Pensioners

I don't know why it is in this country that when the word "pensioners" is mentioned, people automatically think "poor people". So when Revenue and the Department of Social Protection coordinated their information, and found that over 100,000 pensioners who were getting both a private pension and a state pension were not paying sufficient tax, and when Revenue said that that's going to have to change, there was a major HooHaa in the media. Joe Duffy apparently had a field day on Liveline yesterday!

But what about all those other pensioners who had been paying their taxes? And all other tax payers? We're not here to bankroll these 100,000 poor pensioners! And anyways, Revenue has said that they won't pursue the small amounts. So spare us the sob stories.

I think it's only fair that these pensioners should be paying their taxes like everyone else. And apparently that's going to bring in 200 Million Euro annually. I'd rather that money was used for creating jobs for young people, the future of this country, than financing pensioners' winter holidays in Spain.

I'm delighted we finally have a government who's got the balls to take on these unpopular steps, for the greater good. They're not perfect, but they're definitely a whole lot better than the previous guys!

What do you think?