Callous attitude to fate of pensioners

YOU quote Colm McCarthy (July 17): “If people used to snuff it at 70 and now they’ve decided to snuff it at 80 or 85 or 90, then something’s got to give… if people are unhappy with either of those (huge increases in tax or huge increases in funded private sector schemes), it seems to me the obvious alternative is an increase in retirement age.”

Let’s take the more obvious thing first: an economic “expert” supposes that people decide when they are going to die. From what mystic area of his brain did he get this idea?

Apparently if pensioners are not going to the patriotic thing and die at 70, then the retirement age should be increased to make sure they have as little time as possible to take a rest after decades of slaving to increase the wealth of the those who are already wealthy and help keep the country running through their taxes.