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I did a shed load of work and research on fuel poverty (which is broadly defined as when you’re spending more than 10% of your income on energy) three years ago and, on paper, OAP’s are disproportionately affected but, in reality, it’s a lot smaller.
One of the biggest “real world” differences we found was how frugal OAP’s really were, irrespective of income, and we actually found that the “better-off” they were, the more frugal they tended to be - we found many who could afford their energy bills comfortably but would rather put a coat (or two!) on.
That's very interesting.
One could argue that it's actually the other way around: those who were frugal throughout their lives, were consequently "better-off" at old age.
And this is one of the issues with means testing for OAPs - it tends to penalise those who lead modest lives and lived with in their means while saving for their retirement, and favour those who spent their money while they've had it or otherwise just never learned how to manage their finances.
Obviously there's more to it, but just to point-out that means-testing for OAPs is far from being the perfect tool.
Some OAP benefits are universal, e.g. prescription fee exemption for the over 60, or Senior Railcard. I certainly think that we should see more of these.