Paul Johnson, director of the Institute of Fiscal Studies, asks if the time has come for the government to break pledges made to pensioners.

Paul Johnson, director of the Institute of Fiscal Studies, asks if the time has come for the government to break pledges made to pensioners. He charts how the average income of senior citizens has risen and is now higher than that of the rest of the population. "We are in a position we never intended," he says. "One generation has lucked out and generations coming after are not only doing much worse, but paying for the older generation." He asks whether the government can and should sustain the "triple lock" which makes the state pension rise much faster than other benefits. And he argues that the inequality between generations is now entrenching inequality within generations.

Producer: Helen Grady

Interviewees:

Torsten Bell, the Resolution Foundation

Angus Hanton, the Intergenerational Foundation

Baroness Ros Altmann, former pensions minister

John Kay, economist

Joanne Segars, Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association

Baroness Onora O'Neill, philosopher

Frances O'Grady, Trades Union Congress

Ben Page, Ipsos MORI.