On average, retirees receive much more money than retirees.
The calls for a "general overhaul" of the system are getting louder and louder.
Munich – It's an open secret: On average, civil servants who retire receive better pensions than employees who receive the statutory pension.
Since the pension level is currently 48 percent, pensioners have to make do with a little less than half of their previous income in old age.
Bartsch: "It's not the pensions that are too high, but the pensions that are too low"
Just over half of the pensioners get even less than 1000 euros paid out from the pension fund every month, as reported by the
Augsburger Allgemeine
, citing a response from the federal government to a request from the left.
Left parliamentary group leader Dietmar Bartsch complained about a disproportion between pensions and pensions: "If 82 percent of the pensions in the country are below 1,500 euros, but at the same time more than 70 percent of the pensions are above 2,000 euros, the finding is clear: at the end of a long working life there are it's a two-class society in old age."
The pension needs a “general overhaul” in order to be able to secure the standard of living in old age, said Bartsch.
"It is not the pensions that are too high on average, but the pensions that are too low." The minimum pension must be 1,200 euros net.
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For a high pension you have to pay in a lot of money over a long period of time
On average, the standard old-age pension in Germany for 2021 after all deductions was around 1200 euros for men and only 856 euros for women.
According to the Federal Ministry of Social Affairs, every fifth pensioner receives less than 500 euros a month.
If you want to increase your pension, you have to pay high contributions into the statutory pension over a long period of time, i.e. earn well over many years.
For example, those who cannot work as much because of the care of children or relatives, or who earn below average, must expect a rather meager pension.
In addition, the statutory pension is capped so that top earners do not receive an excessive amount of money in retirement.
The maximum pension that you can receive is 3241.80 euros per month - but you have to have earned an absolute top salary for 45 years.
In fact, according to the German pension insurance, only 40 pensioners in Germany achieved this in 2021: they received more than 3,000 euros a month in pension.
Pensions for civil servants in the higher service average at just under 5000 euros
It looks rosier for civil servants than for pensioners: Here, the pension is based on the last pensionable salary and the length of service.
Pensioners can receive a maximum of 71.75 percent of their last salary, which is only achieved after 40 years of employment.
According to the
Rheinische Post
, the average pension rate is currently 65.6 percent - still significantly higher than for pensioners.
This means that the pensions of civil servants are also better on average: in 2021, civil servants in the middle and lower service received an average pension of 2318 euros, civil servants in the higher service 3339 euros and in the higher service 4973 euros, reports the
insurance company
.
If all other citizens were to receive the average pension of civil servants, they would have to work for at least 78 years, postulates the
image
, referring to figures from the Federal Ministry of the Interior.
However, when making this comparison, one must bear in mind that the pensions for civil servants also include benefits that would correspond to company pension schemes for employees.
In addition, pensioners, who are usually privately insured, also have to pay the health insurance contributions themselves when they retire - even if the state usually covers 70 percent of the medical costs with subsidies.
For pensioners, half of the contribution to health insurance is covered by the pension fund.
With material from dpa and AFP
