UK Chancellor George Osborne has confirmed that the state pension age will rise to 66 by 2020 for both men and women.
The increase, which is six years before the rise previously planned by Labour, will begin to be phased in from 2018. This also means that the female pension age will be brought in line with the male age quicker too, it is expected that women and men will have a joint retirement age of 65 by the end of 2018, leading to the rise to 66.
Chancellor Osborne predicts that these new measures will save the government over £5 billion per year. Osborne said: “Raising the state pension age is what many countries are now doing, and will by the end of the next parliament save over £5bn a year - money which will be used to provide a more generous basic state pension as we manage demographic pressures.”
The faster rise is due to both national debt and the fact that people are living longer, in turn this will only mean that future rises will also come quicker than planned.