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Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

telegraph.co.uk

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Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#271

Post by AdrianB1 »

dtgm92 wrote: post #9

This is because of their low birth rate primarily right? I think the system has failed at this point, when you are expected to work that long.

It is simple mathematics. European pension systems are not a saving system, but a pay as you go system, where pensions are paid from the people who work now. What you get in taxes this month you pay as pensions this month, as a state. This is the Bismarck model and it was invented at a time when the average lifespan was lower than the pension age, so many people were contributing very little as a percentage for very few people to get pensions. Today the situation is the opposite, with less and less people paying (not too many people start working at 16 years like in 1860), retirement age was lowered in most countries, the percentage of salary you pay as pension tax can be 25%, growing that is not too easy as this is just part of the taxes workers pay.

This system was working back in 1860, but it is a Ponzi scheme in decline for the past 50 years. And there is no way out, most people rely on state pensions to live after retirement; it is the perfect trap.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#273

Post by brewdad »

harimau777 wrote: post #182
lancekey wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But people are living longer, in better health (I think but didn’t verify with data) and entering the workforce later (due to more secondary schooling). Setting aside the issues of declining birth rate for a minute, this seems like a reasonable adjustment to the other factors?

Personally, I'm not sure that they are living in better health in the way that I care about. I.e. my goal is to retire when I'm still healthy enough to do things (i.e. travel). Although they are likely healthier than previous generations, most of the 70 years olds I see still aren't healthy enough to travel.

I had a great grandparent live to 102. 3 of my 4 grandparents lived into their late 80s with the oldest passing a month shy of 90. Even my grandparent who smoked 2 packs of cigarettes a day lived to 78. For all of them, their last good year was about year 80.

My dad just turned 78 and has really slowed the last 5 years. Longer life says little about quality of life.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#274

Post by Tade0 »

crop_rotation wrote: post #253
martin-t wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might be the obvious solution but is it the right one? People are significantly more productive than say 50 years ago due to technological advancement. So where is all the money going? I am no economist but it is my understanding that all this extra money goes to the rich because they've entrenched themselves in positions where they can extract a portion of a person's income with no recourse. It's not normal that…

> People are significantly more productive than say 50 years ago due to technological advancement. So where is all the money going? People have far better lives considering all the things available to them compared to 50 years ago. Most people would not want to live life like how people lived it 50 years ago. > It's not normal that a single person can legally own tens of apartments and get a third or each tenant's sa…

Plenty of people would want to live life how people lived before 2008 though, or even 2015.

Over the past decade life expectancy in developed countries first plateaued, then declined.

Yes, largely due to the pandemic, but that plateau was also the beginning of decline in some places.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#275

Post by Ray20 »

hmmokidk wrote: post #117
tossandthrow wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is. And this is the case in all western countries. It is just being realized in different ways. Fundamentalle there are 3 ways to cope 1. reduce pensions 2. Raise taxes 3. Decrease amount of benefit receivers. Denmark choose number 3

Can also just raise taxes on the super rich

[flagged]

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#276

Post by kmeisthax »

SoftTalker wrote: post #48
CubsFan1060 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't the fourth way be via increasing either birth rate or immigration?

[flagged]

Integration is the job of the state as much as it is the job of the immigrant.

In America, we discovered basically by accident[0] how to bring in large groups of people and have them be economically and socially productive. Specifically, we had very generous family reunification programs, which outsourced the question of "what immigrants do we admit" to immigrants who had already successfully integrated. Effectively America became an invite system. The end result is that, for basically any background, every American city has a large and established immigrant population from that country for new immigrants to fall back on.

Other Western countries (e.g. western Europe, Canada, the UK, Australia, South Korea, and Japan) didn't do this. Instead, they treated immigration as a transaction: you can't come in unless you have some immediately beneficial purpose, and permanent residency is going to be an even higher bar still. What this gives you is immigration systems that select entirely for disaffected, college-educated workaholic youths with no connections to the local city. To put it in the words of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney:

"America is a melting pot. Canada is a mosaic. In the United States, they don't recognize differences[1]. They don't recognize First Nations. And there will never be the right to the French language."

These words are telling, in ways Carney probably didn't intend. He is proudly admitting that the thing that sets Canada apart from America - the thing that they should fight with military force against a wannabe dictator with annexation dreams - is the fact that they can't integrate people worth a damn.

[0] Family reunification visas were originally intended to deliberately preserve racist prejudices in the US immigration system. This backfired comically.

[1] ...has this guy never heard the phrase 'African-American' before?

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#277

Post by AdrianB1 »

Ray20 wrote: post #260
CubsFan1060 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wouldn't the fourth way be via increasing either birth rate or immigration?

No one knows how to increase the birth rate. And all the studies show that immigration increases the budget deficit, not reduces it (at least in that way in which it is being implemented now).

Actually the factors inhibiting birth rate are well known, but the actions to take are not something states wants to take. In Europe you cannot even talk about it, usually, unless you talk to younger family members and ask them why they don't want kids at or or just 1 or 2 max. There are economic, education and legal aspects that are clear for anyone that looked not farther than 50 years ago when having 3-4 kids was not exceptional.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#278

Post by Ray20 »

robaato wrote: post #186
tossandthrow wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is. And this is the case in all western countries. It is just being realized in different ways. Fundamentalle there are 3 ways to cope 1. reduce pensions 2. Raise taxes 3. Decrease amount of benefit receivers. Denmark choose number 3

No 4 - do like Norway: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_Pension_Fund_of_Nor...

It turns out you won't have a problem funding your pension system if you literally pump out millions of dollars' worth of oil per person.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#279

Post by martin-t »

crop_rotation wrote: post #253
martin-t wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It might be the obvious solution but is it the right one? People are significantly more productive than say 50 years ago due to technological advancement. So where is all the money going? I am no economist but it is my understanding that all this extra money goes to the rich because they've entrenched themselves in positions where they can extract a portion of a person's income with no recourse. It's not normal that…

> People are significantly more productive than say 50 years ago due to technological advancement. So where is all the money going? People have far better lives considering all the things available to them compared to 50 years ago. Most people would not want to live life like how people lived it 50 years ago. > It's not normal that a single person can legally own tens of apartments and get a third or each tenant's sa…

> This is definitely a problem but I don't think the only one.

Certainly. Planned obsolescence and devices being impossible (or illegal) to repair is another. If a device costs 20% less but lasts only half a long, buyers are losing money because the profits go to the rich more often.

Food has ingredients and an expiration date on the packaging as required by law. Expected lifespan should be required for petty much everything.

Re: Denmark to raise retirement age to 70

#280

Post by lnsru »

Retric wrote: post #38
lnsru wrote: post #29

It's obvious, that there is no pension in Europe in 20 years anyway. Demographics are super ugly everywhere. Investing individually is the single way, that works if one does not want to retire in under the bridge. Sadly Germany does not help me caring about my retirement taking 18.6% away and heavily taxing the rest.

The math for pensions is fine as long as the maxes payout isn’t excessive and you don’t start too early. There’s a huge cost difference between a 30k/year pension at 70 and a 45k per year pension at 60. People also focus on a fixed percentage being returned while ignoring the long term increase in productivity and people’s standards of living. In real terms people in 2025 get way more out of pension systems than peop…

I will pay more than €600000 for this “retirement insurance” over my entire career. So with 30k/year pension and living under the bridge at 70 I must have superior health to break even at 90 and benefit from the “insurance” afterwards. Ok, it’s not that bad, there is some disability insurance included. Better than nothing.
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