70 or bust!

Current plans to raise the retirement age are not bold enough

See article

Readers' comments



DG Reid

In every industry, there is a pyramid of needs. Only so many million dollar managers are needed; only so many $100,000 ones and so on. At the end of a career, after 35-40 years of pay increases, your pay has often exceeded your productivity. Sometimes it is the person; sometimes the company just doesn't know how to utilize someone effectively. Either way, the company can do without you, and other companies have little reason to use you versus someone cheaper who can do the more limited job they must fill. It may be true that senior people have superior judgment based on experience, but who will ever know if pay is the principal thing considered. Saying people should work longer implies they stay with the same company since new opportunities are rare, and the current company may simply not need you for the available work.

The only real solution is to invest early and well for when the inevitable job separation comes. The notion that getting the government to pay you when others won't is like saying it is justified robbery.

uncle clive

There has been no mention of survivors' pensions... In particular of spouses with jobs and pensions in their own right collecting survivors' pensions. Double-dipping as we say in Canada.

But I have no idea how big an issue this is. Does anyone know?

In ye olden dayes of breadwinner and homemaker single-income marriages (the 60's) when the husband died, the wife assumed his pension but took a one-third cut, being now a single and the pension was designed for two. Fair enough!

As I understand it... When the Feminists got equality in the workplace, with their own jobs and pensions, they continued to take their husbands' pensions, to which they had forfeited all right. But I have no idea how big an issue this is in practice.

In my understanding... If a married couple of teachers say each have pensions of 60,000... and one dies... the other receives a survivor's pension of 40,000 plus their own... Which is morally repugnant to the last degree... And in any pension reform, that's the place to start... But I have no idea how big an issue this is... It hasn't been mentioned on this blog!

Does anyone know?

Pieter V.

The line arguing that the Belgian retirement age for women is 60 is wrong. That's been corrected in a gradual measure set in place in 1997 and fully in force since 2009 when the pension age became 65 for both men and women. (

Other than that, quite the article. I'd like to know what the average productivity loss with advancing age is though. But 70 or bust indeed...


Here's another scenario;

My father worked at various employers, but then somewhere in his late 40s, as he approached retirement to get the pension he was promised, the company went bust. Anyone who had already retired was Ok, but since his money wasn't vested, it was just gone. So he had to start all over again.

But I guess it turned out Ok in the longer run, since he died in his early 50s. The system works.


Let's take another tack on the issue. How long should retirement ideally be? The "average life expectancy" is just that, an average. If we want to agree with this argument the Economist is making, we use the current data for newborns, seemingly about 78 for someone born right now. Wikipedia, on the other hand, suggests about 75 for males.

So we expect the "average" male to plod along till 70, then heartily enjoy 5 more years of life in retirement. But of course, average means that 50% die older, 50% die younger, so really for a significant fraction, we expect them to work till they die.

Some retirement. Maybe one size, one age fits all doesn't really make sense.

Peter Mueller

@I blame the parents:

> Peter Mueller;
> "Spain has a youth unemployment of 40%"
> Yet Spain is heavily dependent on illegal labor for agricultural
> work. Work exists, but Spaniards aren't interested in doing it.
> Farm work doesn't pay much, but it's better than making nothing.
> The problem is that Spaniards think the opposite.

Work that doesn't pay a decent living (say, 800 to 1,000 euros after tax, as an absolute minimum in Western Europe) is not "work" but slave labour. The "illegal labor for agriculture work" that you talk about is "paid" for with food and shelter (can't be called "houses"). That slave labour is, however, illegal, as you mention. Illegal for good reason, but it seems those neocons don't give a damn on the law.

So the problem is not that people don't want to work as slaves in an allegedly free society. The problem is that people like you, and magazines like The Ideologist, don't stop spreading misantrophic propaganda.

I Blame the Parents

Peter Mueller;

"Spain has a youth unemployment of 40%"

Yet Spain is heavily dependent on illegal labor for agricultural work. Work exists, but Spaniards aren't interested in doing it. Farm work doesn't pay much, but it's better than making nothing. The problem is that Spaniards think the opposite.

Rich and Co.

What's the alternative? However, this does run up against some physiological and brain realities -- especially for men.

Cognitive abilities and brain function starts to decrease significantly starting at abt 55 for men. Roughly 70 for women.

Just because there is a social and economic change and expansion of the life span does not mean evolved physiological and brain processes are going to change to meet those needs.

Johan Sterk

The financial system has become way to expensive to be taken seriously by workers. The law of compound interest does not seem to apply as it should to workers saving for their retirement any more. Systems based on precious metals and barter become more attractive.

I think the smartest policy is to try to avoid that governments and the financial industry grab the fruits of one's labour. I spend time to invest in myself and in my support system. I noticed that doing things for myself rather than my profession actually makes me richer because those activities are not taxed (in my case 52%).

The same holds for exchanging materials and services with family, friends, and neighbours. As plutocrats amass more and more money and power and, therefore, governments work less and less for the common good, people should re-empower themselves and start organising oneself again into trade unions, neighbourhood initiatives and politics.

Statistical sophisms or not, given the scientific and technological possibilities, this is clearly a political rather than an economical problem.


I think a strict age limit neglects the very case-by-case nature of people at that age. Rather, a maximum payout period, say 15 years, that you can adjust/ plan your life to make the most of thse years.


The government is in the pension system to be able to afford public sector and politicians pensions. The worker pays for those.

How can it be that these pensions are not equal?

Why has the worker to carry the risk that he does not know on how much he will retire? Why are there differences between retirement age between workers and public sector workers/ politicians?

I disagree that people live much longer than previously - ever heard of Methusalem? I also do believe that different jobs might force people to retire at different ages (a fighter pilot with 41, a politician with 78...).

We should not really believe this kind of articles written in a magazine with a final pension salary scheme. Common sense and fairness would give immediately the right tool. Pay a pension to government workers what the value creating sector can afford - after all we sit in the same boat.

so not birthrate is the problem - it`s too many parasites!


"Most governments are already planning increases in the retirement age. America is heading for 67, Britain for 68."

Does this mean the age people retire, or the age from which they receive their pensions?


The world has changed in the past century but it appears that the population can't adapt to the new and changing society that technology is providing us with.
We want to raise the legal age of retirement when we should lower it. We now have the technology to put the machines to work and allow them to perform the services we used to do, but pay us to enjoy life at the health clubs, spas, restaurants, and bars. Below are some links to websites that provide robots that can do what we used to do, but better. If you would like more information about the machines that are replacing humans in the workplace search [google: robots,robotics, etc] and see for yourself that those who want to raise the age of retirement are "NUTS". Compare the technology on these websites, look into the future, and you can easily imagine that a humanoid robot that can perform any function that a human can perform is just around the corner. DRINK & BE MARY WHILE A MACHINE SWEATS AT THE WORKPLACE. WE DID IT!!


That's all well and good except for several things:
1) Companies do not want you after 50 - I am experiencing age discrimination now.
2) Government destroyed Social Security when they took it out of the lock box, put it in the general fund, pillaged the funds on other things, brought in foreigners and refugees and gave them benefits, looked the other way at the southern border, are flirting with amnesty for illegal invaders, and all the rest of the deceit and irresponsible actions.
3) I paid in and I want the pay out.


Comparing this one dimensional article with all comments is an eye opener.

Some very honest comments and some political. It also shows clearly who has time to log in and comment - public sector workers with public pensions (Education sector, NHS, government, military). In the UK this clientele approaches already 60% of jobs and is responsible for one of the highest budget deficits in the world (similar Greece) and a continues decline of the pound sterling since WW2 and very poor value generation.

The majority of TE readership is clearly not interested in a holistic view. A country generates a certain value and may or may be not able to afford a proper pension system for everybody.
But it should manage at least a fair distribution.

The ability to retire latest at the same age - if you are a factory worker or a university teacher. The fairness to guarantee a risk free retirement income.

Of course for a while a country may be able to expand public sector jobs with good income until debt is so large that the currency has to be devalued (UK: 2007/8, 25%) and the banking sector has to be rescued with even more debt. This short term thinking from people like Clinton, Blair, Brown has to be paid for by the real economy and hits even existing UK pensioners who retired in Spain receiving a pension in EUROS which is suddenly 25% less worth...

As the public sector has already the majority votes in the UK democracy it will be difficult to reverse this value destroying politics.

In the meantime I wish UK politics would follow China, which considers the task to generate real, value generating jobs for young and old vital for a functional society.

History tells +25% unemployment rate and more will cause social unrest, create extremist parties and causes big distress. "Pane et ludi" approach (Bread and Games or social help and football) will stop working.

Based on that:
1) Reduce public sector jobs by more than 50% - maintain pension system as it is
2) Introduce same pension system to everybody
3) Make these flexible for age/job
4) Have a political target (e.g.+5%) to create real jobs
5) No increase in pension age is necessary, but pension increases stop at 60years
6) Pensions to be manged by the state for free - not service providers for annual 1-5% charges...

That should be bold enough? It certainly will do the trick!


Wcade wrote:

"When FDR started Social Security the life expectancy was 65. Today it is more like 80. So just tie Social Security to life expectancy. Make it 80!"

So you're saying that people should work until they die? I got a better idea: remove the $106K wage income cap on Social Security taxes, as well as subject investment income to Social Security taxes. Doing these taxes will keep Social Security solvent for decades.


Reneging on commitments made to pensioners is not the solution. Nor is allowing pensioners to keep their savings after they die. However higher inheritance tax could be. If inheritance tax sharply shelved to say a marginal rate of 90%, we could still allow the filthy rich to perpetuate inequality by rewarding their undeserving offspring, still allow a reasonable bequest of family heirlooms and still allow for funerals to be funded from the estate. However it would nonetheless reduce inequality, promote meritocracy, take the wind out of the house price spiral (fuelled in part by inheritance) and fund the living to enjoy the retirement they were led to expect they would receive.


This article conflates two distinct things: the age at which pension payments begin vs. the age at which one stops working. These don't have to be the same age, if one has managed to amass any savings during one's working life. If you want to retire at, say, 62 and the Social Security age were raised to 70, then you only have to save eight years' worth of expenses. Not too hard if you have been working for the previous 35-40 years.

Dr Kick

If there is a stepped raise in the retirement age (so that those within ten years of their age will not see any change), that would be reasonable. BUT it must be accompanied by the removal of mandatory retirement ages, such as at the UN. The UN should not have a mandatory retirement age. (They should have a point at which the return to ICSC staff on their pension contributions quit rising.)
I worked in the UN system for eight years--and could have worked another ten to fifteen years, but for that mandatory retirement provision.



Products and events


Take our weekly news quiz to stay on top of the headlines

