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  • July 2017
07

State pension age hike leaves women £32 a week worse off

Open-access content 2nd August 2017

Approximately 1.1 million women in their early 60s are £32 worse off each week as a result of increases to the state pension age at the start of the decade.

2

That is according to research released today by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS), which shows that the age increase from 60 to 63 between 2010 and 2016 resulted in considerably less generous benefits for women aged 60-62 today.

This was partially offset by higher employment rates and earnings, but not enough to prevent a net fall in income, while the age rise boosted public finances by £5.1bn per year by 2015/16.

"The tax and benefit system is much more generous to those above the state pension age than those below it," IFS senior research economist, Jonathan Cribb, said.

"So while increasing the state pension age is a coherent response to the public finance challenge posed by rising longevity, it does place a further pressure on household budgets.

"The increased state pension age is boosting employment - and therefore earnings - of affected women, but this is only partially offsetting reduced incomes from state pensions and other benefits."

It is estimated that the government is providing £4.2bn less of these benefits through the increase in the state pension age, which is set to rise again to 68 between 2037 and 2039.

It was also found that as the reduction in income is similar in cash terms for richer and poorer households, the decline is hitting those worse off significantly harder.

However, there was no evidence of any increase in the proportion of those reporting being unable to afford important items, suggesting that despite lower incomes, families have managed to smooth their spending over time.

"It was right to bring women's state pension age in line with men's and to do so, not at one fell swoop, but to phase it in gradually over a period of time," Barnett Waddingham senior consultant, Malcolm McLean, said.

"It was perhaps inevitable that the increase would hit some women more strongly than others.

"But over the longer term, as more women choose to adopt different lifestyles than their predecessors, we must hope such losses will not occur, and greater equality across the board will be the order of the day."


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This article appeared in our July 2017 issue of The Actuary.
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