As of: March 8, 2024, 9:13 a.m
By: Klaus Rimpel
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The traffic light pension package puts the issue in the spotlight.
Various measures should be taken to combat poverty in old age.
Munich - The traffic light wants to set the pension level at 48 percent of the average salary by 2040 - even that will not be financed without increasing contributions.
Because the baby boomers will soon be retiring.
A further risk of increasing poverty in old age arises from the fact that the actual net pensions (after deducting health insurance and taxes) are far lower than the official average pension (1,550 euros) suggests.
For the average pension you have to have paid into the pension fund for 35 years.
Less pension - women are more affected by poverty in old age
According to the German pension insurance, what is actually left of the pension when everyone is included (including mini-jobbers etc.) is on average only 1054 euros net - around 500 euros below the average pension.
There is particularly little left for women, whose employment histories are often characterized by parenting and part-time work.
In addition, women are still often paid less than their male colleagues for the same work.
The result is an imbalance: while men receive an average of 1,295 euros net, women receive an average of 863 euros, according to a data analysis by “Zeit”.
66 percent of women receive a pension that is below or average - for men this is only 40.3 percent.
More than 15 percent of men receive 1,950 euros or more, while only 1.9 percent of women receive this.
Women could later be more likely to be affected by poverty in old age than men.
© IMAGO/Sven Simon
Inequality - people with a lot of pensions have additional assets
“The pension is the mirror of working life,” says Bavarian DGB deputy Verena Di Pasquale.
“In order to effectively combat poverty in old age and give women the chance to lead an independent life today, changes are needed in the labor market” – such as socially insured and collectively paid employment from the first euro instead of mini-jobs and employment at low wages, says Di Pasquale.
By setting the pension level at 48 percent, pension expenditure will rise from the current 372 billion euros to around 800 billion euros by 2045 due to the aging of society.
The contribution rate that employees and employers have to pay for the pension is likely to increase from the current 18.6 to 22.7 percent (2045).
People with less pension should continue to work
Against this background, Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) advocates incentives for all those who continue to work past retirement age.
“In this way, the employer’s unemployment and pension shares could be paid out as an additional fee,” said Habeck on RTL/ntv.
“Then it would become even more financially worthwhile to work longer, and everyone would get more out of it.” Employed old-age pensioners are exempt from pension and unemployment insurance - but today employers still pay the same amount of contributions for these social insurance schemes as for younger employees.