How will auto-enrolment affect you? The winners and losers of the pension scheme
Workers in their 20s and the low-paid will benefit most while employers will see costs rise
Those aged between 23 and 60 and earning more than €20,000 will be automatically enrolled in the scheme. Stock image: Getty
In January 1909, when the Old Age Pensions Act became law, the over-70s in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland became entitled to a pension for the first time. The uptake was far greater proportionally in pre-independence Ireland than it was in Britain, with some officials noting how the Irish ‘septuagenarians’ queuing up to claim their five shillings a week looked remarkably youthful for their age.
Before the civil registration of births in 1864, most Irish Catholics had no way of proving their age. Instead, officials had to rely on a series of questions to determine how old pension applicants were. One way to establish proof of age was to ask whether the claimant could recall the Night of the Big Wind, a ferocious storm that had wreaked havoc across Ireland in January 1839.
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