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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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The history of state pensions in the UK
— 1948 to 2010 | | Author(s) | Antoine Bozio, Rowena Crawford, Gemma Tetlow |
| Corporate Author | Institute for Fiscal Studies - IFS |
| Publisher | Institute for Fiscal Studies, London, 2010 |
| Pages | 79 pp (IFS briefing note BN 105) |
| Source | Link to download: https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/5000 |
| Keywords | Pensions ; Retirement policy ; Social policy ; Histories. |
| Annotation | This Briefing Note describes state pension provision in the United Kingdom from the inception of the basic state pension in 1948 following the Beveridge Report, to the Pensions Act 2007 and the plans of the Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition government. The main objective is to provide a comprehensive description of the rules that currently determine pension benefits, as well as those that have been in place in the past. The authors also provide a brief historical overview of the dilemmas facing policymakers when contemplating pension reforms and a summary of the most recent reforms. The history of the UK pension system is of a mainly non-contributory system, periodically tempted by the higher replacement rate of social insurance schemes, but always frightened once the costs become apparent. Recent reforms have tilted the system further in the direction of a universal flat-rate benefit, abandoning any social insurance design. This confirms that the main objective of the UK state pension system is to reduce poverty at old age. These flat-rate pensions will also reduce the reliance of the system on means-tested benefits, somewhat reinforcing Beveridge's design of the system. Given these clarifications, it is unfortunate that the latest reforms have still sought to maintain much of the complex structure of the pre-existing system, instead of reforming and rationalising it. However, once issues of transition have been dealt with, there may yet be scope for simplifying the presentation of the rules. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-161113002 E |
| Classmark | JJ: G5: TM2: 6A |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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