Insufficient pension: “Millions of women face a slide into poverty in old age”
Created: 01/16/2023, 11:15 am
By: Lisa Mayerhofer
Millions of women are headed for low pensions despite 40 years of full-time work.
Dietmar Bartsch from the left speaks of "catastrophic numbers".
An overview.
Munich – Countless women in Germany only receive a small pension in old age.
This is not only because many of them work part-time.
Because every third woman with a full-time job is heading for a net pension of less than 1000 euros, even after 40 years of work.
This emerges from a response from the Federal Ministry of Labor to a request from the left, which is available to the
editorial network Germany
.
According to this, around 2.7 million women are affected.
With a total of 7.1 million full-time employees, this corresponds to a share of around 38 percent.
Low pension despite 40 years of full-time employment
In order to get a monthly pension of 1000 euros net, employees currently have to earn 2844 euros gross per month for 40 years.
To be entitled to a pension of 1,200 euros, employees need a gross monthly wage of 3,413 euros for 40 years, the editorial network quotes from the ministry's answer.
Accordingly, women will be disproportionately affected by low pensions.
With a total of 32.6 percent, only just under a third of all full-time employees are women.
But the proportion of women among full-time employees with low pensions is significantly higher: 48.5 percent of full-time employees who are heading for a pension of less than 1,000 euros even after 45 years of work are female.
Millions of women are headed for low pensions despite 40 years of full-time work.
(Iconic image) © Christin Klose/dpa-tmn
In view of inflation and the already high level of old-age poverty among women, these are "catastrophic numbers," said Left Party leader Dietmar Bartsch, who had made the request to the Ministry of Labor.
"More than half of all full-time workers will receive less than 1200 euros after 40 years of drudgery," Bartsch told the
editorial network
.
"Millions of women are at risk of sliding into poverty in old age," he warned.
Women and old-age provision: Germany in last place
On average, German women even receive less than 1,000 euros in statutory pensions: the average pension for all women on old-age pensions is around 807 euros, while men draw an average of 1,227 euros as old-age pensions.
The problem is bigger in Germany than in other industrialized countries: according to a study by Allianz, German women bring up the rear in an OECD comparison when it comes to their old-age provision.
According to this, in Germany the gender-specific pension gap in old-age provision for women compared to men is over 40 percent.
In contrast, the so-called gender pension gap in France is 36 percent, in Denmark only seven percent and in Estonia it is almost non-existent at one percent, according to Allianz.
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There are many reasons for this: First, women are paid less than men on average – even if they work in the same position.
And those who earn less pay less into the statutory pension.
In addition, many women work part-time – mostly to be able to look after the children – or have long breaks in their employment to start a family or to look after relatives.
Returning to work or increasing the number of working hours is often difficult.
As a result, according to Allianz, women pay an average of twelve years less into the statutory pension insurance system than men.
Then there is the fact that women live an average of five years longer than men and therefore have to make do with their savings from working life over a longer period of time.
All of this means that it can become difficult for women to maintain their standard of living as they get older.
Women should definitely find out how much money they can expect to have in old age
But what can women do to protect themselves in old age?
According to Allianz, 59 percent of the women surveyed do not know how much money they can expect to have in old age.
The entitlements to the statutory pension can be calculated individually - more information is available from the Deutsche Rentenversicherung.
If you are heading towards a low pension, you should check the options for a company or private pension scheme.
After all, anyone who manages to save small amounts for old-age provision at a young age can benefit greatly later on.
It's also worth getting together with the family - because every single member should be secure in old age and, in case of an emergency, know about their financial future.
With material from the AFP
