension age means that some I know that have retired due to health of whatever and won’t get the state pension for a few years yet. But then it’ll probably only be about half of what they need to live

So I’m certainly not poor or badly off. I’m not well off either. However ‘off’ I am is due to my own efforts or failures

Anything I have to apply for, as a general rule, I don’t. Although whilst I was getting a blue badge for the missus I applied for a bus pass. Never used it.
 
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Frijj said:
So other than the free things you mentioned there, that other people don’t usually get, and a WFA you failed to mention, you get nothing extra? Okay.
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The wfa should be scrapped, no other benefits, I have never claimed a benefit i my working life , have too much savings to get pension credits
Makem57 said:
The wfa should be scrapped, no other benefits, I have never claimed a benefit i my working life , have too much savings to get pension credits
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I forgot the £10 Christmas bonus 🤣🤣
 
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Frijj said:
I love how you’re so arrogant and so sure you’re right that anyone disagreeing with you is “seething with bitterness”
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Not the fact that we don’t agree, it is the amount of energy you put into posting about people you hate. The last few days it is your anger that an old granny can have a slightly cheaper scone.

For anyone to be so angry about something so trivial that has no effect on you, does seem to be seething with bitterness to me.

Let it go. Old people get discounts, as do students and other groups of people. FFS, I can get all sorts of discounts through my work, mobile phone contract and RAC membership. There are so many options, I generally don’t keep track. Discounts for groups is such a big thing, it will still be here in 20 years time. Learn to deal with it. Posting post after post about all the things you hate is not good.
dangermows said:
Isn't the reward the coin you get/your wages?

Most agree that those who earn more should pay more tax.

And yet we don't apply the same thinking to age. Just you're a certain age so here's a discount.

As with most things, means testing woukd seem the fairest way to go about things. There's some very wealthy pensioners. There's also some who are skint.

On the flip side, as you saying pensioners with a load of coin won't get out, socislise and spend if they have to pay full price?
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So how would means testing work.

“Ok love, a cup of tea and a bit of cake, that will be £4.20, but if you can show me all your finances, I’ll nip in the back, go over them and you could have it for £4.”
 
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DaveH said:
So how would means testing work.

“Ok love, a cup of tea and a bit of cake, that will be £4.20, but if you can show me all your finances, I’ll nip in the back, go over them and you could have it for £4.”
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You raise a very valid point in fairness, despite the jibing. I guess it'd have to be a wider thing where a general discount card is offered, that covers a lot of things and businesses sign up to.

Not very feasible in truth.

So I guess we can at least settle on the fact that plenty will get get discounts when they are well off, simply due to And also, those wealthy OAPs will go out regardless rather than the narrative that they'd only go out if discounts are offered.

As you were.
 
I know a pensioner on state pension that offers to alphabetise people’s book collections for a fiver per every 30 books. He’ll index by surname of the author or year of publication, if that’s what you really want. He does dvds also. He had to fill in a SA100 this year and HMRC are pursuing him for the last 3 years when he didn’t file. Just a pensioner trying to earn an extra few by doing jobs for people that they can’t be bothered to do themselves. What has the world come too? He changes remote batteries for 50p ago too.
 
Mousehold Mackem said:
So if you work hard you shouldn't be rewarded for that hard work? Right.
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Of course you should
For me everyone should be encouraged to work and it must be more financially beneficial to do so ( if you are able)
Got to be good for physical and mental health-which in turn benefits the likes of the NHS as well as individuals and families
 
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dangermows said:
You raise a very valid point in fairness, despite the jibing. I guess it'd have to be a wider thing where a general discount card is offered, that covers a lot of things and businesses sign up to.

Not very feasible in truth.

So I guess we can at least settle on the fact that plenty will get get discounts when they are well off, simply due to And also, those wealthy OAPs will go out regardless rather than the narrative that they'd only go out if discounts are offered.

As you were.
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So that becomes a government thing.

At present you have private businesses making their own decision to give OAPs (amongst many other groups) a discount, mostly as a marketing thing.

If this was a means tested discount eligibility card, then you need a government department to annually perform the means test, and distribute cards. That is likely to need a photo, so then you have post offices involved. Clearly you could not charge for that if it is only for low income OAPs so then it becomes a tax payer problem to fund all this.

And this takes me back to why it is not going to change for at least the next 20 years. Because the only real way to stop it is to pass a law or use tax payer money to produce a card. That means rather than being a thing that does not affect middle aged people, except for making a few feel a bit miffed, all tax payers end up funding something to make a minority feel better. There is zero benefit for the government. What is the point? The 'problem' does not affect someone in their 30s-50s, but the solution will. Doesn't sound like a good selling point to me.

Then you have the party aspect. Such a policy, based around little more than envy with no government gain, is not traditionally the sort of thing Labour or Lib Dem would do. The politics of hate and division has been the staple for Reform and Tories desperate to be like Reform. It is the sort of thing they might do, except it directly makes life worse for their core demographic, so would be insane for them to do. That leaves us with nobody likely to do it and no easy answer.

I literally can not see a reason why or a possible way that discounts for OAPs are going to go away. So shrug it off and lets hope we all have a few decades of being able to enjoy them ourselves between retirement age and our time being up.
 
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