Joel has finally landed his first graduate engineering job after years of lower-paid roles. He's in his early 20s, lives with his parents in London, and works in the capital. But instead of spending the extra cash on holidays or a house deposit, he is pouring more into his workplace pension. The reason? He does not believe the state pension will exist when he retires.
"I don't believe that I'll be a recipient of a state pension," Joel says. "I know a lot of people my age don't think they're going to be... There just won't be enough money."
“Half of Gen Z do not expect the state pension to exist by the time they retire.”
He is not alone. Around half of Gen Z — those born between 1997 and 2012 — say they do not expect the state pension to be around by the time they retire. Growing up with headlines about an ageing population and a shrinking working-age population, Joel thinks his generation will bear the cost.
"It just mathematically doesn't make sense," he says. "There has to get to a point where that state pension is taking up too much of the budget and can't exist in the way that it exists right now."
The state pension age is already shifting. From the start of April, it began rising from 66 to 67, reaching that level by March 2028. It is due to go up again to 68 in 20 years, though a government review may bring that forward.
For 27-year-old retail manager Connor, that is a source of frustration. "The goalpost keeps moving," he says. "At the minute I'll be 68 by the time I can retire, but I do think I'll be probably closer to 75, if I'm honest."
More than 13 million people — 19% of the population — are currently of state pension age. Even with the age rising to 68, that group is projected to exceed 15 million by 2050, nearly a quarter of the population, and climb towards 17 million by the 2070s. That means more people claiming the pension, and fewer workers paying taxes to fund it.
At the same time, almost half of working-age adults are not paying into a private pension. Many will rely solely on the state pension for retirement income — and relative poverty rates among pensioners already stand at 14%.