British Academy: The UK's National Academy for the Humanities and Social Sciences
Why has it all gone wrong? The past, present and future of British pensions
Abstract
Beveridge and pensions
Professor Jose Harris (Oxford)
This paper will briefly review Beveridge?s thinking about pension issues, from his critique of the original Old Age Pensions Act of 1908, through to his commentary on pensions aspects of the post-war national insurance and assistance legislation of 1946-8. However, the main focus will be on the underlying principles and financial planning that lay behind the pension proposals of the Beveridge Report (including Beveridge?s negotiations with the Treasury, the trade union and friendly society movements, and pensioner pressure groups). It will also comment on Beveridge?s predictions of future pension costs, and on the issue of ?retirement?. The paper will assess the degree of priority given to pension issues in relation to other competing expenditure commitments of the 1940s,. such as economic reconstruction, full employment, child support, housing etc. It will also consider how far Beveridge?s proposals and their implementation were influenced by the structural inheritance of a much older system of public pension provision under the poor laws.