Life expectancy did not suddenly shoot up, it has been rising steadily for decades. I wonder why our pensions were okay in the 1960s when life expectancy was ~70 but not okay now when life expectancy is ~80. Just think if it was the other way round with a very young population, you'd surely see the bosses telling us that we have to cut schools because of the large number of children born. http://www.redpepper.org.uk/pensions-mythbuster/ As an undergraduate at Imperial, I would've been sympathetic if a lecturer had simply told us why they were going on strike. They could've explained to students that academics cannot do good science if they're afraid for their old age, and that the strike benefits all future lecturers including many currently studying. To the previous poster who wondered why UCU only strike about pensions instead of more important things. The reason is simple, it's against the law. The International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union mentioned in the blog post used their power to benefit everybody in society not just their members, but unions in the UK are only allowed to strike for pay and pensions. These anti-union laws were first passed by the Thatcher government and were not repealed by New Labour.