The ONS has published the latest healthy life expectancy data: Healthy life expectancy, UK
Helen Morrissey, head of retirement analysis, Hargreaves Lansdown: “We may be living longer, but we aren’t living healthier, with the latest data showing healthy life expectancy has plummeted. In 2022-24, men in the UK can expect to spend 60.7 years in "good" general health. This compares to 60.9 years for women. Compared to 2019-21, this is a decrease of 1.8 and 2.5 years and is at the lowest level since the data was first collected in 2011-13.
There are huge differences across the country, with Richmond upon Thames having the highest healthy life expectancy across both men (69.3 years) and women (70.3 years). Blackpool has the lowest at 50.9 and 51.8 years, respectively.
These discrepancies have massive implications for our retirement planning. Poor health can have massive impacts on our ability to keep working and building up a pension for our retirement. It puts people in the sticky position of building a smaller pension because their working lives are shorter but needing it to last longer.
Added to this is the issue with the state pension. The state pension age will soon be making its way up to age 67. It forms the very backbone of people’s retirement income and yet there will be many who will have a gap of several years between potentially having to leave work and claiming this benefit – how do they make up the gap?
These will be big issues for the government, with a review into the state pension age ongoing. The issue of healthy life expectancy will be key in any discussions around whether the state pension age needs to rise further. It also shows the huge importance of offering flexible working arrangements, or re-training, to those who may still be able to keep working in some capacity.
Auto-enrolment will play a huge role in boosting people’s pension adequacy over time. The fact that people are enrolled into a workplace pension from the age of 22 enables them to build a pension that will give them some level of resilience in retirement. Wherever possible, people should try and boost contributions as and when they can afford it - for instance when they get a payrise to help build their pension further.
It also shows the massive importance of building savings over and above pensions if you are able to. It might be the case that you need to leave or make big modifications to your working life at an age where you are unable to access your pension. In this case, having money in ISAs and savings accounts will be hugely important in giving you something else to draw from.”
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