Every UK citizen is entitled to a basic state pension once they reach the qualifying age. This is one of the great aspects when it comes to living in a welfare state, but ultimately someone has to foot the bill. More and more people are using the basic state pension, and rightly so. The majority of people have been working and paying taxes all their life and so they deserve to be paid back by society.

This is one side of the argument, but others believe that the benefits of state pensions are causing a huge drain on the economy. This is partially due to the fact that the life expectancy age is rising, whilst the qualifying age for a basic state pension has remained stagnant for many years.

The government are aware of this argument, and so are attempting to keep basic state pensions, whilst also making some cutbacks and reforms in a bid to free up some much needed money for the rest of society. The government’s main reform suggestions are as follows.

• To raise the qualifying age for a basic state pension. The ultimate goal is to raise this age to 66 for both men and women by 2020.
• A persons leaving salary used to effect how much a person was eligible to receive. The government now wants “career average” to be the deciding factor.
• Introduce new tax rates based on an individual’s current salary to accommodate for increased expenditure on state pensions.

These proposals aim to save money for the government, whilst at the same time not getting rid of the basic state pension scheme. It should in theory make gaining state pensions a fairer process for everyone. But some people are not so keen on the idea. This is because it could be argued that some who work full time, but are on a low wage will have to pay for the pensions of people who earn a lot more than the national average. This seems totally unfair, but in the same light why should someone on a low wage have their pension cut. The above proposals are the governments solution to try and rectify this problem, and ultimately they want to make sure that state pensions are available to everyone and are fair.