38 and 43 – magic numbers for seniority pensions. For whom?
ZUS calculated that if seniority pensions became available, approximately 380,000 people would benefit from them immediately. Poles. The government is doing everything it can to prevent this from happening. So what?
The possibility of retiring before reaching the statutory retirement age is a very attractive vision at first glance, but not everyone will benefit from it. The condition is to have appropriate length of service and an appropriate amount of contributions on the ZUS account.
The Sejm includes both civic (e.g. NSZZ “Solidarity”) and government projects, and differences in proposals regarding the required experience and age make it difficult to quickly adopt the regulations.
Government project with longer work experience
This type of pension benefit would give many seniors the opportunity to retire before reaching the statutory retirement age, but still subject to sufficient length of service.
In the current pension system, women must work and pay contributions to ZUS for at least 20 years, men – for 25 years. In such a situation, ZUS will grant a minimum pension if the employee has not accumulated a sufficient amount of capital in the ZUS account. When an employee does not have adequate length of service, the pension is most often classified as pennies, i.e. below the minimum pension.
According to the government project prepared by the Ministry of Family, Labor and Social Policy, the internship pension would be available to people insured in ZUS, but also to people using KRUS. The new solution is intended to help especially those whose health condition does not allow them to continue working until they reach the standard retirement age.
The ministerial project included two specific thresholds: women could be entitled to a seniority pension after 38 years of contribution periods, and men after 43 years. The seniority pension calculated in this way could not be lower than the minimum pension. This means that even a person with a sufficiently long period of experience would not receive the benefit if the calculations result in an amount below the statutory minimum.
The effect of introducing seniority pensions in Slovakia
The trade union and the Left have a different proposal – 35 years of work experience for women, 40 years for men. The calculated seniority pension also could not be lower than the guaranteed minimum pension.
OPZZ and NSZZ “Solidarność” constantly remind the government of the need to adopt these changes, justifying it with the need to protect very long-serving people who, due to loss of strength, are unable to continue working until the age of 60 or 65.
Slovakia decided to introduce such a benefit in 2023. Over 61,000 people immediately took advantage of the opportunity. people, i.e. 2.5 times more than usual. In 2024, up to 22,000 people were leaving the labor market. employees per month, which resulted in the need to replace them with employees from India, Ukraine and the Philippines – the case was described by the Slovak daily “The Slovak Spectator”. In the spring of 2024, the Slovak government introduced changes to seniority pensions and made them dependent on a variable retirement age instead of a fixed age of 40.
